Blackstone to launch a bank January 20, 2010 A NEW retail bank to be backed by US private equity group Blackstone is set to go up against Virgin Money and analyst Sandy Chen’s Walton & Co bank later this year in the race to snap up the assets of Northern Rock, RBS and Lloyds Banking Group. Blackstone has applied to the Financial Services [...]
Morrisons to trump its retail rivals January 17, 2010 WM MORRISON supermarkets is expected to announce outstanding trading results this week as it emerges from the Christmas period outperforming its rivals. Like-for-like sales of the UK’s fourth biggest supermarket chain are predicted to have improved seven per cent on the previous year, adding to the impressive turnaround overseen by soon-to-depart chief executive Marc Bolland. Bolland [...]
Banks and miners lift FTSE but retail shares take a dive January 14, 2010 STRENGTH in miners helped Britain’s top share index to a 0.5 per cent rise by yesterday’s close after soaring output figures from Rio Tinto boosted the sector, but retailers fell on weak trading updates. The FTSE 100 ended 24.72 points higher at 5,498.20 after falling for two days, pressured by China’s decision to tighten banks’ [...]
BEST OF THE BROKERS January 14, 2010 XSTRATA Investec Securities yesterday initiated coverage on what it called “the predator of the mining industry”. The broker put a “buy” recommendation on the stock, saying that looking beyond Xstrata’s M&A capabilities, the firm has excellent organic growth prospects and the best leverage of its peer group to rising commodity prices. BOVIS HOMES Panmure Gordon [...]
UK Plc has much to learn from Tesco January 12, 2010 NAPOLEON Bonaparte was right: Britain is a nation of shopkeepers. Tesco’s great figures yesterday confirm that the retailer remains one of the UK’s few truly world-class corporate giants. Group sales increased by 7.5 per cent at constant exchange rates and like-for-like UK sales (ex-fuel and adjusted for Vat) were up by 4.9 per cent in [...]
Tesco tills ring for Christmas with 4.9 per cent sales hike January 12, 2010 TESCO has had its best Christmas in three years after slashing prices and offering double Clubcard points to get customers through the door. Britain’s biggest supermarket chain said yesterday that like-for-like sales at its UK stores jumped by 4.9 per cent during December and early January. Tesco reported a 35 per cent surge in sales [...]
Retail reporting bonanza set to reveal festive cheer January 12, 2010 TOMORROW promises a reporting bonanza, with Christmas updates expected to reveal robust trading over the festive season. Home Retail Group, owner of Argos and Homebase, is expected to reveal an increase in their 2009/2010 profit forecast after sales growth last year. Meanwhile Halfords, HMV, Mothercare, Premier Oil and Premier Foods, the UK’s largest food producer, [...]
ARE THE TESCO FIGURES A SIGN OF BETTER TIMES AHEAD? January 12, 2010 SAM HART | CHARLES STANLEY “We continue to believe that conditions in the UK food retail industry remain relatively benign and expect a tail wind of higher food price inflation to return later in 2010. As such, we expect Tesco to continue to deliver high single/ low double-digit growth for at least the next three [...]
Disappointing results from Alcoa rock mining stocks January 12, 2010 BRITAIN’S top share index closed 0.7 per cent lower yesterday as commodities and banks led the retreat over concerns that China’s move to tighten banks’ reserve requirements may slow global economic recovery. The FTSE 100 index closed down 39.36 points at 5,498.71, dropping back after hitting a 16-month intraday peak at 5,600.48 on Monday. China’s [...]
Waitrose and Sainsbury’s boost their brands January 12, 2010 RETAILERS have had a bumper Christmas according to the British?Retail?Consortium, but here is my review of 2009 as far as supermarkets are concerned. Graph 1 shows the share of total attention that each of the six received on BrandIndex. Over the course of 2009, Aldi and Asda dropped, Tesco and Morrison’s stayed steady, and Waitrose [...]