Time Out owner sells £10m stake November 25, 2010 Oakley Capital has bought a 50 per cent stake in Time Out, in a deal that values the iconic magazine at more than £20m. Founder Tony Elliot has been searching for an investor but was determined to resist being snapped up by a larger media company. He is understood to have made at least £3m [...]
FOOD & BOOZE NEWS May 3, 2010 TRINITY GOES LITERARY Recipe books are ten-a-penny, but not many leave us as watered-of-mouth as How to Eat In by Adam Byatt, chef patron of Clapham’s rather fabulous Trinity restaurant. It’s a tome of serious beauty – the full-page pictures of boiled goose eggs with asparagus soldiers and a sensational fish pie topped with cockles [...]
Alan Johnson to be shadow chancellor October 8, 2010 Labour leader Ed Miliband has chosen Alan Johnson as his shadow chancellor, while Ed Balls will take on the shadow home secretary role. Yvette Cooper will be shadow foreign secretary. Cooper and Balls had been tipped as front runners for the shadow chancellor role, which has been handed to Johnson, a former home secretary. Meanwhile [...]
2010’s Christmas book round-up December 1, 2010 BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS CRISIS ECONOMICS BY NOURIEL ROUBINI WITH STEPEHN MIHM Pengiuin, £25 More than just another me-too account of the crisis, Nouriel Roubini – often called Dr Doom for his Cassandra-like prophecies – gives a compelling account of the 2008 meltdown. He provides the lay reader with succinct and clearly written explanations of the [...]
Profits slide at John Lewis as crunch hits September 17, 2009 THE John Lewis Partnership, seen as a bellwether for middle-class consumer confidence, yesterday reported a 20 per cent dive in first-half profits. Despite a strong performance from its grocery chain Waitrose, the group said pre-tax profits were down by £21m to £86.3m in the six months to 1 August. The group’s department store, famed for [...]
Profits slide at John Lewis as crunch hits September 17, 2009 THE John Lewis Partnership, seen as a bellwether for middle-class consumer confidence, yesterday reported a 20 per cent dive in first-half profits. Despite a strong performance from its grocery chain Waitrose, the group said pre-tax profits were down by £21m to £86.3m in the six months to 1 August. The group’s department store, famed for [...]
High street sales leap in bumper easter April 13, 2010 RETAIL sales growth surged last month after a booming Easter for high street trade. The total value of sales rose by 6.6 per cent in March – the biggest upturn since April 2006 – according to the data from the British Retail Consortium and KPMG. The figures follow positive results from john Lewis and Marks [...]
Wellstream confirms takeover bid is causing shares in the UK to skyrocket September 21, 2010 BRITISH oilfield services group Wellstream Holdings said it had received several bid approaches, lifting its shares 30 per cent and valuing the company at over £700m. Wellstream, which was floated on the stockmarket in 2007 by British private equity firm Candover, makes flexible pipes used by oil companies in deep water, an area set for [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING May 24, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES AIA CHIEF IN THREAT TO QUIT OVER PRU DEAL AIA’s chief executive has told friends and industry executives that he would quit if the UK’s Prudential succeeded in its $35.5bn (£24.6bn) takeover of the Asian businesses of AIG. Mark Wilson has said he would step down once the deal closed because the proposed [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING May 24, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES AIA CHIEF IN THREAT TO QUIT OVER PRU DEAL AIA’s chief executive has told friends and industry executives that he would quit if the UK’s Prudential succeeded in its $35.5bn (£24.6bn) takeover of the Asian businesses of AIG. Mark Wilson has said he would step down once the deal closed because the proposed [...]