CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS April 25, 2010 Bluefin Insurance Services The Axa-owned broker has hired a senior property team from risk management, insurance and reinsurance brokerage Aon. Ed Brown is the first member of the team to join Bluefin. He was formerly a client manager at Aon and now becomes an executive director in Bluefin’s real estate division. He will soon be [...]
A labour of love with rich rewards April 22, 2010 THE idea of buying a romantic, unmodernised property can be immensely appealing, offering both historical charm and the chance to do a place up with your own stamp on it. There’s also the promise of earning yourself a tidy profit when it comes to selling down the road. Simon Barnes, a property consultant, says: “Renovating [...]
London retail boost fuelled by Easter lift April 18, 2010 RETAILERS in central London saw an almost ten per cent rise in sales last month – fuelled by a booming Easter. The figures, based on a comparison with March last year, showed that the weak pound and an increase in Chinese visitors over the holiday helped to keep tills ringing, with a 9.9 per cent [...]
BANKER BASHING IS ‘JUST LOUSY ECONOMICS’ April 18, 2010 AT LONG last, the City’s beleaguered banking contingent has found itself a champion willing to stand up and state the bleedin’ obvious. Tim Morgan, the head of research at inter-dealer broker Tullett Prebon, on Friday put out a damning note condemning our politicians’ obsession with bashing the bankers and non-doms – and advising them to [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS April 15, 2010 Deloitte The accountancy firm has appointed Mark Lillie and Jeremy Harris as partners in its energy, infrastructure and utility practice. Lillie, pictured, will head up the IT strategy team and joins from Booz and Company, where he was partner and vice president. Harris joins the programme leadership consulting practice, focusing on construction and infrastructure projects, [...]
Buy a fraction of St Lucia paradise April 15, 2010 THE Caribbean can be a paradise for second homes: but you have to choose wisely. You don’t want to end up in a tourist trap or an area that has been overdeveloped. And if buying into a new development, you want to be sure it’s managed well and properly financed. The new residences and villas [...]
Find beauty on the Welsh coast April 15, 2010 SECOND home hunters with a bit of cash have tended to gravitate towards destinations such as the Cotswolds and Cornwall. Great minds think alike and because of this, those areas have become over-crowded and pricey to boot. So perhaps it’s time to think outside the box, and there are few places better – or more [...]
Rickie’s return just misses the mark April 15, 2010 Film CEMETERY JUNCTION Cert: 15 HAVING proved he can make it in Hollywood, Ricky Gervais has brought a whole load of Tinseltown gloss back with him for this tale of small-town kids in the Seventies. Written and directed by Gervais and old mucker Stephen Merchant, the film is polished, conventional and formulaic to the degree [...]
He’s seen off his own PM, but now the chancellor must beat the Tories April 14, 2010 WHEN all politicians around him are losing their heads, Alistair Darling is intent on keeping his. Having seen off an attempt to replace him with Gordon Brown’s favourite apparatchik Ed Balls – who wanted to use Labour’s final Budget to make vote-winning spending promises – the famously low-key chancellor says the new enemies of prudence [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING April 12, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES TOP CITY SKYSCRAPER FOR SALE Tower 42, the tallest occupied skyscraper in the City, will be put up for sale as booming prices return to London’s commercial property market. The 600ft former NatWest tower near the Bank of England is expected to fetch more than £300m ($461m) when its owners, Hermes Real Estate [...]