Fears of fresh dip see a race for safe assets August 24, 2010 FEARS of a double-dip recession on both sides of the Atlantic intensified yesterday sending rattled investors rushing into the relative safety of the government debt market. In the UK, yields on 10-year government debt fell to 2.876 per cent – the lowest level on record and below the level of March 2009 when the Bank [...]
Enter the corporate entrepreneur: Britain’s best hope for real recovery October 17, 2010 CO-FOUNDER, MARKET GRAVITY THE UK’s recovery from the deepest recession in eighty years is dependent on sustained private sector growth. Corporate earnings may be recovering, but too much is due to cost cutting, not real growth, and this trend is not sustainable. Recent analysis from Market Gravity illustrates that while 75 per cent of FTSE [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING September 27, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES BRAZIL IN GLOBAL CURRENCY WAR’ ALERT An “interntaional currency war” has broken out according to Guido Mantega, Brazil’s finance minister, as governments around the world comcompete to power their exhange rates to boost competiveness. Mantega’s comments in Sao Paulo follow a series of interventions by central banks in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan [...]
John Lewis shrugs off double-dip fears September 3, 2010 Customers of John Lewis are showing few signs of reining in spending in the face of prospective tax rises and employment uncertainty with the firm posting another week of double digit sales growth. The employee-owned company, traditionally seen as a bellwether of the retail sector but which has outperformed competitors for over a year, said [...]
UK tax boost eases deficit as sales rise August 19, 2010 BETTER-THAN-PREDICTED high street sales and unexpectedly low government borrowing figures gave UK markets a late summer fillip yesterday. Shoppers defied talk of weakening consumer confidence to send the nation’s till receipts up 1.1 per cent between June and July, far ahead of the 0.4 per cent rise pencilled in by economists. The Office for National [...]
UK tax boost eases deficit as sales rise August 19, 2010 BETTER-THAN-PREDICTED high street sales and unexpectedly low government borrowing figures gave UK markets a late summer fillip yesterday. Shoppers defied talk of weakening consumer confidence to send the nation’s till receipts up 1.1 per cent between June and July, far ahead of the 0.4 per cent rise pencilled in by economists. The Office for National [...]
A bonanza of fresh, cheap funds for the retail investor November 3, 2010 HSBC is planning another series of emerging market exchange traded fund (ETF) launches as the price war in ETFs intensifies. Retail investor confidence in using funds tracking more exotic indices is growing and HSBC is cranking up its aggression with planned launches in the first half of 2011 tracking the MSCI India, MSCI Emerging Asia [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING September 5, 2010 THE SUNDAYS The Sunday Telegraph NATIONAL GRID IN $26M US INQUIRY National Grid is facing an investigation by United States regulators over allegations it is trying to charge more than $26m in excessive costs to American consumers, including management expenses for private school tuition fees and the transatlantic shipment of a wine collection. The claims [...]
FTSE traders torn between two directions September 13, 2010 THE FTSE 100 closed 63 points up at 5,565.5 points yesterday, rallying to a four-month high. Good banking and mining figures drove it upwards and a clear momentum emerged. While the upturn is indisputable, the jury is out on how long it will last. The index is out on a limb and opinion is split [...]
London shops boom but UK sales stutter July 18, 2010 LONDON shops enjoyed June sales 14.4 per cent higher than a year ago, according to research out today. The shopping boom far outstrips the rest of the UK, where like-for-like growth was just 1.2 per cent, and represents the strongest sales growth in the capital since October 2006. Research by KPMG and the British Retail [...]