US politicians need to grow up before growth is shut down October 1, 2013 IT is time for Americans to decide: do they want to be a social democracy, Eurozone style, with high levels of tax and public spending, or do they want to be a small state society, with low taxes and low levels of public spending? The partial government shutdown and the political warfare between Barack Obama [...]
Lenders to face crisis survival tests every year October 1, 2013 BRITAIN’S biggest lenders will be put through their paces every year to see if their capital buffers will keep them afloat through a range of possible economic stresses and strains, the Bank of England said yesterday. The new tests aim to make sure banks’ capital buffers are adequate, and to standardise the approach taken to [...]
Mortgage lending hits 2008 levels even before Help to Buy extension September 30, 2013 THE HOUSING market had begun picking up steam even before the government rushed forward the next stage of its Help to Buy scheme, Bank of England figures showed yesterday. In August, when lenders still believed that the latest set of mortgage guarantees would not be available until January, the number of mortgages approved rose to [...]
Help to Buy isn’t the answer to the Conservative predicament September 29, 2013 WITH just 20 months to go before the general election, the Tories need to get their skates on. While many London-centric, private sector employed middle class professionals see Ed Miliband as an unelectable joke, the rest of the country disagrees. YouGov puts Labour 11 points ahead, suggesting a 100 seat majority for Miliband’s party, partly [...]
Borrowers set for small cut in interest rates September 29, 2013 MORTGAGE borrowers who use the government’s new guarantee scheme could see interest rates fall by up to one percentage point, City A.M. understands. Banks lending under the scheme will have to pay the government a fee for each mortgage given out, a cost that will be passed on to borrowers. But the fee will only [...]
Osborne could finally be seeing sense over Help to Buy September 27, 2013 Analysts have welcomed reports that Osborne's Help to Buy mortgage backing scheme could be watered down, as data this morning shows house prices hitting a 2008 high. It was reported in City A.M. today that the programme's upper limit – providing mortgage support for homes worth as much as £600,000 could be reduced on recommendation [...]
Jamie Dimon’s $11bn day out September 26, 2013 JP Morgan boss heads to Washington for settlement talks JP MORGAN boss Jamie Dimon met Justice officials in Washington DC yesterday, travelling down from New York to hammer out the final details of the bank’s bill to settle mortgage investigations. The lender is facing the biggest ever fine levied on a bank, with officials thought [...]
Regulator fines Clydesdale for botched mortgages September 26, 2013 Clydesdale Bank has been fined £8.9 million for failing to treat its mortgage customers fairly. The Financial conduct Authority (FCA) issued the fine after customers were not informed clearly their rights following the bank's miscalculation of repayments on over 42,500 mortgages. In April 2009, Clydesdale discovered an error in its repayment calculation method for customers [...]
RBS pins hopes of turnaround to profits on rising interest rates September 24, 2013 RISING interest rates would quickly make RBS billions of pounds, the bank’s finance chief revealed yesterday, raising hopes that the economic recovery will boost the taxpayer-backed lender. If rates are hiked one percentage point, incomes would rise £450m in the first year, £640m in the second and £860m in the third. And a gradual rise of [...]
New York Report: Stocks fall for a fourth straight session in US September 24, 2013 THE DOW and S&P 500 ended lower yesterday, extending their recent slide to a fourth session as worries over a possible US government shutdown added to investor caution. Although uncertainty remains over the Federal Reserve’s intentions to scale back its stimulus since its decision last week to leave its current programme unchanged, some of the [...]