Axa profit down on life sale losses February 17, 2011 FRENCH insurer Axa saw its 2010 profits cut by almost a quarter after losing €1.64bn (£1.38bn) from the sale of part of its UK life business last year, it said yesterday. Profit fell 24 per cent to €2.75bn from €3.6bn after it sold the majority of its life business to closed-end life manager Resolution for [...]
BNP Paribas misses forecast after AXA charge February 17, 2011 BNP Paribas, France’s biggest listed bank, missed forecasts for fourth-quarter profit after it booked a 534 million euro (£444.8m) charge on the value of its stake in insurer AXA. BNP blamed the surprise one-off charge on “highly volatile” post-crisis stock markets that had taken AXA shares below their book value. BNP owns 5.2 per cent [...]
CBRE snaps up ING property arm for $1.1bn February 15, 2011 CB RICHARD ELLIS looks set to become the world’s largest real estate investment manager (REIM) after it yesterday announced its plan to buy ING’s European and Asian property businesses for $1.1bn (£681m). New York-listed CBRE said yesterday that the cash purchase will improve its foothold in Europe and create a firm with $97.4bn of assets [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS February 15, 2011 Barclays Sally Bott has joined the bank as group human resources director and member of the executive committee. Bott will start her role in April, replacing Cathy Turner. She joins from BP, where she was HR director, and has also recently served as a non-exec board member at UBS. Before this, she was managing director [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS February 13, 2011 Barclays Wealth Solomon Soquar (pictured) has joined the asset manager as head of the strategic solutions group, which is a core part of its ultra-high net worth operation. He will report to Stefanie Drews. Soquar joins the firm from Citi Private Bank, where he was in capital markets. Previously, he has worked at Merrill Lynch [...]
Lloyds of London to spend £300m on new solvency rules January 26, 2011 Lloyd’s of London expects to spend £300m preparing for the European Union’s new Solvency II capital rules for insurers, the chairman of the insurance market said. “It’s a huge task,” said Peter Levene, Lloyd’s of London chairman told Reuters Insider. “It’s costing Lloyds markets just to get ready for Solvency II £300m. It’s a lot [...]
Permira and Axa plan a joint bid to buy Opodo January 23, 2011 PERMIRA and Axa Private Equity are planning to make a joint €500m (£425.5m) bid for Opodo tomorrow, as they seek to compete against US internet travel giants Expedia and Orbitz. However the two private equity groups are likely to face bidding competition from their US rival Carlyle, according to the Financial Times. The newspaper added [...]
HP reveals board reshuffle January 20, 2011 Hewlett-Packard is shaking up its board, bringing in five new directors including former eBay chief Meg Whitman, as new chief executive Leo Apotheker redesigns the company. In addition to Whitman, HP named as directors Shumeet Banerji, chief executive of Booz & Co; Gary Reiner, former chief information officer of General Electric; Patricia Russo, former chief [...]
ENTREPRENEURS NEWS | IN BRIEF January 20, 2011 START UP DISCOUNT WEBSITE LAUNCHED The National Business Awards Entrepreneur of the Year winner Nick Ogden launched a non-for-profit website (www.business.co.uk) that is designed to encourage entrepreneurs to start their own businesses. The website hopes to provide access to the discounts, offers and incentives that are available through partnership. The companies participating so far included [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS January 17, 2011 RSM Tenon The financial services firm has appointed two new directors and an associate director in London. Nick Atkinson has been promoted to a risk management director, specialising in internal audits of the NHS. Nick Davies (pictured) has been promoted to business advisory director in the audit, tax and advisory team, specialising in corporate clients. [...]