Nestle joins the hunt for Yoplait as suitors line up with offers March 1, 2011 NESTLE and General Mills are among leading candidates to buy a 50 per cent stake in French yoghurt maker Yoplait. General Mills and Nestle have submitted offers for the Yoplait stake being sold by private equity firm PAI Partners, valuing the yoghurt maker at about €1.6bn (£1.35bn) according to Bloomberg. China’s Bright Dairy & Food [...]
Resolution rejects more buyouts as focuses on efficiency savings February 23, 2011 CLIVE Cowdery’s insurance buyout firm Resolution will step back from further UK purchases while it integrates its three previous acquisitions. Resolution said in a strategy update yesterday that consolidating Friends Provident, AXA’s UK life business and Bupa Health Assurance should generate £112m cost synergies per year by 2013, up from £75m. The firm said it [...]
Six things to check before setting up the family’s financial safety net February 23, 2011 PERSONAL insurance premiums are set to rise this year, as the market vies to boost profitability. That was the prediction last week from Axa, after it unveiled a drop in 2010 underlying earnings to £131m from £235m in 2009. So what better time to make sure you’re covered? While hunting down a competitive deal is [...]
Resolution halts takeover activity February 23, 2011 Insurance takeover vehicle Resolution has called a halt to its acquisition programme, saying it could meet key financial targets without making further deals for now. “Resolution is confident that it will achieve its targeted mid-teen returns on the UK Life Project without further acquisitions,” the company said in a statement. “It will not contemplate acquisitions [...]
Profits at BNP hit by one-off writedown February 17, 2011 BNP PARIBAS fourth-quarter profits missed analysts’ expectations yesterday despite a rise in revenue, after it had to write down the value of its stake in insurance firm Axa. The €534m (£348m) Axa charge was put down to stock market volatility, which saw Axa shares drop well below their book value. BNP holds a 5.2 per [...]
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 [...]