WH Smith revenue dives 85 per cent during coronavirus lockdown May 14, 2020 WH Smith reported an 85 per cent drop in revenue for last month after the coronavirus lockdown forced the retailer to close high street and transport hub stores. The newsagent chain said travel revenue plunged 91 per cent due to travel bans around the world, and high street revenue was down 74 per cent. WH [...]
Airbus could cut 10,000 jobs amid coronavirus travel slump May 13, 2020 European aerospace titan Airbus could cut up to 10,000 jobs in the coming days as it struggles with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic. The Telegraph reported that executives are set to finalise plans for cuts to the company’s 134,000 staff next week. One source quoted in the report said cuts will be “imminent and [...]
Young’s pub chain to secure extra £100m financing to survive coronavirus crisis May 13, 2020 Pub chain Young’s said it is in the process of securing an additional £100m of financial headroom to help sustain the business throughout the coronavirus crisis. The company said it has issued paper with a value of £30m and a maturity date of 13 May 2021 under the government’s Covid Corporate Financing Facility. It is [...]
Suits you: TM Lewin bought by private equity firm SCP May 12, 2020 British menswear brand TM Lewin has today been acquired by SCP Private Equity via special purpose vehicle Torque Brands. TM Lewin, which was established in 1898, was sold to SCP for an undisclosed amount by Bain Capital Credit which acquired the shirt-and-tie retailer in 2015. SCP has acquired the business as a going concern, taking [...]
A UK-US financial services deal is a prize of untold value May 12, 2020 Now the UK and US have commenced trade negotiations, focus should turn to the benefits both parties could achieve through a deal in financial services. Connecting the UK’s and US’s financial markets, and their wider national ecosystems, would be a huge prize. It would give US corporates and consumers the cheapest possible access to the [...]
Coronavirus lockdown: Kingfisher sales plunge due to store closures May 12, 2020 B&Q owner Kingfisher reported plummeting sales in the first quarter due to coronavirus lockdown measures, but said trading was beginning to bounce back after stores reopened. The DIY retailer said first quarter like-for-like sales were down 24.8 per cent to £2.2bn due to the impact of coronavirus. Online growth increased fourfold from mid-March as Kingfisher [...]
Veteran Hackers, Software Engineers and Creatives May 12, 2020 Hartej Sawhney, Co-Founder and CEO at Zokyo discusses Zokyo’s approach to the digital asset ecosystem. Approximately $2.5 million dollars is stolen daily from cryptocurrency exchanges, with most hacks unreported to the public. There has been a shift in the motivation of cybercriminals from hacking traditional finance to digital assets. Binance, one of the world’s most [...]
Top Cryptocurrency exchanges experience historic volume ahead of Bitcoin’s halving May 12, 2020 This week the price of Bitcoin (BTC) began rising from about $8,600 to surpass the $10,000 mark on May 8, before seeing a pullback. Over the weekend, it lost 12% of its value in 15 minutes, dropping from $9,480 to an $8,300 low, but has since recovered to $8,600 at press time. Ether (ETH), the [...]
Digital Rights Blockchain May 12, 2020 There is a clear use case for a globally recognised digital rights blockchain. Content creators and content consumers can see real value. The challenges are aligning the motivations of all those stakeholders in the middle – including the ones who may become redundant. Musicians, scriptwriters, photographers, artists and yes – even journalists – experience a [...]
Coronavirus: Everything is set to change May 12, 2020 It’s no real surprise that the eagerly awaited unveiling of the plan to get back to normal turned out to be such a litany of vagueness. This is a government that has always been more comfortable talking about what it doesn’t want to see happen than laying out actual plans. But behind the obfuscation, the [...]