Gold fund provider strikes deal with Royal Mint for bullion coins August 22, 2013 ONE OF the world’s top gold exchange traded fund providers yesterday struck a deal with the Royal Mint to help punters exchange their investment for physical gold bullion. ETF Securities, which looks after $12.2bn of gold-backed exchange traded products (ETP), has joined forces with the 1,000 year-old British institution to allow its Gold Bullion Securities [...]
What the analysts are saying about July’s public sector deficit August 21, 2013 This morning, the Office for National Statistics said the UK government posted a £62m deficit in July – down from an £823m surplus the year before (full story here). Here's what analysts are saying about the figures. Martin Beck, UK economist at Capital Economics: Despite signs of life in the economy, July’s public finances data [...]
How Britain can take advantage of a global growth in digital industries August 20, 2013 MOST new jobs are not created by established big businesses adding a few people here and there, or by the many smaller firms that are happy to stay small rather than take a risk and expand. Our future prosperity depends on a relatively small number of rapidly growing firms: high growth “gazelles”. So if we [...]
We should be glad that foreign firms want to buy British companies August 20, 2013 THE ABSURDLY nationalist argument over whether foreigners should be allowed to own companies in Britain is raising its ugly head again. Vacuum technology firm Edwards has just been sold to Sweden’s Atlas Copco for £1bn, last month UK engineering giant Invensys was the subject of a £3.4bn takeover by France’s Schneider Electric, and Kentz has [...]
Before the open – 15/08 August 15, 2013 The Nikkei dropped sharply last night after finance minister Taro Aso denied prime minister Shinzo Abe was not considering a corporate tax cut – as the Nikkei newspaper had previously reported on Tuesday. Many have said such a tax cut would be a huge shot in the arm for Japan, which is languishing under huge [...]
Investment Comment: Taking Aim with your Isa investments August 6, 2013 AT THE beginning of this week, the government removed an unpopular restriction on Individual Savings Accounts (Isas). Now, for the first time, investors with the confidence to select individual shares for their stocks and shares Isa are able to invest in companies listed on the junior Alternative Investment Market (Aim). Preventing investors from putting Aim [...]
City Moves for 2 August 2013 | Who’s switching jobs August 1, 2013 Thomas Cook The travel group has announced the appointment of Sandra Campopiano as chief people officer. She joins from Premier Farnell, where she was chief people officer for six years. KPMG The professional services firm has made three hires to its tax litigation practice. Amanda Brown has been appointed overall head of tax litigation. She [...]
UBS reports big jump in profits and plans to buy back central bank fund July 30, 2013 Swiss bank UBS has reported a 32 per cent increase in second quarter profits after solid gains in its investment banking division, and has announced plans to buy back equity in a fund set up by the central banks as part of its bailout in 2008 (report). Switzerland’s largest bank reported an adjusted pre-tax profit [...]
Britain is falling badly behind in the entrepreneurship stakes July 29, 2013 ONE OF Britain’s great advantages is that we are meant to be a much more entrepreneurial nation than most of our major competitors. We do, indeed, create more companies than some other wealthy countries but as a study by RSM reveals, we are hardly covering ourselves in glory. In fact, we are ranked a pathetic [...]
Phoney war between the generations masks worrying lack of reform July 24, 2013 THE battle of the generations is raging. Did the Baby Boomers have an easier life? Or are the cosseted members of Generation Y – the demographic cohort born from the early 1980s onwards – just engaging in self-pity? The truth is not “somewhere in between”, and this debate is actively damaging. Differences between the generations [...]