Berkeley pays bosses £60m July 7, 2008 Multi-Millionaire property entrepreneur Tony Pidgley and three of his fellow directors at housebuilder Berkeley Group are getting a £60m pay-out, it has emerged. Pidgley and the three other members of the management team will net around 7 per cent of the company, which is valued at around £770m. The pay-outs come at a time when [...]
It is still not the time to be buying into retail stocks July 31, 2008 The European General Retail sector has fallen by about 25 per cent so far this year. But does this sharp decline in price make retail shares a good buy? We think that there are a variety of reasons to remain wary. The first reason is a depressed outlook for consumer demand. With continued worries about [...]
Bet on inflation to beat the downturn August 26, 2008 The market climate has created just the right conditions to make a mint, says Katie Hope It’s pretty grim out there at the moment. Food and fuel prices are rising at the fastest rate on record, contributing to soaring inflation. Even Bank of England governor Mervyn King, who is charged with keeping inflation at around [...]
Merrill soars on bet worst could be over July 30, 2008 Shares in embattled US banking titan Merrill Lynch jumped nearly 8 per cent yesterday after the bank agreed to sell a massive debt portfolio at a discount, raising investor hopes it was putting its problems behind it. CEO John Thain has gone back to shareholders to boost the bank’s capital reserves, despite repeated assurances to [...]
The perfect storm July 16, 2008 Higher than expected inflation figures and growing concerns about the banking sector knocked London’s FTSE 100 index of leading stocks down 2.4 per cent yesterday to under 5,200. The benchmark index has now fallen 23 per cent since a June 2007 high and is in clear bear market territory. Bank stocks, unsettled by fears that [...]
Merrill eyes Bloomberg sale July 7, 2008 American investment bank Merrill Lynch is in negotiations to sell its 20 per cent stake in financial data and news firm Bloomberg, as it seeks to raise more cash to firm up its balance sheet. Talks with the firm’s founder and New York mayor Michael Bloomberg are still at an early stage, according to those [...]
Barratt close to securing debt deal July 10, 2008 Housebuilder Barratt Developments is today expected to reveal it has managed to renegotiate a refinancing package with its bankers. Barratt, which has £1.7bn debt and a market capitalisation of just £140m, has been negotiating with lenders to extend repayment of £400m debt due in April , as well as agree changes to its debt covenants [...]
Persimmon in mass job cull July 7, 2008 Persimmon, Britain’s most profitable housebuilder, will announce tomorrow that it is cutting 20 per cent of its workforce, in the latest mass cull to hit the beleaguered sector. Persimmon is expected to say it is making at least 1,000 redundancies in a trading update on Tuesday, as it attempts to reduce costs and ride out [...]
London and New York need each other July 21, 2008 Much fuss is made about the “lead” or “lag” that London shows vis-ą-vis New York in the financial and business sector. Whenever studies such as the Global Financial Centres Index report is published, many commentators pore over the tables to see by what degree London or New York is ahead. This misses the point: more [...]
Don’t be spooked by inflation: there are ways to protect your portfolio August 15, 2008 Clever investors can protect themselves from the worst effects of rising prices, says Esther Shaw Figures out last week showed that inflation in the UK, as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI), jumped to 4.4 per cent in July, more than double the Government’s 2 per cent target. On other measures, the figure is [...]