Goldman Sachs in pole position for Hastings bid August 29, 2013 GOLDMAN Sachs is discussions with British motor insurer Hastings about taking a stake in the company, it emerged yesterday. Hastings declined to comment on the identity of its potential suitor but the company said it is in discussion with various organisations as it looks to raise funds for future expansion. The company is currently privately owned [...]
Networks see more to 4G than travel games – despite limited roll out August 29, 2013 EE’S TEN-month monopoly on 4G in the UK came to an end yesterday, with Vodafone rolling out a competing network in London and O2 launching in the capital, plus Bradford and Leeds. These small-scale launches have been disappointing to many. But two factors underpin the operators’ abundance of caution: the expensive 3G debacle a decade [...]
Syrian parliament invokes strange Shakespearean allegory in letter to UK MPs August 29, 2013 (Salanio and Salarino encounter Shylock) The Syrian parliament appears to have dropped a reference to Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice" in a letter to UK MPs. In the second paragraph of a document obtained by Sky News, Mohammad Jihad al-Laham, speaker of the people's assembly of Syria, writes: We write to you as fathers and [...]
Football fans descend on Mayfair hedgie August 29, 2013 HEDGE fund Sisu Capital was targeted by a group of angry football fans last night, as Coventry City supporters protested outside the firm’s Mayfair offices. The Sky Blues supporters are furious at Sisu – which took over the struggling midlands club in late 2007 – for moving the team’s home games to Northampton, over [...]
Inside Track: City watchdog must be careful to practise what it preaches August 28, 2013 IT is not easy to overlook the villainy of the banks and credit card issuers which sold superfluous insurance policies to millions of consumers through the York-based company CPP. But for sheer duplicity, the sanctimonious words of Martin Wheatley, chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), came close to rivalling the firms it regulates [...]
Chargemaster pulls flotation August 28, 2013 ELECTRIC car charging company Chargemaster has pulled its £6m float, its chief executive said yesterday. David Martell, who previously floated GPS software firm Trafficmaster, told City A.M.: “There was support out there but we didn’t feel the timing was right. We’re definitely open to it in future.” The company, which has an investment from car [...]
Lloyds Bank private equity arm in the frame for Silverstone stake August 27, 2013 THE HOME of British motor racing Silverstone is nearing a landmark deal that could herald Lloyds Banking Group’s private equity arm investing in the legendary site. Silverstone Circuits, which promotes events at the Formula One and Moto GP racetrack, is understood to be in talks with Lloyds private equity arm LDC to take an investment [...]
Banks hit with further £1.5bn mis-selling fine August 21, 2013 BRITAIN’S biggest banks are braced for another compensation bill with regulators today expected to tell them to pay up to £1.5bn for consumers wrongly sold credit card protection from insurer CPP. The settlement will repay customers who bought insurance through the group from 2005 onwards, and includes those who wrongly thought they were buying identity [...]
UK banks face another mis-selling scandal August 21, 2013 The Financial Conduct Authority is preparing to set out a compensation scheme for consumers who bought identity theft and credit card protection from York-based life assistance company CPP, Sky News was first to report. British banks will again be hit by a mis-selling scandal, which could see them lose up to £1.5bn. Around a dozen [...]
Ex-Channel Five boss Dawn Airey takes Yahoo’s top European gig August 20, 2013 FORMER Channel Five supremo Dawn Airey was yesterday appointed as Yahoo’s most senior official for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Airey, who in a long television career also held senior posts at Channel 4, Sky and ITV, will be based in London as a senior vice-president and work in Yahoo’s headquarter in California on [...]