Windfall for Mouchel chairman August 5, 2012 THE CHAIRMAN of struggling infrastructure firm Mouchel stands to pocket £650,000 for his work in a restructuring deal that will see shareholders’ investment virtually wiped out. Under the debt-for-equity deal announced last week, David Shearer will be paid £150,000 a year for his role as chairman, plus £100,000 to his consultancy firm Buchanan Shearer for [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 1, 2012 Freshfields Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, the law firm, has appointed David Trott as its new global head of finance. He currently serves as head of its London banking practice, and will replace Alan Newton. Additionally, head of restructuring and insolvency, Ken Baird, will become managing partner of the firm’s London finance practice. Revetas Capital Advisors Ian [...]
Our decisive central bank has been neutered by regulatory confusion July 30, 2012 THE TREASURY Select Committee has rightly questioned the arbitrary powers of regulators, particularly the Bank of England, over the boards and senior executives of private firms in the financial sector. Despite the mistakes of our cartelised banks, it’s unwise to assume that regulators can run businesses better than boards. Moreover, trends over the last 12 [...]
Retailers shut up shop on the lengthy slump July 30, 2012 INSOLVENCIES fell across the UK in the second quarter, a PwC report shows today, with even the hard-pressed construction sector seeing an improvement compared with the same period of last year. But retailers are still under pressure, defying the positive overall trend as shoppers stayed away from the high street. The three-month period saw 3,927 [...]
Many banks are at fault – but we still need a strong finance sector July 17, 2012 OPEN almost any paper and you will read at least one editorial or comment piece slamming the financial sector. Of course, the banking industry has given its critics plenty of ammunition: HSBC failed to stop the laundering of billions of dollars of Latin American drug money; JP Morgan’s mammoth losses; the Libor scandal; mis-selling payment [...]
Small firms stay in business as bigger enterprises get battered July 16, 2012 INSOLVENCY among small firms slid last month, as the number of bigger firms going out of business climbed, according to research released today by information services firm Experian. Firms with between one and 100 employees saw their rate of insolvency slump from 0.19 per cent in June last year to 0.12 per cent this June. [...]
RATE CUTS AREN’T ENOUGH TO SOLVE ECONOMIC GLOOM July 9, 2012 FX360 LAST Thursday brought rate cuts from the European Central Bank (ECB), the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), and the Danish and Kenyan central banks. On top of this, the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) raised its asset purchase facility by a further £50bn. Whether coordinated or not, these actions represented substantial monetary [...]
Begbies falls to a full-year loss July 5, 2012 Business rescue group Begbies Traynor swung to a loss in the year to April as its own restructuring expenses ate into its earnings. Revenues at the firm fell just under five per cent to £57.7m and a £5.5m pre-tax profit was more than wiped out by costs from the disposal of its overseas and tax [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS July 2, 2012 Kingfisher Karen Witts will join the home retailer’s board as finance director in October. She is currently finance chief for Africa, Middle East, Asia and Asia Pacific at Vodafone, and is also a non-executive director of Wolseley. Witts worked at BT Group for more than 10 years, most recently as finance head for BT Retail. [...]
ASIL NADIR DENIES POLLY PECK THEFT June 26, 2012 POLLY Peck tycoon Asil Nadir yesterday told the Old Bailey he was a “broken man” with no chance of a fair trial when he left the UK in 1993. The 71-year-old Cypriot has denied stealing nearly £150m from Polly Peck and said the company was never insolvent.