I hear the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the biggest futures and options market on the planet, is doing the rounds of interested parties to find a PR company to handle the forthcoming clearing venture it plans in Europe. The Chicago Merc, now known by the rather less evocative name of CME Group since it merged with the Chicago Board of Trade and Nymex, has been quiet on the venture since it hired Andrew Lamb, a veteran of the London Clearing House, to run it in the summer.

CME Clearing Europe, based in London, currently has two full-time employees, but the search for someone to promote it suggests plans may be coming to fruition. The CME has applied to the Financial Services Authority for a licence to operate as a recognised clearing house and this could arrive as early as the end of this year, allowing the business to launch in early 2010.

It will provide more competition in the market for clearing, hitherto seen as a dull, nerd-infested backwater but now targeted by the exchanges as a route for expansion. The London Stock Exchange has looked at a business jointly owned by Fortis, the Benelux bank, and Nasdaq OMX.

Goldman Sachs abusing kittens! The bank, already attacked for pretty well anything save the impending end of the world in 2012 and the unstoppable rise of Jedward — and give us time, give us time — is now accused of the callous neglect of some adorable little ... Let me allow its neighbour, local paper The Villager, to take up the story.

Five sweet little kittens were born in Goldman’s new HQ in New York, the bank agreed to take care of the vets’ bills and home them with employees, and then ... nothing. It’s the thought of that great vampire squid wrapped around those innocent little whiskers — no, I can’t go on.

My Goldman man denies the charge, with the air of someone who knows something even worse is just around the corner. “Total cr*p.”

Yet again, charity auction proceeds with a hiccup

A curious evening at a gala dinner for Breast Cancer Care thrown by Allan Leighton, who used to run Royal Mail and Asda. Declan Curry, presenter of the BBC’s Money Show, was replaced, against his will, by an overenthusiastic audience member who believed she could do a better job at the charity auction.

Leighton recalled that at last year’s dinner a well-refreshed woman from an unrelated event had climbed on to the stage and berated Sir Stuart Rose over the quality of Marks & Spencer’s clothes. The evening raised about £100,000 and also saw Sir Gulam Noon, the “curry king” embroiled in the cash for honours scandal, win one raffle prize. Alas, it wasn’t a peerage.

Ping! An e-mail arrives announcing the winner of the National Business Award for Innovation. It is ... but ping! Another arrives from the winner of ... Ping! Another. And another. And yet another. Still they keep coming. A colleague gets another dozen. They do seem terribly keen to announce that the winner of the National Business Award for Innovation is ... damn, I’ve run out of space.

Right place, right time
In the blue corner: Eric Anstee

I first came across Eric Anstee as an Ernst & Young-trained accountant drafted in as finance director of Eastern Electricity ahead of its privatisation in the early 1990s. A lot has happened since then; Eastern, which he ran with John Devaney (now in the news at National Express), was sold to Hanson, and he assisted in the break-up of the Hanson empire.

He ran City broker Old Mutual for a while and was in charge of the Institute of Chartered Accountants. Anstee, no relation to Nick Anstee, by coincidence taking office today as Lord Mayor, is now head of a team at City of London Group.

This used to be best known as a PR company headed by mining veteran John Greenhalgh and the vehicle retains a couple of million of pounds invested in mining. “It’s got about £8 million net assets,” Anstee tells me. “They have been looking for someone to come on and develop a strategy and I think the timing is right.

“There’s a lot of opportunity with the banks retreating,” he says. In particular, the business will look at investing in professional practises such as lawyers and accountants. “It gives me the opportunity to build something from a fairly low base. And it’s a great name.”

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