Finance Matters

• 09Sep

  UK employment market ‘recovering’

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  From The BBC:

  The UK jobs market is starting to show signs of recovery, according to a survey of recruitment agencies.The research, produced by Markit Economics, finds “marginal increases” in both permanent and temporary appointments in August. “This is first time we have seen really positive news for the UK jobs market in 17 months,” the report said. However, it added that it was too early to say whether the encouraging figures signalled an end to the recession. A number of economic surveys this week have been more positive about the state of the UK economy, but the BBC’s chief economic correspondent Hugh Pym describes it as “bumping along at the bottom” at best. Business Secretary Lord Mandelson said he believed the economy was coming out of recession but warned there may still be problems ahead. “I think the signs are that it is [coming out of recession], but there is always a risk of a second recessionary dip,” he told the BBC.
  Bumping along the bottom is the best way to describe the path of t…

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• 09Sep

  Cities urge high-speed rail link

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  From The BBC:

  A £34bn high-speed rail network planned from London to Scotland should connect to similar lines already in Europe, city officials have said.Leaders from 11 UK cities have backed plans which would cut journey times. They say London to Manchester journey times could come down to one hour 13 minutes and London to Scotland trips could be made in under three hours. Manchester City Council leader Richard Leese said the UK’s railways have “not kept pace” with the growth of cities. Network Rail, which owns and operates Britain’s rail infrastructure, estimates journey times could be even faster. ‘Global stage’The cities involved are Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle upon Tyne, Nottingham and Sheffield – although their leaders have not put forward an actual route for the line. A British high-speed line could carry up to 15,000 passengers per hour each way between London and other major cities, with double-decker trains offering the po…

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• 09Sep

  Deadline is looming for XL claims

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  From The BBC:

  Holidaymakers who lost money when the XL travel group collapsed a year ago face a deadline of Friday to claim their refunds.XL, once the UK’s third largest package holiday group, fell into administration in September 2008, leaving tens of thousands of travellers stranded. The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) is paying refunds to those who missed out on package holidays as a result. Some have faced delays in receiving their payments owing to “legal issues”. UpdateThe rules state that anyone eligible for a refund must make a claim within a year of the collapse of the company. “The CAA will not accept claims arising from the failure of the XL Leisure Group after 11 September 2009. If you have still to submit a claim, you should ensure you do so before this deadline,” said a CAA spokeswoman. An estimated 240,000 customers had advance bookings with XL. Some 65,102 claims had been made to the CAA by the start of this month, of which 55,324 (85%) have been paid or turned down because of ineligi…

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• 09Sep

  Diageo rejects whisky jobs plan

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  From The BBC:

  Drinks giant Diageo is to press ahead with up to 900 job cuts after rejecting a government-backed alternative.A business case was submitted to the firm last week for keeping its Johnnie Walker bottling plant in Kilmarnock and Port Dundas distillery in Glasgow. But Diageo said the proposals were not commercially viable and its dialogue on the matter was now “closed”. Those involved in the campaign to keep the plants open have described Diageo’s decision as “catastrophic” The Johnnie Walker brand has been linked with Kilmarnock since 1820. It is the most widely distributed brand of blended Scotch whisky in the world. Diageo announced plans in July to cut 700 jobs by closing its bottling plant at Kilmarnock and a further 200 with the closure of its Glasgow distillery. It said the job losses would be partially offset by the creation of 400 new jobs in Fife. The proposals met widespread opposition and a multi-agency Johnnie Walker taskforce – bringing together trades unions, local authoriti…

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• 09Sep

  Websites ‘breaking consumer laws’

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  From The BBC:

  More than half of websites selling electronic goods were breaking European laws aimed at protecting consumers, according to an EU investigation.The analysis of 369 websites selling mobiles, DVD players and games consoles in 28 European countries found that 203 of them held misleading information. The biggest failure surrounded the right to return a product bought on the internet within seven days. Any websites which continue to break the law face fines. “We know from the level of complaints coming into European Consumer Centres that this is a real problem area for consumers,” said EU consumer commissioner Meglena Kuneva. “We discovered that more than half of the retailers selling online electronic goods are letting consumers down.” SweepAuthorities, such as trading standards departments, carried out the investigation in May. They were checking to see if the websites followed rules on providing clear information about the trader, the product, the price, and customers’ rights.
  Some 369…

