Aviva sees new business rise by £690m after major restructuring October 30, 2014 Restructuring at insurer Aviva is paying off as reforms pushed through by chief executive Mark Wilson delivered a 15 per cent increase in new business in the year to date, worth £690m. Especially strong performances in Europe and Asia, which saw rises of 40 per cent and 47 per cent respectively, boosted the growth. Wilson, [...]
Motor insurer’s IPO could ignite the market September 16, 2015 Hastings’ float is putting the spark back into personal lines THE PERSONAL lines insurance market has been the less sexy relation to its commercial cousins in recent months. Zurich and RSA are dancing around the idea of a union, following the marriage of Aviva and Friends Life, not to mention XL Group’s successful play for [...]
Too soon to write off Aviva’s £5.6bn bid for Friends Life – Editor’s Letter November 26, 2014 Aviva’s New Zealand-born chief executive Mark Wilson comes from a family of insurance people and has been an investor in insurance companies since he was 15. Maybe it’s that pedigree that gives him the confidence to press ahead with a strategy that is being doubted by many experts. When he first came into Aviva, he [...]
City Moves for 14 August 2015 | Who’s switching jobs August 13, 2015 Lloyds Bank Commercial Banking Thomas Sandberg has been appointed associate director in the bank’s relationship solutions team within its financial institutions business. He joins from Bank of America Merrill Lynch, where he was vice president of the Nordic market solutions group. Sandberg has also previously held senior structured finance positions at RBS, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley [...]
Barclays’ second boss in a week exits bank: Sir Mike Rake follows Antony Jenkins as chairman John “Mack the Knife” McFarlane wields axe July 15, 2015 Barclays deputy chairman Sir Mike Rake has become the second casualty of newly-installed chairman John McFarlane in a week, after he confirmed plans to leave the bank “by the end of 2015” yesterday – which leaves the rest of the Barclays board looking decidedly exposed, analysts have suggested. BT chairman and Confederation of British [...]
Aviva’s boss Mark Wilson wins over City sceptics to £5.3bn Friends Life deal with cost saving promises December 2, 2014 Aviva chief executive Mark Wilson has won over some of his harshest critics with promises of £225m in cost savings if the proposed £5.3bn Friends Life deal goes through. The companies yesterday confirmed the terms of the deal, and Panmure Gordon analyst Barrie Cornes, who was one of the City’s most vocal opponents of the [...]
EU referendum: Asda, HSBC, Vodafone and nearly 200 sign letter saying Brexit would threaten jobs – but Tesco, Morrisons and Sainsbury’s are not on the list February 23, 2016 The bosses of HSBC, BT, Vodafone and Asda are among those to have put their name to an open letter backing the remain camp and Prime Minister David Cameron's reforms in Europe. More than a third of the UK's biggest companies were represented in the letter, which was published in The Times this morning, saying they represented [...]
29 May on this day May 28, 2015 2004: Bath made their last appearance in a big Twickenham game, losing the Premiership final to Wasps 10-6. Bath had been England’s dominant club side for over a decade, winning 10 cup finals in 13 years from 1984 and six league titles in six years from 1989. Here Simon Shaw consoles his England team-mate Mike [...]
City Moves for 04 August 2015 | Who’s switching jobs August 3, 2015 Legal & General Investment Management Andrzej Pioch has been promoted to co-fund manager in the investment management company’s multi-index team. He joined Legal & General Investment Management in July 2014 as fund manager from Aviva Investors. Argo Group International Holdings The underwriter of specialty insurance and reinsurance products has appointed Steve McGill as global head [...]
Ex-Towergate boss Mark Hodges is named new British Gas manager April 14, 2015 INSURANCE veteran Mark Hodges has been appointed as managing director of British Gas, taking over from interim manager Ian Peters. In his new role, which he takes up from 1 June, Hodges will be paid a basic salary of £625,000, as well as an annual bonus of up to 100 per cent of his salary [...]