Wall Street rallied today in a dazzling return of investor confidence only a day after US financials were slaughtered. The Dow Jones gained 279.01 point (3.51%), the S&P 500 35.02 points (4.35%), and the Nasdaq was up 66.21 points. (4.60%). Marketwatch makes and interesting point with Jeffrey Kleintop, chief market strategist, LPL Financial, as saying: [...]
The announcement by RBS yesterday that it expected to write down £28 billion was extraordinary. Fears that the bank may be fully nationalised drove the share price down 67%. However, the announcement was extraordinary not simply because it would represent the biggest single loss in UK corporate history - but also because of the timing. [...]
Alistair Darling’s Pre-Budget report was received among a flurry of interest and excitement, but anyone expecting tax cuts to help the UK’s small businesses and entrepreneurs will be left sorely disappointed. A cut in VAT from 17.5% to 15% was announced, ostensibly to help consumers - and yet consumers would be hit with rises on [...]
UK banks such as RBS, HBOS, Barclays and Lloyds have had it bad - share prices have plunged wiping billions from their company values, and commercial markets have frozen up leaving them in need of government help to remain afloat. During the drama of the financial crisis, everyone seems to have forgotten about the ongoing [...]
Hell - the DJI has already fallen through 9,000 tonight, only 4 days after crashing through 10,000 points - and the fall is continuing through the last half hour of normal trading. Currently the DJI is just above 8,900 points, a loss of over 3.8% on the day. That’s a consecutive loss of 18% over [...]
As yesterday morning’s speaker on BBC Radio 4′s “Thought for the Day” urged a bleary-eyed nation to consider in its prayers the plight of bankers, whose lives may be torn apart by the credit crisis, and bear in mind their efforts in support of charity, a new day of financial turmoil was about to break. [...]
We’ve seen Northern Rock and Bradford & Bingley collapse, the Cheshire and Derbyshire Building Societies rescued, and even Halifax Bank of Scotland required a bail-out from Lloyds TSB. Turmoil in the world’s markets mean that credit around the globe has literally frozen up, and banks face the very real possibility of a systemic meltdown of [...]
A crisis might be a time for action rather than questions but with the scale of the problems facing the UK banking sector escalating, one particular question regularly bubbles to the surface. Is Grupo Santander any more likely to emerge from the credit crisis in sound shape than some of its failing European rivals? Santander [...]
Stock markets face a further crash over October, as a combination of bad economic data, credit derivative write downs, and the threat of further bank failures, plague financial markets already freezing up. The finance sector is bracing itself for further nasty shocks over the new few weeks, as a slew of worsening economic factors come [...]
The nationalisation of Bradford & Bingley is the most blatant case of legalised bank robbery this country has ever seen, with almost a million shareholders likely to lose a fortune. The whole point of having shareholders in a democracy is that they own the company and can decide its fate between them, including sacking the [...]
Wachovia Corporation (WB) When Harvard economist, Professor Kenneth Rogoff - formerly head of the IMF - predicted at the end of August that at least one major US bank would collapse along with hundreds of smaller banks, trader speculation fell on three names: - Lehman Brothers - Washington Mutual - Wachovia Corporation Since his warning [...]
Shares in US financials have begun a powerful rally, which has seen shares in many US banks leap by double percentile figures. The rally began just before 6pm GMT and 1pm New York time. Companies previously hit hard by investor fears on their mortgage assets are seeing the strongest rebound, with mortgage insurers and US [...]
Within the past 24 hours, two of the world’s biggest investment banks have been destroyed - Lehman Brothers filed bankruptcy, while Merrill Lynch was rescued by Bank of America. The Fed extended emergency lines of credit; Wall St banks set up a $70 billion liqiudity fund. And global insurance super giant AIG suddenly threatened to [...]
I took out a self-certified mortgage with GMAC two years ago, because as a company director traditional lenders tend to get very confused when your income is not a straight salaried income-taxed income. Like many company directors, I instead take an income in the form of dividends. On the low interest rates everyone enjoyed at [...]
The BBC publishes a report: Savings returns ‘beating’ shares which makes the outlandish claim: Savers putting their money in funds investing in UK stocks and shares would have made more money since 2000 by putting it in savings accounts instead. To make such a claim requires extreme generalisation and a complete ignorance of investments. It’s [...]
