The late-night bank manager is planning a High Street revolution August 8, 2010 THE revolution in High Street banking has begun. That’s the bold claim of Craig Donaldson, chief executive of Metro Bank, the first addition to Britain’s retail banking scene in 100 years. And ground zero is the corner of High Holborn and Southampton Row, where its inaugural branch opened a couple of weeks ago. “The revolution has [...]
Apple to open its biggest store in Covent Garden August 6, 2010 APPLE is to open its biggest ever store in Covent Garden on Saturday (August 7). The three storey historic building will have separate rooms for all Apple products and more stock than any other shop. Staff will be equipped with iPod Touches to scan purchases without a till, for the first time. There will also [...]
Numis in FTSE 100 client win August 5, 2010 STOCKBROKER Numis Securities yesterday reached a landmark in its development as it won its first FTSE 100 client, investment firm Alliance Trust. Numis, which has just celebrated its tenth anniversary, already has 22 corporate broking clients in the FTSE 250, including property group Savills, Domino’s Pizza and retailer Mothercare. But Alliance Trust is its first [...]
Why I’m bearish about house prices August 5, 2010 ONE of the big lessons of the recession – and of several previous downturns, including Britain’s crisis in the early 1990s and the secondary banking crisis of the 1970s – is just how important property is to modern economies. Bubbles in housing or commercial property are invariably devastating; they almost always take the economy down [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 5, 2010 FTSE Group The global index provider has appointed Sudir Raju as managing director for its custom index business. Raju has worked for Dow Jones and Stoxx Indexes since 2004, latterly as leader of the Stoxx custom index business. He has a strong technical background with experience extending across index design, production, reviews and operations, as [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING August 4, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES DIPLOMATS TO BECOME SALESMEN The job description for Britain’s ambassadors is to be rewritten to include tough targets for trade promotion and a requirement for the country’s top diplomats to tour the UK’s regions to showcase commercial opportunities abroad. As well as gliding through the corridors of foreign ministries and cultivating contacts with [...]
SocGen beats forecasts as profits treble August 4, 2010 French bank Societe Generale yesterday warned the economic recovery was still fragile, with moderate growth prospects in Europe, after it beat forecasts with over a three-fold leap in second-quarter net profit. The bank, which last month easily passed a Europe-wide stress test with a Tier 1 capital ratio of 10 per cent, said it was [...]
Individual banks buck dreary session as volumes stay thin August 4, 2010 LONDON equities ended flat yesterday as better-than-expected US services and private sector employment figures offset weaker retail shares that fell on concerns of a decline in consumer demand. The choppy session witnessed weaker banks, with the STOXX Europe 600 banking index down 0.4 per cent. Standard Chartered fell 5.2 per cent despite forecast-beating earnings, as [...]
THE TIPSTER August 2, 2010 HIGH street retail giant Next releases its latest trading statement tomorrow and the statement should give some insight into whether the company feels that the man on the street is more optimistic than he was six months ago or if concern about government cuts is still curbing our spending at the tills. Next had a [...]
Metro Bank arrives on the UK high street July 29, 2010 THE WORLD and his dog queued up outside Metro Bank’s first branch in Holborn yesterday morning for the opening of the UK’s first high street bank for over a century. Metro, which freely admits it will not offer the best rates for savers, is counting on a dedicated customer service and convenience-based approach to lure [...]