Financial news

• Jeremy Corbyn to put pressure on Tories over public sector pay cap

  27-06-2017 23:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Labour leader will table amendment to Queen’s speech calling for 1% ceiling on public sector pay to be scrappedJeremy Corbyn will seek to exploit the anti-austerity mood in the new House of Commons and put pressure on Conservative MPs by tabling an amendment to the Queen’s speech calling for the public sector pay cap to be scrapped.Many public sector workers have seen their real living standards fall as a result of the 1% a year ceiling imposed by George Osborne in 2012 after two yea
  
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• Green's 'main purpose' in BHS sale was to avoid pension liability, says watchdog

  27-06-2017 20:20 via theguardian.com
  
  Pensions Regulator publishes report into how tycoon was pushed into agreeing to pay £363m to rescue retailer’s schemeSir Philip Green was pushed to pay into BHS’s pension after the industry regulator found the “main purpose” in selling the department store was to prevent taking on liability for the scheme.The Pension Regulator on Tuesday published its report into a deal under which Green agreed to hand over £363m in cash to rescue the BHS pension scheme, and s
  
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• Singhsbury’s store becomes Morrisinghs after legal threat

  27-06-2017 19:48 via theguardian.com
  
  Egged on by customers, owner finds new name for Tyneside convenience storeA shopkeeper has dealt with the threat of legal action from Sainsbury’s over his similarly named store by changing its name from Singhsbury’s to Morrisinghs.Jel Singh Nagra, 42, has changed the name of his convenience store in West Allotment, North Tyneside, after Sainsbury’s said its original name, Singhsbury’s, was too similar to its own branding. Continue reading...
  
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• Google fine: EU is not waging underhand trade war against ​​US tech firms | Nils Pratley

  27-06-2017 19:41 via theguardian.com
  
  The European commission is not showing signs of anti-American bias – its actions will benefit consumers worldwideLet’s start by laying one falsehood to rest. In fining Google €2.42bn (£2.14bn), the European commission is not engaged in a form of underhand trade warfare against US technology companies. Instead, Margrethe Vestager, the EU competition commissioner, is addressing a central commercial question of the digital age: to what extent should companies such as Google b
  
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• Ladbrokes could face inquiry after betting addicts' details found in bin bag

  27-06-2017 19:30 via theguardian.com
  
  Gambling Commission says it is looking into bookmaker’s compliance with data protection laws after incident in GlasgowLadbrokes could face an investigation from the gambling regulator over an incident in which confidential information about betting addicts, including photos, names and addresses, was found in a bin bag on the street.The Gambling Commission said it was looking into the bookmaker’s compliance with data protection laws after a passer-by found the sensitive documents outs
  
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• UK banks ordered to hold more capital as consumer debt surges

  27-06-2017 19:19 via theguardian.com
  
  Bank of England brings forward annual stress tests as it grows anxious over lenders’ exposure to consumer creditThe Bank of England is to force banks to strengthen their financial position in the face of a rapid growth in borrowing on credit cards, car finance and personal loans.The intervention by Threadneedle Street means banks will need to set aside as much as £11.4bn of extra capital in the next 18 months and is intended to protect the financial system from the 10% rise in consum
  
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• Extra £1bn for Northern Ireland will barely dent public finances

  27-06-2017 19:04 via theguardian.com
  
  UK government will spend £802bn this year, so funds ‘not much more than rounding error’, says IFS deputy headThe deal to spend an extra £1bn over two years in Northern Ireland will do little to disturb the public finances.Of the funds, about £400m will be directed at new physical infrastructure, £150m on better broadband, and £40m will tackle deprivation. Another £350m will be spent on health and education services.Continue reading...
  
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• Grenfell Tower fire: MP says public must be told to stop using Hotpoint model

  27-06-2017 18:54 via theguardian.com
  
  Government should update advice until precise reason fridge-freezer caught fire is known, says Andy SlaughterThe government should immediately tell consumers to stop using the Hotpoint fridge-freezer model identified as the initial cause of the Grenfell Tower fire, according to an MP whose west London constituency experienced a serious tower block fire in 2016.In a letter to the business secretary, Greg Clark, the Labour MP Andy Slaughter said the government should update its advice as a matter
  
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• Ice-cream and booze fuel sales scorcher for supermarkets

  27-06-2017 18:35 via theguardian.com
  
  Higher inflation and even higher temperatures spur healthy 5% boost in sales revenue Booming sales of ice-cream, gin and cider during the heatwave have combined with a jump in inflation to deliver the biggest rise in supermarket sales in more than five years.Sales revenue rose 5% in the 12 weeks to the end of June, the biggest increase since March 2012, in stark contrast to the 0.2% decline a year before, according to the latest market share data from Kantar Worldpanel. Continue reading...
  
