UK dividends won’t recover until 2025 at the earliest after bruising year January 20, 2021 UK dividends are unlikely to recover until 2025 at the earliest after a catastrophic year for payouts amid the pandemic. Eight years of growth wiped off UK dividends last year as companies started to make cuts at the beginning of the second quarter following the outbreak of coronavirus. Payouts fell 44 per cent to £61.9bn [...]
WH Smith expects £20m monthly cash burn as restrictions continue January 20, 2021 WH Smith expects a monthly cash burn of £15m to £20m from January to March 2021, assuming Covid-19 restrictions stay as they are. Trading at the book and stationary chain was ahead of plan toward the end of 2020, so the business had some £340m of available cash and facilities at the end of December [...]
Germany warns of border closures amid fear of COVID-19 mutations January 19, 2021 By Andreas Rinke and Christian Kraemer BERLIN (Reuters) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned that Germany may need to consider border crossing curbs if other European countries do not act to halt the spread of the coronavirus, particularly its new, more transmissible variants. “We can do anything we like, but we will not succeed if [...]
Why 2020 was a year of explosive growth for DeFi and 2021 will be too January 19, 2021 Decentralised Finance or “DeFi” for short has had tremendous traction in 2020, even during the COVID-19 epidemic. The ecosystem has grown by billions just this year, surpassing $15B in December (source: https://defipulse.com/). People have been drawn to the DeFi space because it offers new suites of financial tools and services that you cannot get in [...]
End of the office is overstated, says Brookfield boss January 19, 2021 The end of the office has been overegged according to a top asset manager, as he claims investors are underestimating the extent to which people will return to work. Speaking to the Financial Times, Bruce Flatt, chief executive of Brookfield Asset Management is hopeful that office workers will return to the office and shopping centres. [...]
Ethereum 2.0 staking, a worthwhile investment? January 19, 2021 Background The Ethereum network today is overrun with traffic, causing transaction fees to spike to levels that are not affordable for many use cases. This is partially due to the success of DeFi projects, where users don’t mind paying the high transaction fees because of the financial value of the transactions being made. (In Ethereum, [...]
Hammerson receives less than half its rent as retailers grapple with Covid January 19, 2021 Hammerson received less than half of the rents due for the first quarter of 2021, as retailers struggled in the face of coronavirus restrictions across the UK and most of Europe. At a group level, 41 per cent of Q1 2021 rent due has been received by Hammerson, with the UK collecting 41 per cent, [...]
British Land appoints new chief financial officer from Tesco January 19, 2021 London-based retail landlord British Land has made Bhavesh Mistry its new chief financial officer. Mistry is expected to join British Land no later than 1 August 2021. Until he joins David Walker will continue in his role as interim CFO. The incoming CFO is currently deputy chief financial officer at Tesco, a position has had [...]
FTSE 100 falls as recovery concerns weigh on markets January 18, 2021 The FTSE 100 is fell today as last week’s slide in investor confidence continued. London’s premier index closed 0.2 per cent down to stand at 6,723 points. The FTE 250 of midcaps went the other way, rising 0.1 per cent to 20,646 points. In a sluggish day of trading, markets never really got going, with [...]
Retail footfall decline slows as fewer Brits stay home in lockdown January 18, 2021 Retail footfall levels during the current national lockdown have not plummeted to the record lows seen in March, the latest analysis showed. Footfall across all UK retail destinations dropped 10.9 per cent last week compared to the previous seven days. The decline was less than half the 27.1 per cent drop recorded the week before. [...]