Inflation stays high ahead of festive season December 18, 2012 INFLATION defied expectations to remain high in November, with consumer price inflation (CPI) staying unchanged at 2.7 per cent year-on-year, according to official figures released yesterday. A large part of the year-on-year increase is a result of price rises in food and non-alcoholic beverages as poor harvests around the globe push up the cost of [...]
Inflation unlikely to give festive cheer in thin week for corporates December 16, 2012 INFLATION figures are unlikely to give UK households much festive cheer tomorrow, with forecasts of a slight rise in November. “Data are expected to show that consumer price inflation edged up further to 2.8 per cent in November after jumping to 2.7 per cent in October from a 34-month low of 2.2 per cent in [...]
Our at-a-glance guide to Osborne’s mini-Budget December 5, 2012 THE UK ECONOMIC OUTLOOK ■ The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has revised down its forecast for UK growth and revised up its forecast for public sector borrowing. It says the government is no longer likely to meet its target of reducing debt as a proportion of GDP in 2015-16, breaking its supplementary fiscal rule. [...]
Eurozone retail sales plummet 3.6pc over year December 5, 2012 RETAIL trade in the Eurozone came in for a hammering in October, as sales contracted sharply. Retail sales volumes plunged 1.2 per cent in just a month, Eurostat data published yesterday revealed, meaning that sales are 3.6 per cent lower than just a year ago. The worst fall came in Portugal, where sales dived some [...]
Sainsbury’s has top quarter for market share December 4, 2012 SAINSBURY’S has picked up market share in the last quarter, to make it the biggest winner among the overall grocery market, data revealed yesterday. According to figures from market researcher Kantar Worldpanel the supermarket’s sales rose 4.7 per cent and its share rose 0.2 points to 16.9 per cent in the 12 weeks to 25 [...]
Soaring food inflation erases effect of falling non-food prices December 4, 2012 ANNUAL food price inflation accelerated in the year to November, but a return to deflation in some non-food prices provided a counterweight to keep overall shop price inflation steady. Food was 4.6 per cent more expensive in November than it was a year before, according to data from the British Retail Consortium (BRC), an inflation rate 0.6 [...]
Flood-hit UK to face record wheat prices December 3, 2012 CROP failures in Britain and globally are pushing grain prices to record highs. Floods in the UK have forced it to depend on foreign grain imports. The country is expected to import more than 2m tons of wheat in the 2012-2013 season – a 30 year high. But prices have also been driven up by [...]
Pub meals help Mitchells and Butlers as it faces muted sales November 27, 2012 PUBS and restaurants group Mitchells & Butlers yesterday reported a rise in full-year profit but like-for-like sales in the first eight weeks of the new year were flat, sending its shares down as much as five per cent. The owner of All Bar One, Harvester and O’Neills chains said alcohol duty increases and food price [...]
Cranswick profits jump as pig prices passed on to customers November 26, 2012 CRANSWICK, the sliced meat and sausage-maker, yesterday reported a 21 per cent rise in half-year profits as it succeeded in passing higher pork prices onto its customer. The Yorkshire-based group warned last month that UK prices were at a three-month high and would continue rising because of high livestock feed prices and the introduction of [...]
Bank minutes to show appetite for QE as public borrowing is revealed November 18, 2012 MINUTES from the Bank of England’s November monetary policy committee (MPC) meeting will this week give further clues about the appetite for further quantitative easing (QE) and the extent to which the recent rise in inflation has affected the committee’s decision making. The release is due out on Wednesday, along with public sector net borrowing [...]