The zero-point spread has arrived September 12, 2010 INTENSE competition within the spread betting industry has driven providers to narrow their spreads. A decade ago, eight-point spreads were the norm, today the industry average is just two to three basis points. The most liquid markets such as the European indices and currencies often incur a spread of just one point, making it extremely [...]
FTSE’s winning streak comes to an end after Barclays and mining shares sink September 7, 2010 BRITAIN’S top share index fell from a four-month closing high and ended a seven-session winning run yesterday, led lower by Barclays after management changes and miners on concerns over Australia’s tax plan. In positive news, Invensys climbed 7.4 per cent, with traders citing a newspaper report that the engineering group is a takeover target. An [...]
David Miliband: The least bad option August 31, 2010 ONE of the stories of the summer has been just how far the Labour party is moving to the left, as its leadership candidates appeal to grassroot members and trade unionists angry at the perceived betrayals of the Blair years. With the coalition’s honeymoon long since over, and the Lib Dems’ popularity in freefall, who [...]
Heir to Blair says Labour has not fallen out of love with business August 31, 2010 WITH a week to go until MPs return from their summer break, Westminster is a ghost town. Its tearooms and canteens, normally buzzing with political gossip and intrigue, sit deserted. David Miliband cuts a lonely figure as he strides purposefully across the empty atrium of Portcullis House, the modern extension to the House of Commons. [...]
S&P CASTS DOUBT ON BANK REVIVAL August 26, 2010 RATING agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) cast doubt on the strength of the UK banking sector’s recovery yesterday, saying lenders had been buoyed by a rising economic tide. The claim, made after this month’s bumper first-half earnings season, was immediately rebuffed by banking industry figures. While institutions realise they have been helped by an improving [...]
Tullow slides on Ugandan project delay August 25, 2010 OIL explorer Tullow faced tough questions over its plans in Uganda yesterday, as shares dipped despite a 152 per cent increase in pre-tax profit in the last six months. Its $10bn (£6.6bn) project on oil fields once owned by Heritage stalled in January, after the Ugandan government disputed Heritage’s capital gains tax payments on the [...]
Cameron takes stock after 100 days in power August 17, 2010 TONY Blair, who releases his memoirs next month, says his biggest regret was not doing enough during his early years in power. He wasted his first 100 days – and indeed much of his first term – basking in the glory of Labour’s landslide win. By the time he turned his attention to public service [...]
Reflections on the Philip Green saga August 16, 2010 MY first contact with Sir Philip Green came around two decades ago when he was running a small public company called Amber Day. I had written a two paragraph story for the Independent newspaper which provoked the retailing tycoon to scream down the phone at me the following day. “I cut out your article out [...]
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 [...]