Square Mile’s street closures could be made permanent October 1, 2020 The City of London Corporation is considering making its new street closures a lasting feature of the Square Mile, it was revealed today. Back in June, the governing body of London’s financial district announced a raft of changes to its streets in a bid to encourage people to return to work. These included introducing wider [...]
UK PMIs: Manufacturing recovery continues despite fresh lockdown fears October 1, 2020 Britain’s manufacturing sector continued its strong recovery from the coronavirus slump in September, although it dropped off the record pace set in August. The IHS Markit/Cips manufacturing purchasing managers (PMI) index stood at 54.1 in September, with any score above the 50 mark indicating growth. In August, the index recorded a score of 55.2, its [...]
Why the government must give more support to London’s hospitality sector October 1, 2020 Hospitality and tourism have felt the force of Covid-19 like no other sector. Green shoots started to emerge during the summer months, as Eat Out to Help Out, a staycation boom and the warm weather put much-needed cash in the registers of hotels and restaurants across the UK. While London remained quiet, there was some [...]
DEBATE: Will workplace diversity suffer from a new flexible working culture? October 1, 2020 Will workplace diversity suffer from a new flexible working culture? Jo Preston, director & head of people at Teamspirit, says YES One of the silver linings of the coronavirus pandemic has been the corporate pivot towards flexible working. The swiftness with which thousands of employees transitioned from office desks to kitchen tables demonstrated a huge [...]
JP Morgan agrees to pay $920m over US probe into market manipulation September 29, 2020 JP Morgan Chase & Co has agreed to pay more than $920m and admitted wrongdoing over a US investigation into market manipulation over its trading of metals futures and Treasury securities. The investment bank will pay $436.4m in fines, $311.7m in restitution and more than $172m in disgorgement, according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. [...]
New BBC boss Tim Davie ‘prepared to fire stars’ who break impartiality rules September 29, 2020 The BBC’s new director general today said he is prepared to fire high-profile figures who break the broadcaster’s devout impartiality rules on social media. In his first major move at the helm, Tim Davie, who took up the post earlier this month, said the corporation will publish new social media rules next month which will [...]
US proposal on ESG causes sparks to fly… but it’s the right move September 29, 2020 A spotlight has been cast on the curious logic underpinning the case for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing by the US Department of Labor’s recent actions. In June, the DOL proposed a new rule that would limit the ability of most employee retirement plans to select investments based on ESG factors. More than 8,700 pieces [...]
Carlos Ghosn launches executive training programme in native Lebanon September 29, 2020 Former Nissan and Renault boss Carlos Ghosn is set to launch a management and business programme at a Lebanon university nine months after fleeing to his childhood home from Japan where he faced trial. Ghosn escaped to Beirut after being charged with financial wrongdoing by Japanese prosecutors but denies the allegations. He has now revealed [...]
The clock is ticking for Oracle to make sense of the TikTok deal September 29, 2020 What does the world’s largest enterprise software firm see in a Chinese video-sharing social networking app? Putting the intense political pressure by the US government to make this deal work to one side, the two businesses seem like chalk and cheese to hard-nosed City investors. One company is a behemoth known for serving the corporate [...]
Could decarbonisation be the mega-trend of the next decade? September 28, 2020 US equities have led global stock markets higher over the past decade. In the last ten years, US equities have returned a stellar 292%, compared to just 73% for global equities (as measured by the MSCI USA Index and MSCI AC World ex US Index respectively, in US dollar terms, as at 31 August 2020). [...]