BEST FOOT FORWARD August 9, 2009 KURT Geiger, the high street shoe store favoured by pop stars, yesterday revealed a 21 per cent rise in earnings over the past year to 31 January 2009. The group, in a filing to Companies House, said that like-for-like sales had grown by seven per cent, boosted by business expansion. Earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation [...]
Trying to second-guess stocks is harder than ever October 4, 2009 EQUITY investors haven’t had much time for cliché this year. Earlier this year, they ignored dire predictions – coming from anyone with a keyboard or a microphone – that financial markets might never recover. Instead, they seized upon historically low valuations – and the trillions spent by governments around the world – and began the [...]
Channel Five owner posts a profit slump August 31, 2009 GERMANY’S Bertelsmann posted a 30 per cent drop in first-half operating profit due to a decline in advertising and consumer spending and said cost cuts had held off worse results. The owner of Channel Five parent company RTL Group, which reported results last week, and publisher Random House, implemented strict cost savings earlier in the [...]
Social networking turns profitable September 21, 2009 FACEBOOK, now with 300m users, announced last week that it has broken even. Its revenues cover operating costs. In internet language, one’s “burnrate” is how much money you are losing monthly until you do just that – break even. What is the business model of Facebook? Well, there is traditional and self-service advertising, virtual property [...]
Liberty launches a second fundraising September 23, 2009 SHOPPING centre operator Liberty International yesterday rattled analysts and investors after tapping shareholders for the second time this year in a £280.5m fundraising. The group announced a placing of 56.1m shares, representing 9.9 per cent of Liberty issued share capital, at 500p each. The price is an 11.3 per cent discount to Tuesday’s closing price. [...]
House prices gain in June July 28, 2009 HOUSE prices have risen for the first time month-on-month since January last year, according to the Land Registry’s latest survey. In the latest sign of stability in the housing market, homes in England and Wales rose in value in June by 0.1 per cent to £153,046 on average, the authoritative survey found. The survey said [...]
Third rise for house prices July 30, 2009 HOUSE prices rose for the third month in a row in July in a further sign of stability for the UK property market, putting the average price of a UK home at £158,871. The Nationwide monthly survey showed a rise of 1.3 per cent on a seasonally-adjusted basis while the smoother quarter-on-quarter measure rose 2.6 [...]
Third rise for house prices July 30, 2009 HOUSE prices rose for the third month in a row in July in a further sign of stability for the UK property market, putting the average price of a UK home at £158,871. The Nationwide monthly survey showed a rise of 1.3 per cent on a seasonally-adjusted basis while the smoother quarter-on-quarter measure rose 2.6 [...]
UK house prices seen rising August 10, 2009 STRONG growth in buyer enquiries and price expectations improved to their highest level since April 2007, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) will reveal today. Their latest market survey showed that only 23 per cent of surveyors reported a fall in house prices over the last three months, taking the net balance to -9 [...]
UK house prices seen rising August 10, 2009 STRONG growth in buyer enquiries and price expectations improved to their highest level since April 2007, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) will reveal today. Their latest market survey showed that only 23 per cent of surveyors reported a fall in house prices over the last three months, taking the net balance to -9 [...]