CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS March 14, 2012 KPMG Forensic KPMG has announced the appointment of James Siswick as director of its financial services forensic team. He will help drive the expansion of the firm’s financial crime business, with anti-money laundering and sanctions as his key areas of interest. Siswick joins after fourteen years at Deloitte, where he most recently worked as director [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS March 14, 2012 KPMG Forensic KPMG has announced the appointment of James Siswick as director of its financial services forensic team. He will help drive the expansion of the firm’s financial crime business, with anti-money laundering and sanctions as his key areas of interest. Siswick joins after fourteen years at Deloitte, where he most recently worked as director [...]
Ex-HBOS boss in battle with FSA over fine April 22, 2012 PETER Cummings, the man behind some of the most high profile loans made by Halifax Bank of Scotland (HBOS), has been handed a seven-figure fine by the City regulator. The former corporate boss is believed to have been handed a “warning notice” by the Financial Services Authority, which has been investigating the bank’s buying spree [...]
GEITHNER WANTS CHINA’S HELP ON IRAN January 10, 2012 US Treasury secretary Tim Geithner was in China yesterday to meet Vice-Premier Wang Qishan and senior party members Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang. Geithner is there to push China to join the international sanctions imposed on Iran, in an effort to make the theocratic state drop its nuclear plans, and to discuss the strength of [...]
A leading economist’s view on how to manage financial regulation for the long term February 29, 2012 ALL financial regulation is inherently procyclical. After a crisis has occurred, the immediate, inherent response is “that must never be allowed to happen again”. Thus after the South Sea Bubble, limited liability, joint stock incorporation was effectively forbidden. The problem is that regulations prevent agents doing what they want to do, and hence limit innovation [...]
EU bans Iran oil imports as nuclear row escalates January 23, 2012 EUROPEAN Union governments yesterday agreed to an immediate ban on all new contracts to import, buy or transport Iranian crude oil, a move to put pressure on Tehran’s disputed nuclear programme by shutting off its main source of foreign income. But the governments agreed to phase in the embargo, giving countries with existing contracts with [...]
Gulfsands shuts down its Syria project amid unrest December 12, 2011 UK-LISTED explorer Gulfsands Petroleum and Chinese company Sinochem have shut down their oil operations in Syria following European Union sanctions related to the crackdown on the uprising against the rule of President Bashar al-Assad, Gulfsands said. Although China has resisted sanctions on Syria, Sinochem is bound by EU sanctions since it bought its interest in [...]
Would YOU do the right thing? A business ethics quiz with a twist April 9, 2012 IMAGINE you return from the Easter break to face the following dilemma. You are a non-executive director of a firm of fund managers. One of your firm’s star managers, Brian Poole, after spells as a fund manager with a number of competitors, has now been with your firm for seven years. Due to his consistent [...]
FTSE pegged back by China growth fears March 5, 2012 Uncertainty over global growth dragged on investor sentiment in early trading along with a a renewed surge in oil prices. Brent crude climbed back up near $124 a barrel as another refiner announced cuts to Iranian imports, feeding fears of a supply crunch as the West presses ahead with sanctions on Tehran. Copper prices, however, [...]
Iran fright pushes oil up February 15, 2012 OIL prices soared to a six-month high yesterday after reports that Iran was banning oil exports to six European countries in protest at sanctions imposed on the country over its nuclear developments. Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands and France would be cut off, Iranian state TV claimed. Any such move would pre-empt the EU’s [...]