Welcome to today's round-up of business news from The Times: what we're
saying, what they're saying
Top stories
The Times: A judge cleared the way for prosecutors to force UBS, the
Swiss banking giant, to reveal the names
of up to 20,000 wealthy clients as part of a tax investigation.
Financial Times: Moody's, the credit rating agency, said it was
starting disciplinary action against
some of its staff as it admitted it had incorrectly rated $1 billion of
complex debt securities.
The Daily Telegraph: Shares in London suffered their biggest
slide since March after manufacturing was declared in recession, house
prices plunged and oil soared.
Comment
Carl Mortished in The Times: Owning every
part of the production process from metal mine to packaging plant is an
unfashionable idea, but in some industries it is back with a vengeance.
Kristina Cooke, Reuters: Big US multinationals riding high on overseas
revenue face a challenge from slowdowns
in Europe and emerging markets and inflation worldwide.
Lex in Financial Times: What to do when you sell the soft drink
equivalent of Windows in a mature market? Coke's strong balance sheet and
free cashflow provide the necessary tools.
On the rise
The Times: A former IT technician at Body Shop, the ethical retailer,
was fined for market abuse in a rare
victory for the Financial Services Authority in its battle against insider
dealing.
Bloomberg: Oil rose for a
second day, by as much as 83 cents to $141.80 a barrel, after the
International Energy Agency said that supplies might not keep up with demand
until 2013.
The New York Times: The late Leona Helmsley, the US hotelier and real
estate magnate, left her fortune of
between $5 billion and $8 billion to her dogs.
Downside
The Times: Fears that the slump in the housing market will become a full-blown
crash intensified as a key survey showed prices plunging at their
fastest annual rate since the last recession.
BBC: Business confidence in Britain
fell to its lowest level since 1992 in June, according to BDO Stoy Hayward.
Reuters: US car sales plunged in June to a 15-year low but a month-end
clearance sale helped General Motors to retain
its No 1 spot, sending its shares higher.
Mergers and shakers
The Times: Informa, the exhibitions group, received
an approach from a private equity consortium led by Providence Equity,
valuing the company at £2.15 billion.
The Wall Street Journal: InBev nudged Anheuser-Busch to accept its
$46.35 billion buyout offer and
offered a fresh indication that it is willing to pursue a hostile bid.
The Wall Street Journal: New York has abandoned
efforts to force Richard Grasso, the former chairman of New York Stock
Exchange, to return part of his $187.5 million pay package.
Around Asia
South China Morning Post: Manufacturing in China expanded last month at
the slowest rate in almost three years as input costs soared to new highs,
suggesting weaker growth.
The Times: As many as five million Indian truckers plan to go
on strike on Thursday to protest against a surge in fuel prices and a
claim for trillions of rupees in tax arrears.
Bloomberg: South Korea's won, Asia's worst-performing currency after
the Thai baht, may stop falling
because the current-account deficit will narrow, a Bank of Korea official
said.
Look ahead
The Times: Gordon Brown is poised
to intervene in the battle over TNK-BP next week by appealing directly
to President Medvedev for help in defusing the dispute.
The Independent: Lord Harris, the chairman and chief executive of
Carpetright, gave warning that the market next year would be one
of the toughest in his 50-year career.
Reuters: Starbucks is to close 600 underperforming
stores and eliminate as many as 12,000 full and part-time positions.
MARKETS
FTSE 100 5,479.90 down 2.6% (Tuesday close)
Dow 11,382.26 up 0.3% (close)
S&P 500 1,284.91 up 0.4% (close)
Nasdaq 2,304.97 up 0.5% (close)
Nikkei 13,331.98 down 1% (latest)
Hang Seng 21,841.23 down 1.2% (latest)
Currencies
Sterling $1.994/1.2621 euros (latest)
Euro $1.58 (latest)
Commodities
West Texas crude $142.21 up $1.24 cents (latest)
Gold $941.80 down $2.70 (latest)
New York
Reuters: US stocks rose on
Tuesday after General Motors surprised Wall Street with
stronger-than-expected June sales. Financial shares, which had earlier led
fallers in the S&P 500, turned higher in afternoon trading as UBS upgraded
the credit card companies American Express, Capital One Financial and
Discover Financial Services to "neutral" from "sell". But concerns
about inflation, heightened as oil prices hit a fresh record, continued to
weigh on the market.
Asia
Bloomberg: Asian stocks
declined for the ninth time in ten days on concern that accelerating
inflation and slowing economic growth will curb spending and cut demand for
goods. Woolworths, Australia's No 1 retailer, retreated after a poll
showed that the country's confidence fell to the lowest in two decades. BHP
Billiton fell after Credit Suisse cut its earnings estimate for the
rival aluminum producers Alcoa and Century Aluminum. The MSCI
Asia Pacific Index was down 0.5 per cent in intraday trading.
Paul Larter
paul.larter@thetimes.co.uk
London
Bad news travels fast, as Eurasian Natural Resources (ENRC) discovered
yesterday. Shares in the Kazakhstani producer of ferrochrome for use in
stainless steel production fell 158p to £11.75 amid news of disappointing
prices agreed by a rival producer.
International Ferro Metals, a rival ferrochrome producer, fell 10.75p
to 111.25p. Ferrexpo, which mines iron ore, lost 36p to close at
359p, as Rafaele Genovese and Dave Webster, directors, sold shares.
The FTSE 100 dived 146 points to 5,479.9, approaching this year’s nadir of
5,414 reached at the time of the collapse of Bear Stearns in March. Dire
economic figures, including shrinking UK factory orders and fears of profit
warnings from banks, were the culprits. There were rumours of imminent
profit warnings from Deutsche Bank and UBS. HBOS dropped
below its rights issue price, down 7p at 269p.
Morgan Sindall, the construction company, dived 162.5p to 585.5p after it
announced declining demand for commercial property and for its
house-building unit. Cazenove cut its profit forecasts by 25 per cent.
Next led the slide for retailers, down 60p at 909.5p. There are fears
over bad debt at its Next Directory business, particularly after N Brown,
the catalogue retailer, up 1p to 184p, revealed that rising bad debt had
squeezed margins in the past two months.
Carphone Warehouse fell 14.4p to 183.5p. It had already said that its
TalkTalk division’s sales would slow as people stop moving home and figures
from the Nationwide detailed another slump in house prices, sending the
builders down further.
Robert Lindsay
robert.lindsay@thetimes.co.uk
AGENDA
INTERIMS
Terrace Hill Group
FINALS
Ashley House
Block Shield Corporation
Contentfilm
Cybit Holdings
Digital Marketing
GTL Resources
AGMs
Intercede Group
Nviro Cleantech
Millwall Holdings
Terrace Hill Group
Venue Solutions Holdings
EGMs
None scheduled
TRADING STATEMENTS
Balfour Beatty
CRH
Wood Group
Taylor Wimpey
ECONOMICS
BoE Q1 housing equity withdrawal (0930 BST)
UK June construction PMI (0930 BST)
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