Resolution pledges £500m extra cash to investors June 7, 2011 Resolution, the UK life insurance consolidation vehicle, is to return £500m in cash to investors over the next year, starting with £250m in share buybacks from tomorrow. The insurer, which has combined assets from Axa, Bupa and Friends Provident, will return the second £250m to shareholders in the first half of 2012 after making £235m [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS June 6, 2011 Ingenious The financial services group has promoted Neil Forster from group finance director to the group’s chief operating officer. Prior to joining Ingenious in 2008, Forster was group finance director at Hat Trick Productions and held senior finance roles in Walt Disney’s European television business. Forster remains a non-executive director of Hat Trick Productions and [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS June 5, 2011 Merchant Securities Lindsey Hamilton, formerly head of wealth management at WH Ireland Group, has been appointed as sales director of Merchant Securities Wealth Management. In addition, Chris Theis will join Merchant Securities Limited in August as head of institutional sales and research, moving from Daniel Stewart & Co. AXA Real Estate The real estate manager [...]
BEST OF THE BROKERS June 5, 2011 AXA Goldman Sachs rates the firm “neutral” and has raised its target price by €0.50 to €16.50 (£14.70). The broker expects the bulk of capital generated over the 2011 to 2015 period to be used shoring up its balance sheet. INTERCONTINENTAL HOTELS Deutsche Bank rates the hotels group a “hold” and has raised its target [...]
ARE YOU MORE WARY OF EU VEGETABLES? June 2, 2011 BEN BEAUMONT | CMC MARKETS “Why risk it? News coverage puts the possibility always in the back of your mind. I don’t think food exports should be banned because it is up to people to make their own decision.” DANIEL BROWN | LIBERTY SYNDICATES “It has not been identified that the cucumber is the source [...]
WHISKY AT MIDDAY FOR ABERDEEN’S POLAR FEAT June 2, 2011 THE WHISKY came out at noon at Aberdeen Asset Management yesterday to christen the boat the fund managers are sponsoring on its voyage into the Arctic unknown. The Old Pulteney has been designed to withstand some of the harshest conditions on earth, and her six-man crew – led by Scottish explorer Jock Wishart – will [...]
AXA sells Canadian arm to fuel growth June 1, 2011 FRENCH insurance giant AXA sold its Canadian unit for C$2.6bn (£1.6bn) yesterday as it kicked off a new five-year plan to boost profits and cut debt. AXA, Europe’s second-largest insurer, said at an investor day it is targeting high-growth emerging markets, where it aims to double in size and profitability on a comparable basis by [...]
Better late than never for Henri de Castries June 1, 2011 AXA has changed beyond recognition over the last 30 years. A string of global acquisitions have turned it from a small mutual insurer in France’s Normandy to a global player. Despite its big ambitions, the firm still trades at a discount to the rest of the large-cap insurance conglomerates. Its price to book value before [...]
Axa unveils plans to slash debt June 1, 2011 AXA, Europe’s second-largest insurer, said it would boost earnings and cut debt as part of a 2015 plan to bolster investor confidence in its future growth path. The company is under pressure to deliver a convincing strategy after the crisis forced it to shelve its previous growth targets. Its shares have rebounded this year but [...]
Buyout group pays €2.1bn for PAI’s Spie May 31, 2011 A GROUP led by Clayton Dubilier & Rice (CD&R) has agreed to buy French engineering group Spie in a deal valuing it at €2.1bn (£1.8bn), in the biggest French leveraged buyout (LBO) since the 2008 financial crisis. French private equity group PAI Partners, which said in March it was considering a possible sale of the [...]