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• 09Sep

  McLaren road car marks expansion

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  From The BBC:

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  The BBC’s Richard Scott takes an exclusive look at McLaren’s new super sports car
  Formula One racing group McLaren has unveiled a new road car that marks the creation of a new UK-based carmaker.It plans to build the cars in a factory that it will build next to the group’s headquarters in Woking. Plans to rival the likes of Ferrari and Aston Martin are part of a strategy to grow the business outside racing, where cost cutting pressure is fierce. The move could help cushion McLaren’s racing staff from job losses if F1 budgets are cut. New road car”I am confident that now is the right time for McLaren Automotive,” said chairman Ron Dennis.
  McLaren last produced its own road car, the F1, in 1998. The company began production on the road car in 1994, which was for a time the fastest production car ever made. A variant won the Le Mans 24-hour race in 1995. Since 2003, McLaren has been designing and manufacturing the Mercedes-Be…

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• 09Sep

  China’s Geely may bid for Volvo

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  From The BBC:

  China’s Geely Automotive says its parent company would bid for Volvo if Ford decides to sell the Swedish firm.The company said it would make an offer in conjunction with a government-backed investor and it expected Ford to decide whether to sell Volvo within a month. The purchase would be a big step for Geely, which is currently a relatively small domestic carmaker. It already has a joint venture with Manganeze Bronze to make 8,000 London taxis in China. Geely used to make the cheapest cars in China but has been moving towards appealing to more affluent customers. Marque salesChinese carmakers have expressed a great deal of interest in buying international car marques, although there has been limited success so far. Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery has agreed to buy the off-road Hummer brand from General Motors. Nanjing Automobile bought the assets of MG Rover in 2006 and Shanghai Automotive may end up owning a stake in Saab Automobile as part of the takeover by the luxury…

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• 09Sep

  Oil price up before Opec meeting

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  From The BBC:

  Oil prices have risen ahead of an Opec meeting, as a weaker US dollar made the commodity cheaper in other currencies.Light sweet crude for October delivery rose $3.10 to $71.12 a barrel as the dollar fell to its lowest level against the euro this year, to $1.4535. The rise came as oil ministers from the producers’ cartel Opec prepared to meet for a summit in Vienna. Saudi’s oil minister said the country would keep supplies steady and did not expect Opec’s supply policy to change. “Saudi Oil Minister Ali Al-Naimi, upon arrival in Vienna yesterday, has described the oil market as stable and current prices satisfactory,” the Saudi-owned Al-Hayat newspaper reported. ‘Hysteria-driven market’The meeting is due to begin at 2130 local time (1930 GMT). An hour after the meeting starts there will be figures out from the American Petroleum Institute showing how much crude oil is stockpiled in the US, with the volumes often having an influence on prices. Traders will also be keeping an eye on Trop…

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• 09Sep

  Market crisis ‘will happen again’

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  From The BBC:

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  Alan Greenspan: ‘This will happen again’
  The world will suffer another financial crisis, former Federal Reserve chief Alan Greenspan has told the BBC.”The crisis will happen again but it will be different,” he told BBC Two’s The Love of Money series. He added that he had predicted the crash would come as a reaction to a long period of prosperity. But while it may take time and be a difficult process, the global economy would eventually “get through it”, Mr Greenspan added. “They [financial crises] are all different, but they have one fundamental source,” he said.
  “That is the unquenchable capability of human beings when confronted with long periods of prosperity to presume that it will continue.” Speaking a year after the collapse of US investment bank Lehman Brothers, which was followed by a worldwide financial crisis and global recession, Mr Greenspan described the behaviour as “human nature”. He said the current crisis…

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• 09Sep

  The cost of the financial meltdown

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  From The BBC:

  Governments have been affected differently by the credit crunch. Public borrowing has been rising in all countries as the crisis has caused the economy to shrink, cutting tax revenues. But some countries, like the US and the UK, have been more severely affected as they already had large deficits and have had to spend heavily to bail out their banking sector. Other G20 countries have fared better. Use the map below to see how different countries’ budget deficits , surpluses and stimulus plans compare.
  You can see the BBC’s full coverage of the anniversary of the global financial meltdown…

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