Why purpose is key to success in twenty-first century business May 16, 2016 How should businesses make decisions? The textbook answer is to do a calculation – to trade off the costs and benefits. For investment decisions, this is difficult, because the benefits are uncertain. But for tangible investments, such as building a factory, you can still get a reasonable handle on the benefits – estimate the number [...]
Panama Papers scandal: What we know about the new UK tax taskforce so far April 10, 2016 Earlier today, Prime Minister David Cameron announced that a new tax taskforce would be set up to deal with the fallout from the Panama Papers report. (He also shared a letter from his accountant, which you may have heard about.) While the precise details of the taskforce are still foggy, here's what we've discovered so far: [...]
UK Steel crisis: Industry in showdown with European ministers as top bosses march in demonstration February 15, 2016 The European steel industry and governmental ministers are set for a showdown later today over how best to implement higher tariffs on foreign steel imports. Industry leaders are demanding that more is done to help Europe's steel sector survive, while European ministers claim removing the so-called lesser duty rule, which seeks to apply the lowest possible [...]
New stamp duty land tax extra three per cent charge could hit parents who want to help their children get onto the property ladder, tax experts warn February 23, 2016 If you're currently saving to give your son or daughter a helping hand onto the property ladder, you might find you need to put aside a little bit more than you bargained for to cover tax charges. The Chartered Institute of Taxation (CIOT) yesterday cautioned that the additional three per cent charge on stamp duty [...]
Five things entrepreneurs and founders need to know before joining a growth business accelerator programme February 4, 2016 British entrepreneurs have a lot to be excited about at the moment. With over half a million businesses started in the UK in 2013 alone – helped by a business environment with the fewest barriers to entrepreneurship in the world – and the number growing, it’s a good time to be a British-based business. Unsurprisingly [...]
Local councils handed power to extend Sunday trading hours in bid to address high street decline February 9, 2016 Local councils will be given the power to extend Sunday trading hours under new rules confirmed today. The government is introducing amendments to the Enterprise Bill – which are expected to be implemented in the Autumn – to devolve powers to local authorities, aimed at helping shops compete better with online retailers. As well as [...]
Superforecasting: How seemingly ordinary people can predict everything from world events to election results May 27, 2016 The President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo was having a stressful time in 2013. A rebel militia had just taken control of Goma, a large province with a population of about a million people, and regional powers were putting pressure on him to wrest it back by force. Little did he know that [...]
We mustn’t let the EU referendum narrow our view of the City’s global opportunities February 29, 2016 Only 115 days to go. The EU referendum has been a huge story since well before the date was announced and now we have months of campaigning before polling opens. In fact, so dominant has the referendum been recently that the world outside Europe has been almost overlooked by the media. I’m writing this column [...]
Helicopter money won’t save us: We’ll only revive global growth if governments lead from the front February 26, 2016 The rhetoric from the G20 finance ministers meeting in Shanghai this week will probably be dominated by urging central bankers to do more to give an ailing global economy a fillip. But they have leant on central bankers for too long and should get on with adopting sensible fiscal policies if they want sustainable growth. [...]
Bashing landlords won’t bring down sky-high rents in London February 10, 2016 The proportion of households renting privately in London has more than doubled over the last 10 years. And with demand far outstripping supply, fears are mounting that London’s sky-high rents will rise even further. Some believe a simple fix would be for the winner of May’s mayoral election to introduce some form of rent control in [...]