Carillion: Trade credit insurers pull cover as Carillion “hangs by a thread” January 13, 2018 Euler Hermes and other trade credit insurers have stopped writing new coverage for suppliers to embattled contractor Carillion, sending a signal the company is at risk of collapse, according to reports. Tokio Marine HCC and MGA Nexus also said they would not insure deliveries to the firm, Insurance Insider reported. Trade credit insurance protects firms [...]
Markets roundup: Pound sterling hits its highest since the Brexit vote as FTSE 100 smashes records January 12, 2018 The pound partied hard this afternoon following reports of good news for Brexit negotiators – as the FTSE 100 ended the week by breaking another record Sterling began the evening more than one per cent higher against the dollar, while it mustered a 0.2 per cent rise against the euro as reports the Spanish and [...]
Downing Street calls City chiefs in for latest Brexit meeting January 10, 2018 Securing a Brexit transitional deal will be high up the agenda for the chief executives of some of the City’s biggest firms at a high-level roundtable tomorrow afternoon with Theresa May. Around a dozen senior figures from firms including Goldman Sachs, Barclays and HSBC are expected to meet the Prime Minister, along with chancellor Philip [...]
Emerging markets: How different local expectations can dramatically change the investing landscape January 10, 2018 Most financial best practices originated in developed economies. And while best practices and ethical principles endure regardless of locality, they can be challenging to implement in underdeveloped markets where the operational framework may be quite different. There are certain unique challenges I face as a practitioner in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that would be [...]
A robot tax is a tempting but misguided response to our public funding crisis January 10, 2018 The threats posed by automation are now a common topic for futurologists. The reality is that automation has been quietly progressing for some time, and while we are a long way off a Skynet-style singularity, the development of artificial intelligence means robots are not only taking our current jobs, they are going to take more. [...]
UK mergers and acquisitions hit a new record last year as companies defend themselves from foreign takeovers January 9, 2018 The number of merger and acquisition (M&A) deals in the UK hit a record high last year, despite growing dissatisfaction from the business community with the pace and vagueness of the Brexit negotiations. The number of deals where a UK company was the target escalated to 1,543 in 2017 from 1,493 the year before, according [...]
Brexit job losses may be lower than first feared says City of London Corporation boss January 9, 2018 London financial services job losses after Brexit may be lower than previously thought, according to a top City of London official. Jeremy Browne, the City of London Corporation’s envoy to the EU, said financial services firms’ plans to move jobs out of the UK and into the EU were becoming less drastic than initially thought. [...]
Hastings shakes up head honchos as chairman is replaced by chief executive January 9, 2018 The chairman of motor insurer Hastings is to step down and be replaced by the firm's chief executive, it was announced this morning. The shake-up of the firm's top two jobs comes just a day after an unsavoury spat at the AA –which reportedly centred on a tie-up with Hastings – took a turn for [...]
Revealed: The seven best-value stocks to watch in 2018, according to Canaccord Genuity January 9, 2018 Despite a rocky 2017 which saw a number of lawsuits come to a head, Lloyds Banking Group has been named one of the most promising stocks to watch this year by Canaccord Genuity Wealth Management. Based on the value of the stocks at the moment and their potential to generate strong returns over the next [...]
The next frontier for insurtech is reinventing insurance itself January 8, 2018 In 2015, when I first invested in an insurance technology startup, the term “insurtech” hadn’t been coined, and the explosion of investment in insurance was yet to begin. Fast-forward three years, and the landscape has changed immeasurably. Over $230m was invested in insurtech globally in 2015, growing to over $500m in 2016. Despite the fanfare, [...]