The US banking reporting season has got off to a good start today after JP Morgan reported a 13% increase in profits to $5.4 billion (£3.3 billion) – exceeding analysts’ expectations. Furthermore, revenues were 7% higher in the three months to the end of June at $27.4 billion. The good performance comes despite losses from [...]
US banking giant Goldman Sachs has today reported a $2.39 billion (£1.49 billion) profit for the fourth quarter, 53% lower compared with a year ago. However, the figures were roughly in line with expectations but shares still fell 3.1% to $169.22 in pre-market trading. The fourth quarter figures come at the end of a difficult [...]
The Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), the body established to compensate victims of banking failures, will now reimburse up to £85,000 per saver if a bank collapses, up from the £50,000 limit previously agreed. It is hoped the new limit, which is paid for by the UK financial services industry, will avert customer panic if [...]
British banks will unveil their first-half profits this week with the five biggest banks expected to reveal they are back in the black. Banking giant HSBC will kick off the reporting season tomorrow, with Lloyds Banking Group and Standard Chartered announcing their results on Wednesday, Barclays on Thursday and Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) on [...]
Santander has announced plans to charge customers up to £50 per month for using their unauthorised overdraft. The £5 per day charge, capped at a maximum of £50 in any one month, will apply to new current accounts opened from December. Customers who use their authorised overdraft will be charged 50p per day, up to [...]
Britain’s first postgraduate course in Islamic finance is to be launched today at the Islamic & Ethical Finance Conference in Edinburgh. The MSc in Islamic accounting and finance will be taught at Dundee University, who created the course to meet rising demand from banks for professionals trained in the Islamic principles of banking. “Not many [...]
Eleven industry leading sustainable banks have pledged to deliver banking services to the world’s poorest people. The banks made the promise at the second summit of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV) in Dhaka, capital of Bangladesh, earlier this month. “Fighting poverty will remain the first priority for the banking sector in the [...]
In a bid to speed up trips to the shops, supermarket giant Tesco has opened the first self-service store in Northampton. The Tesco Express store has five self-service tills but no manned checkouts. There is, however, one member of staff available to authorise transactions for age-restricted items such as alcohol and knives. The news will [...]
The Elysée Palace has today announced that French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, may walk out of the G20 summit in Pittsburgh next week unless an agreement is reached with regard to bank bonuses. France has long been arguing that excessive bankers’ bonuses reward the risk-taking that led to the financial crisis. At last week’s meeting of [...]
Consumer advice sites Moneyfacts and uSwitch.com have reacted with cynicism to the Royal Bank of Scotland’s (RBS) decision to lower overdraft fees. RBS and sister bank NatWest cut unauthorised overdraft fees in half to £15 earlier this week. Charges for bounced cheques were reduced from £38 to £5. The changes come ahead of a ruling [...]
Ten US banks have been given approval to repay a combined $68 billion (£41 billion) in Government bailout money, said the US Treasury. In a sign that stability is returning to the banking sector, the banking giants will repay some of the money it was loaned in the US Government’s $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief [...]
Hopes of a recovery in the US resulted in a rise in shares yesterday with the Dow Jones industrial average closing up 235 points at 8,504.08. The rise came after a better-than-expected profit report from home improvement company, Lowe’s Cos., leading analysts to believe recovery may be closer than previously thought. Shares plummeted last week [...]
Fortis Insurance has reported its 2008 results with a full year net profit of €6 million, which came despite €639 million of investment losses. All of the insurance unit’s profit was made in its Belgium branch, with the international insurance business only breaking even. The insurance unit’s profit was dwarfed, however, by the Fortis banking [...]
Supermarket giant Tesco is planning to compete with High Street banks by opening bank branches in 30 of its stores by the end of the year. The branches are expected to be called ‘Tesco Bank’ and the supermarket hopes to take advantage of the lack of confidence in existing banks by attracting disillusioned customers. The [...]
Chancellor Alistair Darling has announced that an inquiry is to take place into the operations of banks after it was reported last week that banks are planning exorbitant bonuses for its staff. The review will examine how banks are managed and Mr Darling expects the review to make recommendations about the effectiveness of risk-management by [...]
The FTSE 100 Index is in danger of falling below the 4,000 mark as banking shares continue to fall as a wave of bad news continues to hit the UK economy. Shares in Barclays took another pounding today. At one point, the stock was down 33% to 48p – the lowest level since 1985. However, [...]
