African billionaire joins the race to buy Arsenal May 23, 2010 AN African billionaire has joined the race to take control of Arsenal. Manufacturing mogul Aliko Dangote, worth over £2.5bn, is understood to be keen to snap up the 16 per cent stake in the club held by Lady Nina Bracewell-Smith. Speculation has been mounting that a bid may be forthcoming from one of the club’s [...]
Mozzarella in Mayfair goes glam May 17, 2010 Cielo/Luxx 3 New Burlington Street W1S 2JF 020 7297 2893 www.cielorestaurant.co.uk, www.luxx-london.com FOOD *** SERVICE **** ATMOSPHERE *** Cost per person without wine: £50 THESE days, being a restaurant plain and simple just isn’t good enough. Since the credit crunch bit, we have entered a new realm of added value, and if you like to [...]
Peacocks ready to sell after bumper Christmas May 16, 2010 FASHION retailer Peacocks may cash in on its storming run of form with a sale that could value the business at £600m. The budget store has seen sales rocket as customers flocked to it during the recession. Now shareholders are understood to be keen on a quick sale, with the private equity arm of Goldman [...]
Blues double stars salute Ancelotti May 16, 2010 THE FA CUP FINAL 2010 FRANK LAMPARD and John Terry, two of the players closest to Jose Mourinho during his reign as Chelsea manager, have hailed double-winning boss Carlo Ancelotti as the equal of the self-styled Special One. Ancelotti led his squad on an open-topped bus parade through west London yesterday as ecstatic Blues fans [...]
Intesa’s Fideuram listing to be delayed May 13, 2010 ITALY’S Intesa Sanpaolo is understood to be preparing to delay listing its Banca Fideuram asset manager until after the summer, potentially slowing the bank’s plans to boost capital. It is expected to wait for better market conditions to list Fideuram, Italy’s market-leading asset manager. A spokesman for the bank said work on the initial public [...]
ON IN LONDON | SIX OF THE BEST May 6, 2010 ART: Angela de la Cruz Head along to the Camden Arts Centre to decide for yourself whether de la Cruz, a painter who inflicts deliberate damage on her canvases, is worth her nomination for the Turner Prize as announced this week. THEATRE: Posh The Royal Court’s cracking show offers a satirical look inside the privileged [...]
SPORT | IN BRIEF May 6, 2010 Tiger back on form at Sawgrass GOLF: Tiger Woods made a welcome return to form as he closed in on the leaders in the Players’ Championship at Sawgrass. Woods, who missed the cut in the Quail Hollow Championship last week, was just three shots behind clubhouse leaders JB Holmes and Robert Allenby on three-under-par as he [...]
Panel slams Bear Stearns risk taking May 5, 2010 THE former chairman and chief executive of Bear Stearns conceded yesterday that the failed investment bank had taken on too much risk. “That was the business. That was, really, industry practice. In retrospect, in hindsight, I would say leverage was too high,” a weary-sounding James Cayne told a nine-hour hearing of the Financial Crisis Inquiry [...]
Banks and champagne are out, but the Tory big beast is still standing May 4, 2010 KEN Clarke has gone awol. He left the last campaign stop at the same time as his chief of staff, who has long since arrived, but is nowhere to be seen. “He insists on driving himself,” one aide tells me, with an exasperated look. Eventually, forty-five minutes after we’re supposed to meet, he storms into [...]
Making returns on the Russian rouble just got a whole lot easier May 4, 2010 AT THE end of last week, the Russian central bank chose to cut interest rates by 25 basis points to encourage loan growth and stimulate the economy – despite mounting concerns about inflationary pressures. Bank Rossii has been making it increasingly clear that the monetary easing cycle is now slowing. Indeed, finance minister Alexei Kudrin [...]