Sales are strong at Asda but high fuel costs keeping shoppers away November 15, 2011 SUPERMARKET group Asda yesterday reported a pick up in third-quarter sales growth, helped by revamped own-brand food ranges and a pledge to be cheaper than rivals. Sales at stores open more than a year rose 1.3 per cent, excluding fuel and VAT sales tax, in the three months to September, Britain’s second-biggest supermarket group said [...]
BANKER GETS MORE BANGS FOR HIS BUCKS AT MAYOR’S SHOW WEDDING November 13, 2011 NO NEWS is good news, says the City of London Corporation, which yesterday breathed a sigh of relief after the St Paul’s protesters decided to respect the fact the Lord Mayor’s Show is a “community event”. “There was no disruption, not even shouting,” said a City of London spokesperson on Saturday’s “walking, marching pageant of [...]
Culpable execs must be sued, Olympus is told November 10, 2011 A JAPANESE shareholder in Japan’s Olympus has asked the camera-to-medical-equipment maker to sue 21 former and current executives if it finds they violated their duties in connection with acquisition deals at the centre of a governance scandal. In a letter the shareholder asked the company’s auditors to seek repayment of 139.42bn yen (£1.13bn) plus interest [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS November 10, 2011 Sciens Sciens Fund of Funds Management Holdings has appointed Alex Allen as senior portfolio manager in Sciens’ fund of hedge funds business. Based in the London office, he will report to Stavros Siokos, president of the Sciens fund of hedge funds and managed account platform businesses. Prior to joining Sciens, Allen was a co-founder and [...]
Demand for permanent staff declines as Britain’s economic outlook worsens November 8, 2011 EMPLOYERS are increasingly reluctant to take on permanent staff, preferring temporary contracts because they are uncertain about the strength of the economy, a report published today from KPMG reveals. Permanent placements fell for the first time in two years in October. The survey’s index now stands at 49.7, down from 51.2 in September and 52.4 [...]
MF Global clients set for further delay as empire’s sell-off begins November 7, 2011 NEARLY two-thirds of positions from the British unit of MF Global were still open yesterday, a week after it filed for bankruptcy protection, sparking frustration about delays in moving business to new brokers. UK administrators KPMG said 954,000 positions were open out of the 1.6m in place when MF Global Holdings filed for bankruptcy protection [...]
End the stigma that surrounds stress in the City November 7, 2011 LLOYDS Banking Group has announced that Antonio Horta-Osorio is expected to return before the end of the year, but City sources have been saying there is no way that he will be able to come back as chief executive after taking time off for physical and mental exhaustion. The persistent stigma is that after any [...]
Probes start into MF Global client funds November 3, 2011 US regulators are launching a broad review into the business practices of failed futures brokerage MF Global as their hunt continues for over $600m (£375m) in missing customer money. Round-the-clock shifts for examiners have become the norm as they sort through the collapse of the firm headed by Jon Corzine. The head of the US [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS November 2, 2011 Brookfield Asset Management The property, renewable power and infrastructure asset manager has appointed Julian Schiller as senior vice president in the global private funds group in London. He will look after European and Middle Eastern investors and assist in broader business development for the real estate group, working alongside Barry Blattman and Martin Jepson. Schiiler [...]
Client money not separated at MF Global November 1, 2011 BANKRUPT US broker MF Global flouted rules on keeping client and company funds in separate accounts, the head of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange claimed yesterday. Under rules set by the CME and the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), companies must hold client assets separately from those belonging to the company, but the exchange said preliminary [...]