WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING
FINANCIAL TIMES
FORD SELLS AUSTRALIAN LOAN BOOK TO MACQUARIE
Ford, the US carmaker that underwent a debt-for-equity swap this year to bolster its balance sheet, has quit Australia’s retail car finance market after selling a A$1bn (US$874m) motor loan portfolio to Macquarie Group. The Australian investment bank is expanding its presence in the sector as well as filling a market void left by Ford’s withdrawal. It follows the earlier departures from Australia of GE Money.
BC PARTNERS EYES FLOTATIONS
BC Partners will today present its investors with plans to become one of the first European private equity groups to float some of its top-performing portfolio companies if markets remain buoyant next year. The plans would boost BC’s hopes of raising a new multibillion-euro fund next year by repairing some of the reputational damage done by ill-judged deals, such as its buy-out of Foxtons, the London estate agency.
REDHALL SHARES DROP 14 PER CENT
Shares in Redhall fell 14 per cent yesterday after the specialist engineer warned of lower-than-expected volumes in the nuclear and chemical sectors. The company said profits would be marginally below market expectations. As a result its shares fell 25p to close at 156p.
GAS PROFIT MARGINS ‘BIGGEST IN DECADE’
Gas suppliers are making bigger prof it margins than at any time in the past decade because of a plunge in wholesale prices that has not been matched by a fall in household bills, a leading consultancy has ?calculated. The Energy Contract Company suggested gas sales could be “exceptionally” profitable, depending on when suppliers had bought the gas.
THE TIMES
BRITISH AIRWAYS’ ‘FIGHT FOR SURVIVAL’ IS OVER
Willie Walsh, the chief executive of British Airways, has signalled that the immediate crisis facing the airline has receded and it is no longer in a “fight for survival”. He added that the airline’s merger with Iberia should be completed before the end of the year. Walsh has also expressed an interest in buying bmi.
INFRASTRUCTURE CHANGE ‘WILL FAST-TRACK PLANNING’
More than 50 of Britain’s biggest energy projects, including wind farms, power stations, gas storage sites and high-voltage transmission lines, could be fast-tracked through the planning system under powers handed to the Government. Ed Miliband, the Energy Secretary, said that Britain’s planning system was not fit for purpose.
The Daily Telegraph
KPMG AND PWC REYKJAVIK OFFICES ARE RAIDED BY ICELANDIC POLICE
Police have raided the offices of KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in Reykjavik, seizing documents and computer data as part of an investigation into alleged criminal activity at three collapsed Icelandic banks. The targets of the raids were the firms’ banking clients Kaupthing, Glitnir and Landsbanki.
FAILED GROUP’S £11M RUBY “NEAR WORTHLESS”
A gem valued at £11m on the books of a failed construction company could be nearly worthless, reports suggest. The 2kg ruby, called the Gem of Tanzania, once underpinned the finances of Wrekin Construction, which went into administration in March with the loss of around 500 jobs.?The stone could be worth just around £100.
WALL STREET JOURNAL
COLLAPSE OF PENSKE DEAL SPELLS END FOR SATURN
A deal to save General Motors’s Saturn brand fell through after former race-car driver Roger Penske unexpectedly abandoned a bid to buy its network of dealers, prompting GM to say it would shut the operation down.
FINRA PROPOSES A DATABASE EXPANSION
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority proposed expanding its corporate-bond database to include all asset-backed securities, a move that would make it easier to oversee securities that were at the heart of the credit crisis. Pending Securities and Exchange Commission approval, Finra would collect ABS transaction data. The independent brokerage regulator would decide whether to distribute the data.