The Facebook debacle deserves a reaction from London May 28, 2012 THE controversies surrounding the historic $104bn flotation of Facebook in the US should have reminded all of us that although the New York financial markets may currently be the place to go for technology flotations, they are not infallible. What is disappointing is that with so much wrangling about how the float was handled, very [...]
BEST of the BROKERS May 23, 2012 BP Canaccord Genuity has raised its rating on the oil giant from “hold” to “buy’ and has a target price of 485p. While the broker is not yet confident BP can recover from its 2010 spill in the long run, it sees a strong bounce coming in 2013-14 once various US court cases are resolved. [...]
Evidence of revolt at every single level May 20, 2012 THE shareholder spring has sprung. Since proxy season started, we’ve become accustomed to the sight of investors giving directors a bloody nose. I’ve decided to crunch the numbers to see just how rebellious the buy side has become. A win is a win. Just three firms have been voted down at their annual meetings in [...]
FTSE lurches higher after a volatile day of bank and commodity swings May 10, 2012 A BOUNCE back by risk-sensitive banks and commodity stocks hauled Britain’s stock index higher yesterday after a roller-coaster session, with worries over the global growth outlook easing following benign US jobless claims. At the close, the FTSE 100 index was up 13.90 points, or 0.3 per cent at 5,543.95, holding above key technical support at [...]
Avon bidder in sale of £1.3bn Reckitt shares May 9, 2012 JAB Holdings, the company that manages the interests of the Reimann family of Germany, said yesterday that it was selling a 4.9 per cent shareholding in the household goods company Reckitt Benckiser to raise more than £1bn. The proceeds are widely expected to be used by the family, which owns the fragrance group Coty, to [...]
Reckitt Benckiser’s focus on key brands and markets pays off May 1, 2012 CONSUMER goods group Reckitt Benckiser reported a slightly better than expected four per cent rise in underlying first-quarter sales yesterday as a new focus on its top brands and faster growing markets started to pay off. New chief executive Rakesh Kapoor, who took over last September after Bart Becht’s shock decision to retire, said the [...]
Avon lady spurns her $10bn suitor April 2, 2012 COSMETICS giant Avon has shunned a $10bn offer from its upstart European rival Coty, it emerged yesterday. The world’s biggest direct sales company, which is famous for its army of door-to-door sales representatives known as Avon Ladies, dismissed the offer as “opportunistic” after Coty revealed that it had been trying to lure the board into [...]
Women now make up a quarter of new FTSE board members March 12, 2012 A QUARTER of new FTSE 100 board hires made in 2011 were female, research will reveal this morning, in a new record that highlights a dramatic change at the top of Britain’s largest companies. Of the 190 appointments made to FTSE 100 boards during 2011, 47 were women, boosting the total number of female-held directorships [...]
Shock as Lazard’s UK co-head of investment banking quits March 8, 2012 ALEXIS de Rosnay, the co-head of UK investment banking at Lazard, has quit the firm, City A.M. has learnt. The influential rainmaker, who joined Lazard from Lehman a little over three years ago, resigned in the past few days, say sources, without having tied up a new position. There is speculation that de Rosnay, who [...]
FTSE buoyed by energy stocks February 24, 2012 Upbeat economic data across the Atlantic and strong energy stocks helped to keep the FTSE 100 on track today despite relative weakness in Europe. US blue chips added 0.4 per cent overnight after weekly jobless data showed the US labour market remained on the mend, with the Dow approaching levels not seen since before the [...]