Final salary pension funds return to the red, with pension trustees looking for more money to shore up the losses. What no one seems willing to talk about, though, is the mismanagement of final salary pension funds - and how the managers of these funds have been actively seeking to generate losses against their own [...]
If there’s one thing US analysts seem to enjoy at the moment, it’s downgrading US financials. It’s no surprise that the very companies most actively shorting financials should then release doom and gloom analyses, undermining these further. And in an almost tit-for-tat battle, analysts at different banks have been downgrading each other continually over the [...]
“The Credit Crunch is Over” is a bold statement to make, and more experienced people foolishly made the same prediction much earlier in the year. However, as we near the first anniversary of the Credit Crunch slamming into the financial markets, here are the observations and predictions from Finance Markets: 1. The Credit Crisis is [...]
With the collapse of Indymac, the FDIC was forced to allocate anywhere between $4-8 billion in assets to take over the company. Who are the FDIC? The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is an independent agency created by the Congress that maintains the stability and public confidence in the nation’s financial system by insuring deposits, [...]
The market in “sell and rent back” has boomed incredibly over the past couple of years. Originally there were just a handful of established companies in this market - but the tail-end of the property boom has brought in a massive influx of property speculators who have entered this market as an alternative to buy-to-let. [...]
Government to crack down on hidden credit card charges
Tougher rules are to be brought in to protect consumers from hidden credit card charges and premium-rate phone calls to customer service departments. The Government has launched a consultation on how to implement the changes, which are required under a European Consumer Rights Directive and will apply to countries across the European Union. The new [...]
Which? report claims free banking is a myth
A new report by consumer group Which? highlights the high charges that can be applied to ‘free’ current accounts. While these accounts are free while in credit, charges can be applied if a customer goes overdrawn, especially if they do so without permission. Customers can also be charged for overseas transactions and for agreed overdrafts. [...]
Households more optimistic about their finances
Household finances are still deteriorating, but at a slower rate, according to the Markit household finance index. The index increased from 37.5 in July to 38.9 in August, with figures above 50 representing a positive change in household finances, and figures below 50 representing a negative change. The August figure represents the third consecutive monthly [...]
Think tank calls for council housing sell off
The Policy Exchange, a leading UK think tank, is calling for expensive social housing to be sold as it becomes vacant. This could raise £4.5 billion a year and the money could be used to create the largest social house building programme since the 1970s, the think tank suggests in a new report. Between 80,000 [...]
Barclays appoints new chairman
Barclays has announced the appointment of Sir David Walker as its new chairman. He will take over from Marcus Agius who resigned from the role after Barclays was fined £290 million by regulators in the UK and US for manipulating Libor, the interbank lending rate. The appointment of Sir David, a respected and experienced banker, [...]
Post Office stepping up mortgage offering
The Post Office is expanding its mortgage service with the introduction of mortgage specialists in its branches. Mortgages have been available from the Post Office since 2009, but applications have had to be made online or over the phone. It currently offers mortgage with deposits as low as 10 per cent and plans to enhance [...]
Help Loan closed after breaching money-laundering rules
Payday Loan company MCO Capital has been closed down by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and fined £544,000 after failing to check the identity of its borrowers. The firm, which traded as Help Loan, was targeted by criminals and cheated of more than £1.5m by the fraudsters due to its negligence. The criminals stole [...]
Health insurance becoming unaffordable warns Bupa
The rising cost of private healthcare is pushing health insurance in the UK up to unaffordable levels, according to international healthcare group Bupa. A lack of competition among private hospitals has led to the cost of treatment rising, and the insurer says that this could lead to health insurance becoming unaffordable. An increase in the [...]
Bank of England forecasts zero economic growth
The Bank of England does not expect the UK economy to grow at all this year according to its latest quarterly report. It had previously forecast growth of 2 per cent for 2012 but recent gloomy economic data has led to the growth forecast being revised downwards. The forecast for medium-term growth has also been [...]
Standard Chartered in money-laundering scandal
Standard Chartered has become the latest UK bank to be accused of illegal activity. It has been accused by the New York department of financial services of hiding $250 billion worth of illegal transactions with Iranian banks between 2001 and 2010. The US regulator claims that the bank, which has wholesale banking, corporate finance and [...]
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