CITY HEADS OUT FOR A GLORIOUS WEEK OF RACING AT GOODWOOD
HORSERACING fanatics in the City have abandoned ship again this week to head over to Glorious Goodwood, running all week until Saturday. Around 100,000 attendees are expected to descend on Goodwood over the course of the festival, with the Tote estimating its potential winnings at £2.75m from 300,000 bets.
Schmoozing at the first day of the racing yesterday – alongside the likes of actress Liz Hurley, a guest of Highclere Thoroughbred Racing boss Harry Herbert, and rugby legend Laurence Dallaglio – were Sir Peter Osborne, father of the chancellor and founder of interior design company Osborne & Little, and John Dodd, founder of new sponsor Artemis Investment Management.
Later in the week will bring high hopes for Andy Stewart – who retired from Cenkos just last week – in the form of his horse Fleeting Spirit.
But perhaps in with the best chance of all the City lot this week is Paul Roy, the former president of global markets and investment banking at Merrill Lynch who set up investment firm NewSmith Capital Partners in 2003. Roy is also chairman of the British Horseracing Authority and a keen racehorse owner in his spare time – and his nag, Canford Cliffs, is the favourite to win Goodwood’s flagship race, the £300,000 Sussex Stakes, later on today. Roy himself, however, won’t be biting his nails in the thick of the action – he’s chosen to head off on a summer holiday instead. SPORT: P26
FILM REEL
First Goldman’s making a movie about itself, and now everyone’s hopping on the bandwagon.
The name Ross Mandell might be familiar to some readers, since the former boss of Sky Capital Holdings was accused by US authorities last summer of running a “trans-Atlantic boiler room” scam – something for which he has not yet been tried, and which he vehemently denies.
Mandell’s idea is to create a reality TV show about himself, his wife and children in order to clear his name. He claims already to have television producers lining up to cut a deal for the show, which is provisionally entitled “Facing Life”.
“People think that I’m a beast, that I’m an animal,” he tells Reuters. “I’m not. I’m a loving human being, I’m a sober man, I’m God-fearing and a member of Alcoholics Anonymous.”
FOND FAREWELL
A piece of sad news for the City, after Jupiter fund management veteran Laurie Petar passed away at the weekend from prostate cancer. Petar, who managed the firm’s fund of investment trusts and monthly income fund, had continued to run his funds throughout his long illness. Jupiter chief executive Edward Bonham Carter paid tribute, saying: “Laurie will be greatly missed by all who knew him at Jupiter, where he was both a valued colleague and a friend.”
DOG’S LIFE
Billionaire Metro Bank founder Vernon Hill’s little Yorkshire terrier, Duffy, is fast
becoming a bigger ambassador for the bank than his owner. I hear there’s a sizeable portrait gracing the reception on the first floor of the firm’s new Holborn office, featuring Hill, his wife Shirley and Duffy, all encased in a gaudy shiny frame.
Next thing you know, that furry face will be gracing the bank’s customer documents.
BLUE PLANET
Forget shareholder activists: it’s animated movie characters that boardmembers at mining giant Vedanta need to watch out for at its annual meeting later today. Vedanta, you may recall, has been involved recently in a lengthy spat with charity Survival International over its attempts to mine on land in India belonging to a native tribe, the Dongria Kondh.
Survival now plans to take protestors dressed up as the blue people from the Avatar movie along to the AGM in Westminster. “The Dongria Kondh have been described as the ‘real Avatar tribe’ because their plight closely parallels that of the aliens in James Cameron’s blockbuster”, a spokesman informs me, solemnly.
STREET FIGHTING
Trivia of the day, courtesy of a planning and transport committee meeting of the City of London. The corporation yesterday approved a request from Islington Council to include three City boundary roads in its 20mph speed limit, though with one condition attached – a request for a road name change. Apparently, some members of the corporation have been gunning for 21 years – no joke – to secure a change of name for Goswell Road, which runs between Angel and the Barbican. The reason? The City traditionally doesn’t have any roads, since “roads” are strictly highways that lead to urban areas, while highways in those areas are “streets”. Nothing if not sticklers for ttradition, these folk.