Pick mining giants for commodity exposure October 25, 2010 CHINA’S restrictive export practices in rare earth metals have intensified fears among traders and market analysts that a bubble is forming in junior mining stocks such as Canada’s Rare Element Resources, Quest Rare Minerals and Avalon Rare Metals. These companies have seen their share prices surge in recent months despite the fact that they are [...]
BORIS FUND BREAKFAST CLUB MEETS AT SAVOY December 7, 2010 LONDON mayor Boris Johnson played host to a star-studded launch for the corporate sponsors of the charitable Mayor’s Fund for London yesterday morning, with grandees of the City treated to an 8am poached egg and salmon breakfast in return for their paid-up membership of the London Business Club – an organisation for fund donors. The [...]
Mobile luxuries October 13, 2010 On the face of it, the idea of phone as status symbol runs fairly contrary to the general reality of the phone market now: anybody can own an iPhone, Blackberry or any one of the plethora of good-looking, ingeniously engineered smartphones out there, and most of us do. But there are those looking for something [...]
How to make a saloon car sexy September 21, 2010 Forget large SUVs. This is the Mitsubishi ASX crossover and it is the future of family SUVs – well, as far as Mitsubishi is concerned. Now that driving a proper 4×4 through the boroughs of Islington or Wandsworth is such a complete no-no, thank goodness that the car manufacturers have come up with an alternative [...]
How AirAsia boss Tony Fernandes shrugged off the global recession September 5, 2010 IF Tony Fernandes, the chief executive of pioneering low-cost carrier AirAsia, ever suffered from shyness as child, he is certainly cured of it now. The UK-educated Malaysian entrepreneur, who founded the short haul airline in 2001 and its longhaul sister AirAsia X six years later, dominates the meeting room of his West End PR agency [...]
RUBENS AND CHARLES I WATCH LUXURY GONGS November 15, 2010 THE great and good of the British luxury brands industry gathered for one of the biggest events of the year last night, as its lobbying group, Walpole, held its annual awards. In Whitehall’s Banqueting Hall, under the glow of a delicately lit ceiling of Rubens masterpieces and near the site where King Charles I was [...]
RUBENS AND CHARLES I WATCH LUXURY GONGS November 15, 2010 THE great and good of the British luxury brands industry gathered for one of the biggest events of the year last night, as its lobbying group, Walpole, held its annual awards. In Whitehall’s Banqueting Hall, under the glow of a delicately lit ceiling of Rubens masterpieces and near the site where King Charles I was [...]
Making money out of the East isn’t that easy November 10, 2010 DAVID Cameron is not having an easy time in China. Instead of idle rhetoric about trade and cooperation, Cameron’s visit has been overshadowed by human rights concerns, by global imbalances, and, perhaps most surprisingly, by a dispute over the symbolism of the poppy. China is one of the world’s most exciting countries, but it is [...]
BP venture to pay highest ever dividend October 12, 2010 TNK-BP HOLDING, the publicly traded part of BP’s joint venture in Russia, said yesterday it has recommended a record-high interim dividend of 124bn roubles (£2.6bn). Russia’s third-biggest oil company, which elected former BP chief executive Tony Hayward to its board last month, has recommended the payout in what several analysts said is a move to [...]
THE WORLD NEEDS MORE INNOVATION October 21, 2010 CAN you have too much innovation? You might be forgiven for thinking that you can, given that the financial meltdown was caused, in large part, by overenthusiasm for financial innovations such as collateralised debt obligations and credit-default swaps. Paul Volcker, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve, says he thinks the greatest financial innovation of [...]