The Government has announced a second rescue package worth £200 billion for the banking system which will insure British banks against losses from bad loans. The plan is designed to prevent the financial crisis from getting worse and to improve confidence and the banks’ ability to lend. Under the terms of an insurance scheme, banks [...]
Global shares have plummeted this morning on the news that some of the world’s largest economies are bracing themselves for recession. Reports that unemployment in the UK soared by 164,000 to 1.79 million in the three months to August, are adding to fears, as well as the news that retail sales in the US fell [...]
Yesterday, several central banks including the Bank of England, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the US Federal Reserve announced they were to cut interest rates by half a percentage point in an attempt to boost the economy. However, the markets failed to respond to the news after London’s FTSE 100 closed down 5.18%, France’s [...]
Switzerland’s largest investment bank, UBS, has announced it is to axe a further 1,900 jobs in its investment banking, equities and fixed income units. The news follows that yesterday from PricewaterhouseCoopers, administrators of Lehman Brothers’ European division, who said 750 workers are to lose their jobs with immediate effect. With regard to the job losses [...]
M&S Money launches 3% cash ISA
M&S Money has launched an Advantage Cash ISA paying 3 per cent, and which allows transfers in from other ISAs. It can be opened with a minimum deposit of £100 lump sum followed by minimum monthly deposits of £25. The 3% rate is variable, but there is no short-term bonus so the return won’t plummet [...]
Google suspends UK Compare Mortgages site
Google has closed its UK mortgage comparison site which it launched in July last year, after it proved to be less popular than expected. Mortgage comparison sites are designed to allow visitors to compare mortgages quickly and easily without having to visit each lender’s individual site. Google was competing with several well-established comparison sites, including [...]
AA launches ‘black-box’ policy for young drivers
The AA is launching an innovative car insurance policy called Drivesafe which could help younger drivers save up to £850 a year. Younger drivers already pay substantially higher premiums than other motorists and these costs are increasing. A new study by Confused.com suggests insurance costs for younger driver have gone up by 5.7 per cent [...]
ATOL scheme updated to protect online bookers
ATOL, a financial protection scheme managed by the Civil Aviation Authority, is being extended to protect up to six million more holidays a year. The scheme ensures that holiday makers do not lose out financially if a travel company collapses, and that they are not stranded abroad. An increase in the number of holidays booked [...]
Home repossessions lowest for four years
The number of UK homes repossessed fell to 36,200 in 2011, significantly below the Council of Mortgage Lenders’ forecast of 40,000, and lower than 2010 when 37,100 homes were repossessed. With interest rates remaining low and lenders adopting a sympathetic attitude to customers in financial difficulty, repossessions fell to their lowest level since 2007. However, [...]
Monthly pay lasting just 17 days
Workers are running out of money just 17 days after receiving their monthly pay, according to new research by the Halifax bank. This means that the average UK worker spends half the month worrying about money. The study, based on the responses of more than 2,000 adults, found that 10 per cent of workers start [...]
Women disadvantaged by auto-enrolment changes
Government proposals to increase the auto-enrolment threshold to £10,000 could put 1.8 million women at risk of missing out on a pension, the TUC has warned. Under the auto-enrolment scheme, which will be phased in from October, private sector employers will automatically enrol workers between the age of 22 years and the state pension age, [...]
Emergency household repairs company Homeserve is taking longer than expected to get back on track after its operations were suspended last October. The company expected customer numbers to fall by 5% this year but it has increased this estimate to 8% and announced the loss of 200 jobs. It estimates that renewal revenue in 2013 [...]
Sale rumoured for Yorkshire and Clydesdale banks
There is growing speculation that National Australia Bank (NAB) may sell Yorkshire Bank and Clydesdale Bank after the Australian parent company announced a strategic review of the two banks’ operations. The Australian economy is performing well and NAB reported strong profits for the final quarter of 2011 but with the UK economy at a virtual [...]
More women experiencing debt difficulties
Women in Debt, which offers female-focused debt advice, has warned that the number of UK women facing serious debt has grown significantly over recent years. The organisation believes that more women will need advice on solving debt problems in the future because they are building up an unsustainable level of indebtedness. Women in Debt’s director, [...]
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