Tory economic plan is a damp squib February 2, 2010 IT should have been an important moment, the day the Tories unveiled their masterplan to sort out the economy. So it was with some trepidation that I turned to George Osborne’s 23-page document, tantalisingly entitled “A new economic model”. I shouldn’t have bothered: the report is a damp squib. A few of the proposals are [...]
CREDIT RECOVERY BOOSTS METLIFE February 2, 2010 MetLife’s fourth-quarter earnings fell 70 per cent because of investment losses, but its operating profit beat Wall Street expectations by a penny yesterday as the credit market recovery boosted revenue at the biggest US life insurer. MetLife’s quarterly operating profit was five times higher than last year, at $793m (£496m), or 96 cents per share.
Shared ownership suits City workers, not just teachers January 28, 2010 LONDON house prices might have risen some 5 per cent since last January but as any first-time buyer will tell you, it is tougher than ever to get on the property ladder. With mortgage approvals still below their long-term average and deposits often as high as 40 per cent, even young professionals earning a decent [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING January 27, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES TWITTER WORKS ON TECHNOLOGY TO EVADE CENSORS Twitter, the internet social network, is developing technology it hopes will prevent the Chinese and Iranian governments being able to censor its users. Evan Williams, the chief executive and co-founder of Twitter, which has been credited with helping anti-government protesters in Iran to organise resistance, said [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS January 27, 2010 Aviva The insurance giant said yesterday Patrick Regan, its incoming chief financial officer and executive director, will step up to his new role on 22 February. Regan was previously group chief operating officer and chief financial officer at Willis Group, and has also held finance roles in the past at the likes of RSA and [...]
Paulson and Friedman asked to explain AIG pay to banks January 26, 2010 FORMER US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and ex-New York Fed chairman Stephen Friedman will testify today at a congressional hearing on bailed-out insurer American International Group’s (AIG) payments to banks, a committee aide said yesterday. Paulson and Friedman, both former longtime executives and chairmen at Goldman Sachs, were considered among key figures in AIG’s government [...]
B&B, Rock on cusp of bad bank merger January 24, 2010 PART-nationalised lender Bradford & Bingley is on the brink of receiving the go-ahead from the European Commission for its package of UK state aid, in a move that will pave the way for a merger of its toxic mortgage book with Northern Rock’s bad bank. A marriage of Bradford & Bingley and Northern Rock’s bad [...]
New rules would be bad for London January 21, 2010 HOW predictable. No sooner was Barack Obama humiliated by the Massachusetts electorate earlier this week – his left-wing candidate lost Ted Kennedy’s ultra safe seat to a radical conservative – than he announces another war on Wall Street. It is easy to forget in Britain, where Obama remains extraordinarily popular, that his administration is no [...]
US banks reveal cost of repaying bailouts January 20, 2010 WALL Street’s major players revealed the full price of buying their way out of the US government bailout scheme yesterday. Bank of America joined Citigroup to see its bottom line pummeled after paying a hefty penalty to escape the $700bn state Troubled Asset Relief Programme (Tarp) in the fourth quarter. Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS January 20, 2010 Boylesports The Irish bookmaker has appointed Lee Richardson as its new chief executive. Richardson, who has a passion for restoring and driving classic cars in his spare time, joins from Canadian gaming software provider Chartwell Technology, where he led its licensing and marketing arm. He was also previously chief operating officer for Coral Eurobet, where [...]