Currie to head antitrust body … July 17, 2012 FORMER Ofcom boss Lord Currie has been chosen as the first chair of the Competition and Markets Authority – the UK’s new antitrust regulator. Currie will earn £185,000 a year for the three-day a week commitment, serving as chair of the body for a four-year term beginning this summer. The CMA is part of the government’s [...]
Why Britain must not veto banking union for Europe July 16, 2012 DAVID Cameron risks facing his own personal European groundhog day. A watershed European summit last month advanced proposals for a Eurozone banking union. Final approval is due in December. The aim is to break the fatal link between euro area banks and sovereigns. Less painful for Germany than eurobonds, but seen as credible by financial [...]
You won’t get better banks if you split one bad regulator into three July 12, 2012 GOOD riddance to the Financial Services Authority (FSA). This inflated docklands quango was supposed to regulate the City, but its 4,000 staff were too busy ticking boxes to see the ticking time-bomb of the banking collapse. Likewise, the FSA failed to take any interest in Libor rigging, despite warnings from City journalists and the Bank [...]
PTT extends Cove bid deadline in race against oil major Shell July 9, 2012 PTT Exploration and Production yesterday extended for a second time the deadline for investors to accept its $1.9bn (£1.2bn) offer for gas explorer Cove Energy, as it waits for rival suitor Shell to make its next move. The Thai company has been fighting with oil major Shell to buy Cove since February. Cove has huge [...]
Eurozone summit fails to solve growing debt crisis July 1, 2012 EUROZONE leaders made only a few small steps towards easing the pain caused by the sovereign debt crisis, and remain far away from targeting the root causes of the currency area’s problems, economists have warned. Politicians agreed last week to make plans for a “single supervisory mechanism” for Eurozone banks, probably run by the European [...]
RAPID responses July 1, 2012 No light touch [Re: From boom to bezzle: this banking scandal will run and run, Friday] The chief big lie in this whole saga is the idea that banks faced light touch regulation. The Financial Services and Markets Act, 2000, was never ever light touch. Wrong touch, yes. Mis-touch, certainly. And definitely overweening and prescriptive, [...]
Barclays’ reputation is severely damaged but it will not be alone June 28, 2012 THERE can be little that is more precious to a bank than a reputation for integrity. The revelation that Barclays has paid a £290m fine for “misconduct” with regard to the setting of benchmark interest rates affecting trillions of pounds of financial contracts is a big blow for the bank’s reputation. Cue politicians calling for [...]
Libor: the vital number for every banker June 27, 2012 Q What is Libor? A The London interbank offered rate (Libor) is set daily for 10 major currencies and for 15 borrowing periods, ranging from overnight loans to 12 months. It is set by the British Bankers’ Association, after speaking to 16 banks and studying their data on the cost and price of lending to [...]
Fund platforms hit by FSA plan to ban rebates June 27, 2012 PLANS to make investment platforms more transparent are set to cost investment firms millions, though companies said yesterday they are prepared for the upheaval. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) wants to ban providers from paying to have their products included on platforms, meaning investors would pay fees directly. The rules would mean the end of [...]
Should the UK create an industrial strategy to guide its future economic development? June 27, 2012 YES Vicky Pryce The UK needs a strategy for industry and it must be better than what has gone before. All too often, our industrial policy has been reactive and incoherent. It has responded to lobbying and failed to offer consistent and equal support to sectors of industry. Good industrial policy must provide the tools [...]