Ocado to report a healthy sales drive June 20, 2010 THE online grocer, Ocado, aims to make its stock market debut by the middle of next month and is expected to make a formal announcement next week. The company has achieved soaring sales but has yet to make a pretax profit. Ocado hopes to achieve a valuation of £1bn and has appointed JPMorgan Cazenove, UBS [...]
The bike and car parts retailer who wants to own Britain on the move June 20, 2010 Halfords and its chief executive David Wild are having a good recession. Earlier this month, the bikes and car maintenance retail chain posted a strong set of full-year figures: pre-tax profits rose 42 per cent to £110m, while sales rose three per cent to £832m. The FTSE 250 business said the trend for healthy living [...]
THE TIPSTER June 13, 2010 FOOTBALL results might be capturing everybody’s attention at the moment but there are some key financial scores out this week. Following positive full-year results in March, grocer J Sainsbury is expected to announce first quarter profits this week. Will its management confirm Morrisons’ news that a slowdown in the market has begun? With the firm’s [...]
Tesco chief’s exit is a blow but shares still good buy June 8, 2010 AND so the curtain falls on Terry Leahy’s remarkable reign at Tesco. Most investors will be shocked by his departure; the received wisdom was that Leahy would stick around until 2014, when its troubled Fresh & Easy US venture started to come good. His exit is a major loss for the grocer, there is no [...]
FTSE sunk by BP’s oil slick woes June 8, 2010 Britain’s FTSE 100 share index fell yesterday, led down by energy shares as BP dropped again on fresh Gulf of Mexico oil slick worries and banks which were hit by Eurozone debt concerns and the threat of punitive taxes. By the close the FTSE 100 was off 40.91 points, or 0.8 per cent at 5,028.15 [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS June 8, 2010 Signia Wealth The ultra high net worth wealth manager has hired mobile phones tycoon John Caudwell to take up a seat on its advisory board. Caudwell will provide entrepreneurial leadership for the firm alongside its other advisers, including private equity guru Jon Moulton. Caudwell previously founded and led the Caudwell Group, including mobile phone retailer [...]
WM Morrison poaches Waitrose second in command as seeks to move upmarket June 8, 2010 WM Morrison yesterday lured Richard Hodgson from Waitrose to be commercial director to replace trading director Martyn Jones, who has been give the new role of corporate services director. Jones will take up his new position from September 2010 when he will step down from the Morrison’s board. Hodgson has experience across all areas of [...]
Kidd proves man of moment to snatch glory for City A.M. June 6, 2010 CAPTAIN Jack Kidd scored in the last minute to hand Team City A.M. New York a dramatic 11-10 victory in the final of the MINT Polo in the Park tournament in London. Kidd swooped to strike the winner in a Square Mile showdown against Team IG Index Paris with just seconds to spare of regulation [...]
The grocer who says this year will test retailers as well as shoppers May 31, 2010 Much like the rest of the country, the chief executive of the country’s third largest supermarket group is trying to make up his mind about the coalition government. At the start of the election campaign Sainsbury’s boss Justin King was one of many who backed Tory plans to scrap national insurance hikes for employers, a [...]
UNRESOLVED ISSUES CAUSE HEADACHES May 31, 2010 DAVID MORRISON CFD MARKET STRATEGIST, GFT MOST investors will be relieved to see the back of May and hope that June will usher in greater market stability and lower volatility. The last month has been a shocker, with only the relief rally at the end of last week ensuring that major indices avoided a fall [...]