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• IMF cuts US growth forecast, as Bank of England tells banks to boost capital - as it happened

  27-06-2017 18:09 via theguardian.com
  
  UK central bank has ordered British banks to set aside more capital, and rushed forwards its consumer credit stress testsLatest: IMF criticises Trump and cuts growth forecastsSummary: What we learned from the BoE todayMark Carney press conference highlightsBank of England tells banks to set aside more capitalGOOGLE HIT WITH RECORD EU FINE5.09pm BSTAnd finally (probably), European stock markets have ended the day in the red.In London the FTSE100 lost 12 points to 7434, despite mining shares rally
  
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• Ocado's self-drive vehicle makes deliveries in first UK trials

  27-06-2017 18:02 via theguardian.com
  
  Retailer tests plans for ‘Smart Platform’ online shopping business with driverless delivery vehicle developed by OxboticaOcado has sent a self-driving truck trundling through the backstreets of Woolwich, south-east London, as part of the UK’s first trial of autonomous grocery deliveries.The small vehicle, developed by Oxford-based Oxbotica, is spending 10 days shipping food and snacks to Ocado customers who live in the area, to test Ocado’s plans for its “Smart Plat
  
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• Local authorities not up to speed with fast broadband delivery

  27-06-2017 16:45 via theguardian.com
  
  Eleven areas fail to provide the government’s minimum download proposal of 10Mbps, says Which?It might be home to the Shard skyscraper, City Hall and Tate Modern, but the central London borough of Southwark has been named one of the 20 worst places in the UK for broadband speeds, in a list that stretches from Orkney to Bexhill-on-Sea.An analysis of 719,000 speed tests by the consumer organisation Which? found that 11 local authority areas didn’t meet the minimum download speed propos
  
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• World's first floating windfarm to take shape off coast of Scotland

  27-06-2017 15:55 via theguardian.com
  
  Turbines for £200m Hywind project will be towed from Norway across North Sea and moored to seabed off north-east ScotlandThe world’s first floating windfarm has taken to the seas in a sign that a technology once confined to research and development drawing boards is finally ready to unlock expanses of ocean for generating renewable power.After two turbines were floated this week, five now bob gently in the deep waters of a fjord on the western coast of Norway ready to be tugged acros
  
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• Sky Sports to replace numbered channels and slash prices in revamp

  27-06-2017 15:29 via theguardian.com
  
  Broadcaster to launch themed channels for football, golf and cricket, with cheapest package costing £18 a monthSky is scrapping its numbered sports channels and replacing them with themed offerings focused on specific sports – led by football, golf and cricket – as it combats falling viewer numbers with a branding revamp and a cheaper viewing package. The retirement of Sky Sports 1,2,3,4 and 5 and the introduction of a new package two-thirds cheaper than current prices represen
  
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• For too long, Pakistani schools have been a means to provide jobs, rather than education

  27-06-2017 15:04 via theguardian.com
  
  Pakistan is trying to spend its way out of its education crisis. It can’t. But the government can learn about accountability and efficiency from private schools
  With more than 20 million children out of school, Pakistan has, at last, begun talking about its education crises. Our media and civil society routinely grill politicians on a lack of funding for public schools. Opinion sections of national newspapers usually publish a few articles a week on how the lack of quality education is bec
  
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• Google fined record €2.4bn by EU over search engine results

  27-06-2017 14:14 via theguardian.com
  
  Brussels claims tech giant abused market dominance by manipulating its search engine results to favour its own comparison shopping serviceThe European Union has handed Google a record-breaking €2.42bn (£2.14bn) fine for abusing its dominance of the search engine market in building its online shopping service, in a dramatic decision that has far-reaching implications for the company.By artificially and illegally promoting its own price comparison service in searches, Google denied both
  
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• Many Britons are hooked on costly credit. Here’s what the new minister should do | Rowena Young

  27-06-2017 14:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The Tories have appointed Guy Opperman to oversee financial inclusion. But what indebted Britons really need is access to more responsible lendersWhat value a life? For Jerome Rogers, a 20 year-old motorcycle courier, it was painfully low. Within 24 hours of a visit from a bailiff, he was found by his brother and a friend to have hanged himself. The sum of his debts? Around £1,000, or a couple of weeks’ income on the average UK wage.Tragically, he is no longer here to tell it, but st
  
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• Net-a-Porter owner opens tech hub in London

