Credit Suisse and Silicon Valley Bank chaos are symptoms of fragile banking system March 21, 2023 City folk around in 2007 must have been getting very twitchy over the last week. Some of the market moves were reminiscent of the early stages of the financial crisis once people clocked on to just how bad banks had messed up. Credit Suisse tumbled more than 30 per cent at one point. Its peers [...]
OBR blames optimistic economic forecasts on ‘volatile’ environment March 20, 2023 Overly optimistic economic forecasts are down to the “very volatile” nature of the UK in recent years, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) chairman has said. The official Treasury watchdog was warned by Deutsche Bank analysts that it may have repeated its mistake of over-estimating growth figures and wiping out spending power. Speaking at a [...]
London house price growth slows, but you’ll still need over £1m to live in Camden, Kensington or Westminster March 20, 2023 The price of the average London home stood at £680,806, according to online estate agent Rightmove, which found that house prices in the capital rose 2.5 per cent compared to three per cent in Britain as a whole in the last 12 months. When looked at borough-by-borough, property prices fared differently. So while Camden residents [...]
Bank of England confirms AT1 bondholders priority over shareholders as it proclaims UK banks ‘safe and sound’ March 20, 2023 The Bank of England confirmed the pecking order in which investors would be paid out if a bank went bust as it sought to reassure markets about the stability of the UK’s financial system. In a statement released today, the UK central bank confirmed that alternative tier 1 (AT1) bondholders would be prioritised over shareholders [...]
Job Hunting? Three In-Demand Jobs In London This Week March 20, 2023 The London labour market is starting to cool, although we’re not quite facing the big freeze that many analysts had predicted––at least not yet. According to the latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures, vacancies across the UK dropped in the three months to December 2022 (the sixth consecutive fall), but remained elevated at 1.16 [...]
Crash? What crash? House prices defy gravity though London lags slightly March 20, 2023 House prices continues to defy expectations with a steady recovery this month that has seen the average property coming onto the market increase by £3,000. Asking prices for new sellers do still remain £5,800 below their peak in October 2022. London’s average asking price fell by 0.1 per cent in March, leaving the average price [...]
After years of vague pledges, company boards are starting to care about their emissions March 20, 2023 For the first time, investors and company boards are taking to start taking climate risk more seriously as we head towards Cop28, hosted by the United Arab Emirates this year, writes Kari McCormmick.
American candy stores or retail hub? What might be next for Oxford Street March 19, 2023 It has been three years since the UK was plunged into its first-ever full scale lockdown – forcing the majority of stores in London’s West End to temporarily cease trading and arguably altering the state of physical retail forever. The pandemic forced once seemingly indestructible retailers such as Debenhams, Topshop, and Gap off Oxford Street, [...]
What do Brits think of capitalism? Not much, it seems March 18, 2023 One of the most surprising findings of an international survey conducted on attitudes towards capitalism for the book In Defence of Capitalism is that the British – in the motherland of capitalism – are far more critical of capitalism than might be expected. Only in 12 countries are attitudes towards capitalism more negative than in [...]
American candy stores: Calls for ‘stronger’ laws and business rate reform to clamp down on shops which blight Oxford Street March 17, 2023 Westminster City Council has called for a “stronger” economic crime bill and reform of business rates to officially bring a halt to American candy and souvenir stores which continue to litter Oxford Street. “We are dealing here with a sophisticated operation which is skilled at exploiting UK legal loopholes,” Cllr Adam Hug, leader of Westminster [...]