Tullow down after £1bn share placing January 27, 2010 TULLOW oil shares plunged yesterday after the company raised £1bn to fund expansion in Uganda where it hopes to gain government support for a major acquisition. Shares fell as much as 5.6 per cent after the London-based oil explorer launched the placing. The firm – which has more licences in Africa than any other UK [...]
Q&A INSOLVENCY January 21, 2010 Q. I’m thinking of setting up a business, but what would happen if it all went wrong? Will I be declared bankrupt? A.The best way to protect yourself is to set up as a limited company right from the start, says Tim Carter, head of insolvency at law firm Stevens & Bolton. By doing this [...]
Labour can’t even organise a proper plot January 7, 2010 HOW incompetent can you be? If the Labour Party had any sense, it would remove Gordon Brown as soon as possible; all the polls show that Labour would gain at least some ground with any half-decent alternative leader. A change at this late stage is what the Tories dread the most. Instead, we had the [...]
BP’s fall takes fuel out of oil stocks but FTSE rises higher February 2, 2010 Britain’s top shares closed higher for the third straight session yesterday as miners and banks extended the previous day’s gains but BP dragged energy stocks lower with fourth-quarter results that missed expectations. The FTSE 100 was up 35.90 points, or 0.7 per cent at 5,283.31, after closing 1.1 per cent higher on Monday. Miners added [...]
UK house price fall slowing November 1, 2009 UK house prices fell at their slowest annual rate since June 2008 in October, dropping 4.2 per cent, due to an ongoing lack of housing for sale after the credit crunch, property data company Hometrack will say today. Hometrack’s survey of estate agents and surveyors showed that house prices rose 0.2 per cent in England [...]
UK house price fall slowing November 1, 2009 UK house prices fell at their slowest annual rate since June 2008 in October, dropping 4.2 per cent, due to an ongoing lack of housing for sale after the credit crunch, property data company Hometrack will say today. Hometrack’s survey of estate agents and surveyors showed that house prices rose 0.2 per cent in England [...]
Election timing is all as the economy wobbles January 17, 2010 It’s not supposed to be easy being Prime Minister, but even this one must wonder what he did in a former life to incur such wrath. Within a few days of launching election mode yet another miserable attempt at a coup had been made and failed, damaging the Government’s chances of re-election still further. Post [...]
Selfridges to make 100m November 29, 2009 Selfridges, the London luxury department store group, is today expected to unveil profits of £100m in its 100th year as the store is buoyed by a surge of wealthy overseas shoppers taking advantage of the weak pound. The retailer, which also has stores in Manchester and Birmingham’s Bullring centre and plans to open another in [...]
Buy-to-let is back as rents stabilise and low prices attract landlords December 3, 2009 BUY-TO-LET is starting to look like an attractive proposition once again, as lower house prices and a stabilising rental market result in more enticing yields. Data from LSL Property Services – the company that owns Your Move and Reeds Rains estate agencies – shows that annual returns on landlords’ investments have turned positive for the [...]
ECONOMIC DIARY November 29, 2009 Monday 30 NovemberUK: November GfK Consumer Confidence (12am)November Hometrack Housing Survey (12am)CBI Service Sector Survey (12am)October Net Consumer Credit (9.30am)October Net Lending Secured on Dwellings (9.30am)October Mortgage Approvals (9.30am)October Final M4 Money Supply (9.30am)Eurozone: November CPI Estimate (10am)US:November Chicago PMI (2.45pm) Tuesday 1 DecemberUK:November PMI Manufacturing (9.30am)November Nationwide House Prices (7am)Eurozone:November PMI Manufacturing (9am)October Unemployment [...]