  27-06-2017 13:25 via theguardian.com
  
  New building in White City shows increased commitment to IT, and the UK, after merger with Italy’s YooxThe owner of the Net-a-Porter luxury fashion website is to hire at least 100 more IT experts over the next two years as it shrugs off the impact of the Brexit vote to open a tech hub in the UK.Designed by Nicholas Grimshaw, the architect behind the Eden Project domes in Cornwall, the hub, in west London’s White City, can house up to 650 IT experts. That is an increase from the 500 e
  
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• Rohan Silva: we need a union for entrepreneurs

  27-06-2017 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The former adviser to David Cameron and Second Home co-founder on immigration, childcare and the government’s disregard for small business“When I was in No 10, the business department would routinely say small businesses are inefficient, that we were misguided in encouraging more people to start them. I think that’s a pretty perverse world view,” says Rohan Silva, co-founder of Second Home – a co-working space, with members including creative and tech businesses and
  
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• Fault in ADT burglar alarm left our rental property unprotected

  27-06-2017 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  We discovered the alarm wasn’t working and have no idea how long it’s been out, but ADT isn’t acknowledging the problemWe have an ADT burglar alarm on our house in west London, but recently discovered it wasn’t working and have no idea how long it has been out. It’s a rental property and is between tenancies, so we rely on the alarm for security. Despite a number of phone calls and emails to ADT, the only explanation has come from a call handler who reluctantly told
  
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• Dutch companies set up giant bread bins to help cities tackle rat scourge

  27-06-2017 08:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Businesses in Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam are getting involved in efforts to collect waste bread and turn it into biogas and fertiliserOnce upon a time, you would throw your old bread to the birds. But in the Netherlands, where an excess of crumbs is feeding a growing scourge of rats, people are starting to turn to massive bread bins instead. Rather than ending up in the street or the dump, collected bread waste is taken to anaerobic digesters and turned into biogas or made into fertilise
  
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• Consumer confidence collapsed after general election, YouGov finds

  27-06-2017 06:58 via theguardian.com
  
  Hung parliament, pay squeeze and housing slowdown took consumers’ spirits to lowest level since Brexit vote, says pollConsumer confidence slumped in the 12 days after the general election to its lowest level since the aftermath of last year’s Brexit vote, as households were unnerved by the impact of a hung parliament.A poll by YouGov found that consumers feared the unstable political situation would hit house prices and dent their living standards, which have already come under press
  
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• Co-op Bank abandons sale talks as it edges towards rescue deal

  27-06-2017 06:58 via theguardian.com
  
  Lender says plan to secure hundreds of millions from hedge funds would allow it to ‘safeguard its values and ethics’The Co-operative Bank has abandoned talks over a sale after edging closer to clinching a deal with hedge funds to stump up millions of pounds to bolster its financial position. The extra financing from hedge funds comes four months after the bank had put itself up for sale, weakened by low interest rates and its costly turnaround programme. Continue reading...
  
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• UK financial stability report: five things to watch - Financial Times

  27-06-2017 06:06
  Financial Times
  UK financial stability report: five things to watch
  Financial Times
  This morning at 10.30, the Bank of England will publish its twice-yearly report on UK financial stability. Mark Carney, the bank's governor, will present the report alongside any recommendations from last week's Financial Policy Committee meeting ...
  BoE warns asset management 'fragmentation' could harm UK's financial ...Investment Weekalle 344 nieuwsartikelen »
  
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• Almost half of highly skilled EU workers 'could leave UK within five years'

  27-06-2017 01:01 via theguardian.com
  
  Deloitte study finds 47% were considering leaving after Brexit, while overall one-third of non-British workers could leaveOne third of non-British workers are considering leaving the UK, with highly skilled workers from the EU most likely to go, according to new research into the impact of Brexit on the jobs market.The consultancy firm Deloitte found 47% of highly skilled workers from the EU were considering leaving the UK in the next five years. In a report on Tuesday, it warns of serious impli
  
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• Potential Martin Shkreli jurors: we can't be impartial over 'most hated man' in US

  27-06-2017 00:08 via theguardian.com
  
  Some interviewed said they couldn’t be part of the pharmaceutical CEO’s trial because of his notoriety for raising the cost of a life-saving drug 5,000%Several potential jurors at the federal securities fraud trial of Martin “Pharma Bro” Shkreli were excused on Monday after telling the judge they couldn’t be impartial toward the flamboyant former pharmaceutical CEO because of his notoriety for raising the cost of a life-saving drug 5,000%.
  At jury selection in a Bro
  
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