Barclays is celebrating the tenth anniversary of the UK’s first offset mortgage. The bank’s Woolwich subsidiary took the plunge in June 2000 and the lender claims it has saved borrowers more than £1 billion in mortgage interest over the years. The average Woolwich offset mortgage stands at £132,000 and customers typically keep £21,000 in their [...]
New Chancellor, George Osborne, is today set to wield the axe by announcing plans to cut £6.2 billion off the £156 billion deficit this year. The new Con/Lib coalition Government has said trimming the budget deficit is one of its priorities. However, Mr Osborne’s predecessor, Alistair Darling, warned that cutting the deficit too quickly could [...]
Spain’s Government has passed the €15 billion (£13 billion) austerity plan, which has been implemented to deal with the country’s deficit, which is currently 11% of GDP. Spain aims to reduce the deficit to 6% by 2011, which involves a 5% cut for civil servants. Deputy Prime Minister, Maria Teresa Fernandez De la Vega, acknowledged [...]
The Cabinet Office has today announced that the world’s second largest economy expanded by 1.2% between January and March compared with the previous quarter – marking the fourth straight quarter of expansion. The growth was boosted by exports, while on an annual basis, growth was 4.9% – however, analysts had expected growth of between 5.4% [...]
The strength of the recovery in the world’s second largest economy should lead it to start reducing its massive debt from 2011, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF is urging Japan to increase consumption tax, while containing its growth in spending, in order to deal with its debt which currently stands at [...]
Influential think tank, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR), believes taxes will increase sharply in the next ten years, in order to cut the UK’s budget deficit. According to a report by the Institute, taxes would have to rise by the equivalent of 6p on the basic income tax rate to bring [...]
The European Commission has warned that additional measures may need to be taken by Portugal in order to cut its budget deficit. Like Greece, Portugal’s public finances are in a dire state and last month, international credit rating agency, Fitch, cut the country’s credit rating to ‘AA-’ with a negative outlook. According to Fitch, Portugal’s [...]
Lufthansa has announced it is planning to save £100 million pound at airline BMI, which involves slashing almost one quarter of its capacity and the loss of 800 jobs. The German owner also said the restructure will see BMI’s name changed back to its former name – British Midland International – believing that British Midland [...]
The Pre-Election Budget will be delivered today by Chancellor Alistair Darling but he has repeatedly said there will be no “giveaways” ahead of the general election. What we can expect to see, though, are more details of how the Government expects to trim the budget deficit. Mr Darling has previously pledged to halve the budget [...]
The Venezuelan economy, which relies heavily on revenues from its oil reserves for its economic growth, contracted by 5.8% in the fourth quarter of 2009 compared with a year earlier. According to the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV), the economy shrank 3.3% during the 2009 year. The BCV said the global economic crisis and “the [...]
Both Northern Rock and the Post Office have launched new mortgage deals with lower rates. The Post Office has cut the cost of its Bank of Ireland lifetime tracker loans from 3.29% to 2.99%, or from 3.59% to 3.49%, dependent upon the loan-to-value ratio. Bank of Ireland has also reduced the price of its five-year [...]
At today’s Pre-Budget Report, Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling unveiled measures to claw back money in order to pay off the UK’s spiralling debt. Mr Darling confirmed there would be a one-off 50% tax on bankers’ bonuses paid above £25,000. The Chancellor said the banks, rather than the bankers, will pay the tax and [...]
Credit rating agency, Fitch, has cut Greece’s sovereign debt rating to a decade-low to BBB+ from A- with a negative outlook. Greece, which is the euro zone’s weakest economy, has the highest debt of the 16-member bloc and the downgrade comes after recent warnings by two other agencies that they were considering such measures. The [...]
Last December, the Government cut the VAT rate from 17.5% to 15% in an attempt to boost spending. However, the rate is to revert back to the normal 17.5% level from 1 January 2010 but research shows that Britons are unaware and unprepared. Research from Auto Trader shows that 12 million Brits are unaware of [...]
Bank Rossii, Russia’s central bank, has cut interest rates by 50 basis points to 9% – a record low and the ninth time rates have been cut since April in bid to boost demand. Russia’s economy, which is heavily reliant on oil exports, has suffered from a severe downturn but the economy appears to now [...]
The European Central Bank (ECB) today elected to keep interest rates on hold at the historic low of 1% for the sixth consecutive month. The news came shortly after the Bank of England announced it was keeping interest rates at 0.5%. Furthermore, the US central bank, the Federal Reserve, opted to keep interest rates at [...]
In a speech to the City today, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne is expected to announce that retail banks should be stopped from paying cash bonuses of more than £2,000. Many experts have been arguing that big bonuses prompted excessive risk-taking at banks which contributed to the financial crisis. In his speech, Mr Osborne is expected [...]
The Obama administration is proposing to cut the salaries of top executives at firms which have received billions of dollars in Government aid. The institutions that are affected are Bank of America, American International Group (AIG), Citigroup, General Motors, GMAC, Chrysler and Chrysler Financial. According to reports, these seven companies will see their 25 highest [...]
Japan Airlines (JAL) has announced plans to cut its operating schedule and reduce headcount by almost 7,000. The loss-making airline said that a total of 6,800 jobs will go as it embarks on a cost-cutting exercise and is making plans for fuel-efficiency and a focus on business customers. The news comes as there are rumours [...]
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 [...]
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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