UK Vs Ireland: Where’s the best place to do business? Here’s how they compare on ten factors October 30, 2014 When it comes to doing business, which country is more favourable? Singapore has, once again, been named the best place to do business according to the World Bank’s annual rankings. It’s the ninth year in a row the Asian city has topped the league, but closer to home, the UK and Ireland have both become [...]
As QE ends in the US, has it changed the world for the better? October 29, 2014 Sam Bowman, research director at the Adam Smith Institute, says Yes. Many people, including me, expected QE to cause uncontrollable inflation and end in disaster. How wrong we were. The US and the UK, which did QE, are growing healthily. The Eurozone, which didn’t, is in ruins. QE helps to keep nominal spending steady during [...]
FTSE rises after Glaxo sets out recovery plan – London Report October 22, 2014 BRITAIN’S top share index yesterday ended higher, with motor insurers advancing on news of an increase in car premiums and drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline rising after its results. The FTSE 100 finished 0.4 per cent higher at 6,399.73 points. It had fallen more than 10 per cent in four weeks before making a marginal recovery since late [...]
The crackdown on no win, no fee risks handing a victory to dodgy directors October 15, 2014 One of the hazards of policymaking is that many of the best-laid plans can have curiously unintended consequences. In implementing policy, meanwhile, government can often find its left hand undermined by its right. So it has been with the Ministry of Justice’s laudable bid to halt spurious and costly civil litigation, an initiative which now [...]
Aim-listed firms bouncing back: Alternative Investment Market companies have biggest quarter of takeover activity October 5, 2014 The London Stock Exchange’s market for smaller growing companies, the Alternative Investment Market, had its biggest quarter of takeover activity in over two years as Aim-listed firms become attractive takeover targets. According to the accountancy group UHY Hacker Young, the three months to the end of September saw 13 merger and acquisition deals involving Aim [...]
City Moves for 26 September 2014 | Who’s switching jobs September 25, 2014 PwC The professional services firm has appointed Simon Hampton to lead its real estate deals practice. He joins from Jefferies, where he was head of real estate, gaming and lodging. Hampton has also held senior positions at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Alliance Trust Peter Michaelis has been appointed head of equities at the savings [...]
In charts: Just how big is Barclays’ record £38 million fine? September 23, 2014 Barclays has been fined £38m for failing to protect customer’s money, the largest ever handed out for such client asset breaches. The financial watchdog ruled Barclays put at risk £16.5m of customer money and failed to protect it from potential costs, delays and loss of assets if the bank were to become insolvent. The size [...]
How incompetent policymakers have kept the Eurozone in perpetual crisis September 9, 2014 THE EUROZONE lurches into yet another crisis, with fears of deflation and a further drop in output. There are several dominant explanations as to why Europe has been unable to recover from the crisis. Depending on their tastes, most commentators subscribe to them either on their own, or in various combinations. One puts the blame [...]
How an independent Scotland can keep the pound – and have more stable banks August 20, 2014 When Scottish voters go to the polls in their independence referendum next month, they may ultimately make their decision on the basis of a single question: if we voted Yes, what currency would we use? The question has massive implications for Scotland’s economy, and since the “Plan A” of a formal currency union between Scotland [...]
Rising rates will kill off the zombie firms – but this may hurt SMEs too August 13, 2014 It’s been a while since we heard about zombie companies – those businesses without much of a future, clinging on mainly because of record low interest rates. There’s an underworld of these poorly performing firms – unable to invest, tired, demotivated, with poorly rewarded staff and new ideas that are thwarted at every turn by [...]