Finance Matters

• 02Sep

  Brown expands youth jobs scheme

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  From The BBC:

  The government is pledging a further 85,000 “opportunities” to help get young people into work.Prime Minister Gordon Brown will make the announcement at a Backing Young Britain summit in Birmingham. Under the scheme 45,000 young people will be helped to find jobs in retail, tourism, leisure and hospitality. The figure also includes a pledge by retailer Morrisons to give extra training to every one of its 36,000 employees under the age of 25. Backed by employersA further 5,000 opportunities, including apprenticeships with companies such as Centrica, Carillion and Royal Mail, will also be created. More than 150 employers, including Microsoft and Pfizer, are said to be supporting the Backing Young Britain campaign. The government has announced plans to help young people with training and employment as part of a £5bn investment. The campaign is to help people like Ben Willis, a 19-year-old from Middleton in Greater Manchester, who has had trouble finding work since leaving school. “E…

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• 02Sep

  E.On not to renew FA Cup backing

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  From The BBC:

  The Football Association has said energy firm E.On will not extend its sponsorship of the FA Cup – reported to be worth £32m – after the 2010 final.E.On had a high-profile four-year deal with the competition, during which it tried to encourage fans to go “green”. “The FA can confirm that E.On’s sponsorship of the FA Cup will come to a close at the end of the current 2009/10 season,” said the FA. E.On said a new UK sponsorship strategy meant it was not pursuing a renewal. ‘Open market'”The FA would like to thank E.On for its investment into and support of the competition to date,” said the English football’s governing body. “We now look forward to taking the FA Cup sponsorship opportunity to the open market for the 2010/14 period.” It is believed the FA is confident about signing another high-profile sponsorship deal. The FA has yet to agree a deal for the television rights to FA Cup that had been owed by broadcaster Setanta before its collapse this summer. It is estimated this ha…

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• 02Sep

  Currys firm summer sales down 6%

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  From The BBC:

  The owner of Currys and PC World, DSG International, has said sales fell by less-than-expected during summer, a sign consumers may be spending again.Sales at its stores that have been open at least one year fell 6% in the 16 weeks to 22 August, less than the 7% to 11% that analysts had forecast. “We remain cautious about the economic outlook,” DSG said, but added it was an “encouraging” period. DSG also sold its eight Electro World stores in Poland for 1 euro. Same-store electrical sales in the UK fell 14%, but the group was lifted by strong sales in the Nordic countries and its revamped stores in Italy. In addition to Currys and PC World, DSG owns Elkjop in the Nordic region and UniEuro in Italy….

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• 02Sep

  Threat to 510 jobs at UK lender

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  From The BBC:

  UK sub-prime lender Cattles has said it may cut as many as 510 jobs at its Welcome Financial Services subsidiary.The embattled firm is proposing closing 30 branches when the leases expire and reducing its sales and support teams. As well as trading under the Welcome brand, Batley-based Cattles also owns debt recovery firm Lewis. Cattles, hit hard by the economic downturn, appointed a new management team earlier this year and has been seeking ways to cut costs. Cattles discovered it had an extra £700m of bad loans on its books following a review of its accounts earlier this year, which it put down to a failure of internal controls. The company said it would now enter into a consultation process with the staff affected by the proposals, with about 510 receiving notice that they are at risk of redundancy….

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• 02Sep

  Australian growth beats forecasts

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  From The BBC:

  The Australian economy grew by more than expected in the second quarter of 2009, boosted by increases in household consumption and business investment.The economy expanded by 0.6% in the three months to June from the previous quarter, the government said. Analysts had forecast growth of 0.2% after a sharp drop in export prices was announced earlier in the week. The government has announced stimulus measures of more than 70m Australian dollars ($60m; £37m) in the past year. Australia is one of the few developed countries to have avoided falling into a recession. Adam Carr, chief economist at ICAP, called the results “fantastic”. “It’s looking like we will be firing on all cylinders in H2 [the second half of the year] and 2010,” he said. He added that he thought the Reserve Bank would raise interest rates before the end of the the year. On Tuesday, figures showed Australian export prices in the second quarter had fallen by 15.8% – the largest drop in the 50 years since records bega…

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• 02Sep

  Bristol brokers battle downturn

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  From The BBC:

