City warns over rights issue rip off December 13, 2010 INVESTMENT banks have been slammed by the City’s top institutional investors for charging unfairly high fees to companies raising capital through rights issues. An inquiry commissioned by the Institutional Investor Council, backed by the Association of British Insurers and the National Association of Pension Funds, lashes out at investment banks today for charging underwriting fees [...]
Merlin claims to boost lending to businesses February 9, 2011 HOUSTON, we have an agreement.” So joked one of the chancellor’s key allies yesterday, clearly relieved to have finally signed a deal of sorts with the four Merlin banks. But the government has got precious little for the weeks it has spent locked in negotiations with HSBC, RBS, Lloyds and Barclays. Here City A.M. looks [...]
How business school helps with a job-hunt February 16, 2011 ASK people who are currently studying an MBA what their top priority is and they will almost all tell you that it’s finding a job after they graduate. Always true, perhaps, but more so at the moment when the economic future remains uncertain. We asked four recent MBA graduates how they used their time and [...]
Desert sands blowing into the gears of the economy January 31, 2011 THE LAST time Egypt unsettled international markets this badly was in 1973. On 6 October of that year, the Egyptian army mounted a shock assault on the Israeli occupied Sinai Peninsula. After initially losing ground, the Israeli army rapidly recovered, fighting back until a ceasefire was agreed on 25 October. The war, though relatively small, [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS November 25, 2010 Grant Thornton Grant Thornton has appointed a new head of retail: Barry Knight. Knight brings 20 years’ of financial advising experience in retail, tourism and travel. He has worked for Littlewoods, Burton Group (now Arcadia Group), Sears, Selfridges, Jaeger and Boots. In his new role at Grant Thornton, he will be leading the retail team [...]
Jain not a shoe-in at Deutsche November 17, 2010 SENIOR Deutsche Bank executives and members of the supervisory board – which will select the next chief executive — have signaled it is not a foregone conclusion that Anshu Jain will get the job. “The captain of the ship needs to give a direction and detect icebergs, but he doesn’t have to row the boat,” [...]
Low correlations and high liquidity ensure currency’s continued appeal November 23, 2010 FOR about a decade before the crisis, institutional investors were happy to accept that the currency markets were an area where active fund managers could add value. But they lost their faith in the asset class during 2008 when many currency managers lost money. Some of those managers who were running quantitative strategies and who [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS October 13, 2010 PwC The accountancy firm has appointed three new senior managers to its business continuity team, part of the risk assurance practice. Tom Buchanan, who previously worked at Barclays and Tesco, joins the crisis management team. James Cooke joins from Deloitte to focus on IT disaster and service recovery planning, while James Crask (pictured) will develop [...]
Sales of super-high heels lift sales at Kurt Geiger stores November 23, 2010 LUXURY shoe brand Kurt Geiger has reported a 25 per cent rise in turnover in the nine months to November this year, as ladies have flocked to buy its coveted 120mm-high heels. Sales of its highest heels quadrupled compared with a year earlier, it said in its third quarter trading update. Sales of red and [...]
CONTAGION IS STILL A RISK FOR THE EURO November 23, 2010 BORIS SCHLOSSBERG DIRECTOR OF CURRENCY RESEARCH, GFT AFter several weeks of tense negotiations and turbulence in the credit markets, Ireland accepted a financial aid package from EU and the IMF. Although the size of the deal will not be known for days, analysts put the total at about €100bn – 40 per cent of the [...]