Old Mutual earnings dive as new business is hard to find August 5, 2009 OLD MUTUAL, the insurer listed jointly in the UK and South Africa, reported a bigger-than-expected drop in statutory profits yesterday, despite making improvements at its troubled US life business. South Africa’s largest insurer said its earnings were boosted by investment returns from its US bond portfolio, offsetting weakness in Europe and South African arm Nedbank. [...]
CITY MOVES WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 5, 2009 ExecutionExecution has taken on Joseph Dickerson to strengthen its banking equity research team. Joseph will be responsible for developing coverage on HSBC, Standard Chartered and the Spanish banking sector. He joins Execution from Citadel Investment group where he was a senior analyst. He will work with Fiona Swaffield and Anke Reigen in the company’s experienced [...]
SocGen sees profits slide as bad debts mount, but investment banking thrives August 5, 2009 SOCIETE Générale (SocGen) suffered a 52 per cent decline in net profit, the French bank said yesterday, as losses on bad loans mounted and it wrote down its derivatives holdings. France’s second largest bank, posted profits of €309m (£269m) for the quarter, down from €644m in the same period of last year, despite revenue rising [...]
Grey panther made head of APA August 2, 2009 Former Credit Suisse banker Jeremy Bennett has been named as interim head of the Asset Protection Agency (APA), which runs the government’s £600m toxic bank asset scheme. Bennett was one of the “grey panther” regulators at the Financial Services Authority, who prowl insurers looking for rules failures.
How finance can salvage its reputation August 2, 2009 FINANCIAL institutions almost never win the PR wars. When banks lose money, politicians and the media are angry. When they make money, politicians and the media are equally angry. The only time this golden rule breaks down is at the height of a bubble, when everybody – even the industry’s fiercest critics – gets drunk [...]
BRC warns on credit insurance July 30, 2009 The British Retail Consortium (BRC) will today warn of a lack of available trade credit insurance. According to the BRC’s Quarterly Credit Conditions, more than half of the firms it surveyed have been hit by the problem. Three quarters of those affected have suffered problems with suppliers who are unable to take out credit insurance [...]
Strong home sales cheer US investors July 27, 2009 US stocks rose slightly yesterday in a late rally as investors rotated into financial shares, which had lagged in the recent two-week run-up. Upbeat data on new home sales underpinned financial stocks, the session’s strongest sector, and prompted investors to snap up the shares of several regional banks, which had been among the worst hit [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING July 23, 2009 FINANCIAL TIMES Ericsson joins fight for Nortel wireless unitEricsson has joined the battle for control of Nortel Network’s core wireless division in a move that pits it against Nokia Siemens, one of its biggest European rivals, and MatlinPatterson, a US private equity fund. The flurry of interest, ahead of today’s planned auction of the assets, [...]
Writedowns hit BNY Mellon July 22, 2009 BANK of New York Mellon (BNY Mellon) saw its second-quarter profit fall by 43 per cent, due to charges on the state aid it received from the US government, coupled with losses in securities and writedowns relating to the housing market. The New York-based custody bank said net income sank to $176m (£107m), or $0.15 [...]
FSA fines HSBC 3.2m July 22, 2009 BANKING giant HSBC has been slapped with a £3.2m fine for losing a floppy disk and CD containing customer details in the post and leaving client files out on desks. The bank now features in the top-ten biggest fines handed out by City watchdog Financial Services Authority (FSA), after the regulator said it made repeated [...]