Dow ends at highest level in four years May 1, 2012 THE Dow closed at its highest level in more than four years yesterday after US manufacturing expanded at a faster pace than expected in April, easing jitters about a slowdown in the economic recovery. The Dow Jones industrial average gained 65.69 points, or 0.50 per cent, to 13,279.32 at the close. The Standard & Poor’s [...]
Microsoft takes on Kindle with e-reader stake April 30, 2012 MICROSOFT yesterday took its first step into the e-reader game, taking on digital giants Amazon and Apple by joining forces with Barnes & Noble and its e-reader Nook. The news sent shares of the US book retailer rocketing by a staggering 90 per cent in early trading. Microsoft will invest $300m (£184.6m) in return for [...]
Best bread and butter on earth at fab Dabbous April 30, 2012 RESTAURANT DABBOUS 39 Whitfield Street W1T 2SF FOOD ***** SERVICE ***** ATMOSPHERE ***** Cost per person without wine: £50 Ollie Dabbous, the man behind the most talked-about, hardest-to-book new restaurant in England, is from Guildford. I like that. It gives Dabbous – whose food was said to be so exciting by one famous critic that [...]
LOW PROFITS MAKE AMAZON A GAMBLE WORTH AVOIDING April 30, 2012 INVESTORS often make the mistake of confusing a great product with a great investment idea. The latest stock to benefit from such a misperception is Amazon. The company’s shares skyrocketed by more than 15 per cent, after its earnings release last Thursday, despite the fact that it barely makes any money. Don’t get me wrong. [...]
FTSE losses limited by Aberdeen April 30, 2012 The FTSE 100 was solid this morning as Aberdeen Asset Management reported a bounce back in client funds, making it the top riser. Investors have been spooked by the Eurozone crisis, which has re-emerged with the debt woes of the likes of Italy and Spain again laid bare. London’s blue chip index has also been [...]
Troubling times for retailers to the squeezed middle April 29, 2012 SPARE a thought for the squeezed middle. No, not the ordinary family as defined by Ed Miliband, but the places they shop and the things they buy. The mid-market consumer firm is finding the going very tough indeed. There has been much written about Tesco’s troubles in recent months, punctuated by a series of ignominious [...]
Samsung hits record $5.2bn profit thanks to Galaxy April 27, 2012 Samsung Electronics posted a record $5.2bn (£3.2bn) quarterly profit as it shifted over 20,000 Galaxy smartphones an hour in January-March, outselling Apple’s iPhone in a duel for the lucrative high end of the mobile industry. Chairman Lee Kun-hee’s South Korean group, whose $190bn market value is 11 times that of Japanese rival Sony, sold 93.5m [...]
Ofcom deepens probe into BSkyB’s broadcast licence April 26, 2012 OFCOM has stepped up its probe into whether BSkyB remains “fit and proper” to hold a broadcast licence, it emerged yesterday. The investigation into whether News Corp is an appropriate dominant shareholder of the satellite broadcaster has focused so far on publicly available information, such as from newspaper reports and the Leveson inquiry. But last [...]
Sales of high-end televisions boost income at LG Electronics April 25, 2012 LG ELECTRONICS, the world’s second-largest television maker, more than trebled its quarterly profit to $393m on improved margins and a pick-up in high-end TV sales, underscoring South Korea’s dominance in an industry once ruled by Japanese rivals. LG had a more than 13 per cent share of the global television market in the fourth quarter, [...]
Recessionary data brushed off as FTSE mirrors gains seen on Wall St April 25, 2012 THE UK’s blue-chip index closed up yesterday, shrugging off weak UK GDP figures showing Britain slipped back into recession and disappointing first-quarter results from drugmaker Glaxosmithkline, as investors awaited results from a key US Federal Reserve meeting. Early gains on the FTSE 100 index were led by a rise on Wall Street, which opened up [...]