B&M: Revenue ticks up as new stores outperform June 4, 2025 Discount retailer B&M has reported a bump in its full-year earnings after progress in France and a better-than-anticipated performance at its new stores. The London-listed Luxembourg-headquartered company reported revenue of £5.57bn in the 52 weeks ended March 29, up 3.7 per cent year on year. It said the higher revenue was “primarily driven” by the contribution [...]
Private equity: Are the doors to the most exclusive club in town finally opening? June 4, 2025 Private equity has carved out a record as one of the best-performing assetclasses of the last 25 years – for the exclusive benefit of a privileged few. Now, at last,private investors can get in. Trillions of dollars have flowed into private equity in the past twenty-odd years. Global private capital assets under management reportedly more [...]
Hospitality ranks bottom for UK wages as sector struggles with costs June 3, 2025 Hospitality workers are now the worst-paid employees in the UK as the sector continues to struggle with high costs. A combination of high energy prices, high wholesale prices and high taxes have squeezed margins in the last two years, making it hard for a sector pummelled by the pandemic to recover. Accommodation and food service [...]
JP Morgan launches risk-rated investment portfolios June 3, 2025 JP Morgan plans to scale up its UK investment offering after fresh research revealed a huge frustration among UK retail investors. The lender found nearly one in six UK investors were unsatisfied with the income they received from investments, despite two-thirds saying the income from investing was important. The firm is using its Asset Management [...]
Keep electric cars exempt from Congestion Charge, says Polestar boss June 3, 2025 Electric car users should not be forced to pay London’s congestion charge, even at a discount, the boss of Polestar has said. Transport for London (TfL) last week unveiled proposals to hike the Congestion Charge by a fifth last week, the first increase since 2029. The announcement was coupled with news that electric vehicle (EV) [...]
Monzo: The rockstar fintech setting the City abuzz June 3, 2025 Monzo has dominated City chatter in recent months with its hotly anticipated IPO, and now the fintech unicorn’s latest financial results indicate the talk is only going to get louder. The UK fintech veteran broke another milestone in the last 12 months after topping £1bn in annual revenue. Behind the surge in takings was a [...]
AI regulation needs to be smarter in the UK, urges Deepmind boss June 3, 2025 Demis Hassabis, chief executive of Google Deepmind, has called on UK policymakers and business heavyweights to embrace the “smart regulation” of AI, warning that a failure to do so could prompt unintended harm, or the loss of public trust. He announced at London’s inaugural SXSW event on Monday: “AI is the most important technology humanity [...]
London Tech Week is a chance to take the lead on AI June 3, 2025 Rapid advancements in AI – if matched by agile government policy, infrastructure investment, and responsible adoption across both private and public sectors – presents a transformative opportunity for the UK, says Leon Butler The pace of change in technology is moving faster than it ever has – but slower than it ever will. This presents [...]
Gone phishing: the rise of retail cyber crime in three charts June 2, 2025 In the past month alone, cyber attacks have gone from occasional headlines to near-daily national news fixtures. Marks and Spencer’s, Co-op, Harrods – along with international names like Dior and Coinbase – have all recently fallen victim to cyber incidents. Retailers in particular have found themselves in the cross hairs, and while not every incident [...]
AI watchdog slams government over facial recognition rollout May 29, 2025 An artificial intelligence (AI) search body has criticised the UK government for accelerating the deployment of facial recognition technology without first establishing a comprehensive legal framework. The Ada Lovelace Institute has warned the increasing use of live facial recognition (LFR) by police and retailers across the UK is happening in a “legislative void”, raising urgent [...]