Wall St up as Fed holds rates – New York Report July 29, 2015 US STOCKS finished stronger yesterday after the US Federal Reserve said the economy and job market continued to strengthen and left its key interest rate unchanged. The central bank’s comments on the economy and inflation after its two-day pow-wow appeared to do little to drastically change wide expectations that the first rate hike will come [...]
Pound falls after UK retail sales in June disappoint July 23, 2015 The pound fell 0.12 per cent against the dollar to $1.5595 after British retail sales unexpectedly tumbled in June amid broad-based declines in sales of food, household goods and petrol. Data released today by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed retail sales fell 0.2 per cent in June, down from 0.2 per cent growth a [...]
Make Marston’s a large one as food and drink sales progress July 22, 2015 Brewers and pub group Marston’s yesterday announced it had made “profitable progress” in line with expectations for the 41-week period to 18 July. “In Destination and Premium [brand units], like-for-like sales for the 41-week period were 1.7 per cent ahead of last year, including like-for-like food sales growth of 1.6 per cent and like-for-like wet sales [...]
Restaurant review: Be prepared to shell out for Crab Tavern July 21, 2015 Crab Tavern is the tenth restaurant to open at the City’s newest dining destination, Broadgate Circle. It’s now overflowing with the kind of high-end, high-turnover gastro-chains that private equity guys go nuts for: opening branches in the City completes a perfect capitalist ouroboros in which we can literally get rich off of our own appetites. [...]
Europe still has a problem with low inflation July 16, 2015 While consumers may be happy to see prices rising more slowly, central bankers and politicians around Europe are a little more nervous about how they are are behaving across the European Union and Eurozone. The European Union experienced annual inflation of just 0.1 per cent in June and the Eurozone only did marginally better with [...]
Inflation back to zero: Here’s what the analysts said July 14, 2015 Falling clothing and food prices sent Britain back into "noflation" in June, down from 0.1 per cent in May, according to figures releases today by the Office for National Statistics. Read more: Britain falls back into "noflation" territory Here's what analysts had to say: Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit, said: Core inflation (excluding energy, food, [...]
UK inflation falls back to zero as Britain returns to “noflation” territory July 14, 2015 The falling price of clothes and food meant that Britain's consumer price index slipped back to zero last month, from a 0.1 per cent increase in May, and coming in line with economists' expectations. Figures released today by the Office for National Statistics showed clothing and footwear prices fell by 0.4 per cent in the [...]
Retail sales and jobs data expected to prove positive – The week ahead July 12, 2015 RETAIL sales data and employment figures due out this week are expected to show improvement, while some of the UK’s biggest brands will update the market over the next five days. The British Retail Consortium (BRC) retail sales monitor for June, out tomorrow, is expected to show healthy year-on-year retail sales growth in June. Data [...]
How the chancellor used his new-found luck: Easing the squeeze on public services July 8, 2015 GEORGE Osborne has not, up to now, been a very lucky chancellor. He inherited a huge fiscal deficit and has presided over a recovery that, in the early years, repeatedly disappointed. Initial plans to eliminate the deficit over the life of the last Parliament morphed, year by year, into plans to halve the deficit over [...]
Bank of England monetary policy committee could split over timing of first interest rate rise June 24, 2015 One of the MPC’s nine members, Dr Martin Weale, has indicated that the Bank of England should be prepared to raise the cost of borrowing as early as August. The comments indicate the monetary policy committee could soon face a split over when to raise interest rates from the historic low of 0.5 per cent they [...]