Transocean payout on hold after oil spill August 15, 2010 TRANSOCEAN, the company that leased the rig at the centre of the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, has been blocked from paying shareholders a $1bn (£640.7m) dividend. A Swiss regulatory body has rejected plans by Transocean, which leased the Deepwater Horizon rig from BP, to pay shareholders a dividend of 82 cents per [...]
Kleinwort case is settled July 11, 2010 A legal battle between Commerzbank and a former Kleinwort investment banker over the use of the Kleinwort name has been settled. According to a Financial Times report, Commerzbank – which sold Kleinwort Benson in June – issued a High Court lawsuit against former Kleinwort banker Robert Pasley-Tyler, claiming he had infringed the Kleinwort name. Kleinwort [...]
Australian bank investors lose US court case June 24, 2010 FOREIGN investors who bought shares of National Australia Bank on an overseas stock exchange cannot sue in a New York court over large writedowns related to the bank’s onetime US mortgage unit, the Supreme Court ruled yesterday. The justices upheld a ruling by a US appeals court that dismissed the lawsuit on the grounds that [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING August 11, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES EVERBRIGHT BANK PRICES IPO AT TOP OF RANGE China Everbright Bank, the last of China’s big national lenders to sell shares to the public, is set to raise up to Rmb21.7bn in its initial public offering after pricing its shares at the top end of an indicative range. The country’s 11th-largest bank will [...]
BP launches $30bn sale of global assets July 28, 2010 BP YESTERDAY kick-started its $30bn (£19bn) asset sale, with a number of potential buyers already lining up just one day after announcing the move. It is understood that BP is already in talks with a number of buyers, including India’s Reliance Industries and Essar, to sell off $500m in African retail assets. The group has [...]
BP launches $30bn sale of global assets July 28, 2010 BP YESTERDAY kick-started its $30bn (£19bn) asset sale, with a number of potential buyers already lining up just one day after announcing the move. It is understood that BP is already in talks with a number of buyers, including India’s Reliance Industries and Essar, to sell off $500m in African retail assets. The group has [...]
JP Morgan in WaMu probe July 7, 2010 HOLDERS of $1bn (£659m) of securities issued by a Washington Mutual entity have sued to void an eve-of-bankruptcy exchange of their investment, a complaint filled with claims of fraud and secret agreements says. The dispute centres around an exchange of securities that were swapped into preferred stock just as regulators seized Washington Mutual Bank (WaMu) [...]
Google wins piracy battle with Viacom June 24, 2010 Google won a landmark victory in the battle over pirated content yesterday after a US judge threw out a $1bn (£670m) lawsuit accusing the company of turning a blind eye to illegal videos on its YouTube service. The ruling against Viacom, which the firm has vowed to fight, will have far reaching implications for the [...]
Q&A September 2, 2010 Q.I am a small business owner and am wondering what exactly is the 2010 Equality Act? A.The new Equality Act is coming into force on 1st October. It compiles the last 30 years of gender, disability, sexuality, religious and ethnic discrimination legislation into a single act – with some added extras. The Department for Equalities [...]
Q&A September 2, 2010 Q.I am a small business owner and am wondering what exactly is the 2010 Equality Act? A.The new Equality Act is coming into force on 1st October. It compiles the last 30 years of gender, disability, sexuality, religious and ethnic discrimination legislation into a single act – with some added extras. The Department for Equalities [...]