  They started in a spare bedroom in Bristol, twenty eight years ago.Now, Peter Hargreaves and Steve Lansdown’s firm of investment advisers is valued at over £1bn on the London Stock Exchange. And after the worst year on the FTSE in decades, Hargreaves Lansdown has reported a profit of £73.1m in the year to June, up from £60.9m in the previous 12-month period. So how have they defied financial gravity? “We have our clients to thank,” Peter Hargreaves says in his typically bluff manner. “They’ve stuck with us through a difficult year, and told their friends about us too.” It is true that an additional £2bn has been invested this year, taking total investments to just shy of £12bn. But the Bristol firm has also, to some extent, bucked the recent massive falls in the market, protecting both their clients’ money and their own profits. Investments fallingMalcolm Davies is a probably a typical investor. At 65 he is still working, in an advertising agency.
  “My bi…

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• 02Sep

  Mayor condemns hedge fund plans

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  From The BBC:

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  Boris Johnson objects to plans to regulate hedge funds
  EU plans to regulate hedge funds are a “blatant attack” on London’s role as an international financial centre, the mayor of the city has said.Boris Johnson added that suspicions ministers in Paris and Berlin were using the proposals to deliberately target London were “not unfounded”. Mr Johnson fears plans to require hedge funds to be more open will drive many to relocate outside the EU. He visits Brussels later to lobby for a draft European directive to be changed. Hedge funds use sophisticated, complex investing strategies to make returns, even when markets are falling. PenaliseUnder the EU plans, they would be required to be more open and their ability to borrow would be limited. London is currently the home of 80% of Europe’s hedge funds, but they could be tempted to move to Switzerland and the US, the mayor argues, saying the directive would penalise all of the UK…

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• 01Sep

  Court hearing expat pensions case

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  From The BBC:

  A case that could affect the pensions of thousands of Britons who have retired abroad will be heard in a European court later.A group of 13 pensioners who have moved abroad want their UK state pension to rise in line with inflation each year. Inflation proofing only applies to UK pensioners who live in the European Economic Area or in 15 other countries, but not some commonwealth states. A two-hour hearing will be held at the European Court of Human Rights. This is the latest stage in a long-running legal challenge, and will be the end of the line in the legal process. The two-hour hearing is expected to take place in the Strasbourg court on Wednesday, but judgement in the case will not be made until March or April 2010. ApplicantsOne of those whose case is to be outlined during the hearing is Annette Carson, who emigrated to South Africa in 1989. After emigrating, she continued to make full contributions to her UK state pension and, on retirement in 2000, began to receive pension paym…

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• 01Sep

  Fall in Premier League spending

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  From The BBC:

  English Premier League clubs have spent about £450m in the summer transfer window – down from last summer’s £500m record, a report says.While the level of purchases from other top flight clubs remained the same, there had been a 40% fall in transfers from overseas clubs, Deloitte said. Sterling’s weakness and a 50% tax rate may have been factors, making it more costly to lure overseas stars, it said. Manchester City’s £120m summer splurge made up 27% of overall spending. Meanwhile, Aston Villa, Liverpool, Sunderland and Tottenham Hotspur have all reportedly spent more than £25m each. Capital drivenThe fall in spending, given the economic climate, was “expected”, said Paul Rawnsley, director in the sports business group at Deloitte. He added that the sale of the next round of international media rights sales was likely to generate higher revenue for Premier League clubs. But Mr Rawnsley said that “without further significant capital injections from owners, transf…

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• 01Sep

  Bulbs phased out from Tuesday

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  From The BBC:

  It is light, bright and has been around for 120 years. But from Tuesday the 100 watt bulb bows out from Britain.Under new EU rules the manufacture and import of 100 watt bulbs and all frosted bulbs will be banned in favour of the energy-saving variety. According to the Energy Saving Trust, compact fluorescent lamps (energy-saving bulbs) use 80% less electricity than standard bulbs. They could also save the average household £590 in energy over their lifetime of between eight and 10 years, and if all traditional bulbs were replaced, the carbon saving would be the equivalent of taking 70,000 cars off the road. Good reasons. But while cutting carbon and cheaper bills might entice many, others are less happy. Commonplace complaints about the new bulbs include they take too long to warm up, they are ugly, they give off poor light and they contain mercury – making them potentially hazardous and hard to get rid of.
  And according to campaigners, energy-saving bulbs can trigger migraines…

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