Aegon cash call fears grow as capital shrinks August 12, 2010 FEARS of a fresh rights issue overshadowed a consensus-beating second quarter performance from Dutch insurer Aegon yesterday, after the firm said its capital buffer had fallen. Shares in Aegon fell 3.5 per cent to €4.37 (£3.60) as the life and pensions firm said tougher requirements from ratings agency Standard & Poor’s meant its reserve capital [...]
BarCap to cut hundreds of jobs in an effort to cut costs August 10, 2010 BARCLAYS Capital is expected to announce hundreds of redundancies as early as today, affecting back office staff across the firm’s global operations. It is understood the layoffs are intended to cut costs to compensate for a sharp fall in market activity in the second quarter. The investment banking arm was responsible for around 87 per [...]
Why I’m bearish about house prices August 5, 2010 ONE of the big lessons of the recession – and of several previous downturns, including Britain’s crisis in the early 1990s and the secondary banking crisis of the 1970s – is just how important property is to modern economies. Bubbles in housing or commercial property are invariably devastating; they almost always take the economy down [...]
BarCap makes lion’s share of profit despite revenue drop August 5, 2010 PROFIT at Barclays Capital made up 87 per cent of the banking group’s overall earnings, though much of its £3.4bn profit was due to unexpected one-off items and credit changes. While pre-tax profit for the half had almost trebled compared to the first half of 2009, this includes a £851m gain on its own credit. [...]
London & Stamford stock to move to main market August 5, 2010 AIM-LISTED property investor London & Stamford is seeking shareholder approval for a switch to London’s senior stock market as part of a plan to adopt tax-efficient REIT status. The Guernsey-based company, set up by veteran real estate entrepreneurs Raymond Mould, Patrick Vaughan and Humphrey Price, was formed in October 2007 to snare discounted properties after [...]
Xstrata to pump $5bn into new mines August 3, 2010 Mining group Xstrata said it would pump over $5bn (£3.14bn) into new mines and keep targeting organic growth rather than acquisitions, after more than doubling first-half earnings per share on higher metals prices. Xstrata – the world’s biggest exporter of coal used in power plants – said it had approved $4.2bn to build the Las [...]
The million euro silver lining July 29, 2010 THE final moments of a sports match can be excruciating. Even more so if you placed a heavy bet on one of the teams to win. That was what happened to Conor Foley, an avid rugby fan, when he watched New Zealand lose in a shock defeat to France in the quarterfinals of the Rugby [...]
UBS manages £1bn profit in tough quarter July 27, 2010 SWISS bank UBS said it would resolve tax haven disclosures with US authorities by the autumn as it announced consensus-beating second quarter results and slowing outflows yesterday. The world’s second largest wealth manager is due to honour its agreements with the US Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission by October. UBS hopes [...]
Heritage must pay full taxes on Ugandan oil deal, says minister July 25, 2010 PETROLEUM explorer Heritage Oil must pay the full amount of tax on earnings from the sale of assets in Uganda before the government fully endorses the deal, the country’s energy minister said yesterday. The Ugandan government said on 6 July it had given Heritage conditional approval to sell its exploration assets in the country to [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING July 22, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES TARGETFOLLOW SEEKS MPS’ HELP The owner of a large property portfolio that includes the Centre Point tower in London has enlisted the help of his local MPs to stave off administration after loans of more than £200m provided by Lloyds expired on Thursday. Targetfollow, the Norwich-based property developer managed by Ardeshir Naghshineh, has [...]