What the other papers say this morning – 31 October 2013
FINANCIAL TIMES
UK star rainmakers team up
Three of London’s star dealmakers are joining forces in a City advisory boutique, reflecting the exodus of senior talent from bulge-bracket investment banks amid intense political and regulatory scrutiny. Simon Warshaw, former co-head of investment banking at UBS, will this week team up with Robertson Robey Associates, said people close to the situation.
38m Adobe customers hit by breach
Adobe said that the extent of a major cyber security breach it suffered this summer was much wider than first reported. The company behind Photoshop and the widely used Acrobat document reader said for the first time that hackers stole the encrypted passwords of about 38m active users.
Batista seeks bankruptcy protection
Brazilian tycoon Eike Batista triggered Latin America’s biggest corporate default on Wednesday when he filed for bankruptcy protection for his oil exploration and production company OGX. The filing signals the demise of one of the greatest fortunes built during the emerging markets boom of the first decade of this century, and of a businessman whose brash ambition symbolised the rise of Brazil as a new economic power. The reorganisation is also expected to raise chances that the oil regulator could confiscate OGX’s last oil exploration blocks.
THE TIMES
CWC considers Dominican Republic bid
Cable & Wireless Communications is considering a €1bn bid for a telecoms network in the Dominican Republic to ramp up its presence in the Caribbean, but it may face fierce competition from Digicel.
US and China causing wine price rise
Despite 2.8bn cases of wine being produced last year, there was an undersupply of 300m cases, according to an industry report for investors by Morgan Stanley. Each case contains twelve bottles. Poor weather, mainly in France and Argentina, led to a dip in global output of 5 per cent to the lowest level since the 1960s.
The Daily Telegraph
Invesco to cut Rentokil stake by 11pc
Invesco has hired Deutsche Bank to sell 194m of its 454m Rentokil shares, raising around £209m. Invesco Perpetual is slicing its stake by 11pc in pest control company Rentokil just two weeks after its star fund manager Neil Woodford left the firm.
Dell admits laptop smelt of cat urine
Manufacturing processes used for Dell’s Latitude 6430u meant the laptops smelt of cat urine, the company has admitted. The company has admitted that the issue is real. It recommended that users should send affected laptops back, and offered to replace the palm rest and keyboard.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
McDonald’s partners with Kraft
McDonald’s is joining with Kraft Foods Group to sell packaged McCafe coffee in US grocery stores in test markets, Kraft chief executive Tony Vernon said Wednesday. The coffee will be sold next year in whole-bean, ground and single-cup formats for use in brewers like Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Keurig machines.
Nokia to seek UK HTC sales ban
Nokia said will seek financial compensation as well as a sales ban on devices made by HTC in the UK, after a major court victory in its continuing patent disputes with the Taiwanese company.