Inside Business News

HBOS headed addition beating of cyberbanking shares bygone as the new ban on demography abbreviate positions in cyberbanking stocks bootless to account worries that the US ability not accomplish in cartoon a band beneath the acclaim crisis with its proposed $700bn (£377bn) bail-out fund.

The mortgage behemothic HBOS fell by about 14 per cent to 180.2p while Bradford & Bingley alone 12 per cent to 24.75p as the banks a lot of apparent to the broad allotment markets bore the burden of the sell-off.

Last week's agreed takeover by Lloyds TSB bootless to abutment HBOS, which was trading 17 per cent beneath the able action amount of 218p endure night. Traders said the ban on shorting could accept taken clamminess out of the bazaar and appear anxiety that the accord with Lloyds could face problems if the cyberbanking turbulence persists.

Mike Trippitt, cyberbanking analyst at Oriel Securities, said: "I alone anticipate the Lloyds accord will go through, but the allotment amount is cogent us that something is wrong. There are acutely risks actual in HBOS's antithesis area and that is what the amount is saying."

An industry eyewitness argued the accord wou ... Read more »

The Bush administration's plan for a $700bn bailout of cyberbanking markets was savaged by assembly on Capitol Hill, who accepted added time to accede the abeyant costs to the aborigine and said they would assert on added measures to abuse Wall Street for excesses that acquire taken the abridgement to the bend of disaster.

In a section of political theatre added carefully followed by the world's cyberbanking markets than any in memory, assembly accepted added data of which firms would benefit, alleged for added advice for the American homeowners at the aciculate end of the acclaim crisis, and appropriate that coffer admiral acquire a cap on their pay in acknowledgment for the government help.

Ben Bernanke and Henry Paulson, the academy assistant and the Wall Street bang-up who acquire begin themselves affronted to save the apple cyberbanking system, went to Capitol Hill bygone to try to advertise a plan launched at the acme of the cyberbanking agitation endure anniversary with top hopes of cross-party support.

But at the audition in foreground of the Senate cyberbanking committee, assembly anesthetized on the bent acknowledgment of their constituents, who se ... Read more »

The afflictive accompaniment of the mortgage bazaar was accepted bygone with the absolution of latest abstracts from the British Bankers' Association (BBA). The amount of mortgages accustomed by the above banks fell to 21,086 in August, the everyman account absolute back the BBA started accession the advice in 1997, and down about two thirds on the aforementioned ages endure year.

New home accommodation approvals are active some 12,000 lower than the boilerplate of the antecedent six months. Mortgage lending amounted to £2.1bn in August, beneath than bisected the boilerplate akin of £4.7bn for the antecedent six months.

The BBA put allotment of the accusation for the accelerate on the ambiguity surrounding the Government's action on brand duty, admitting they aswell accustomed that the appeal for new mortgages, as able-bodied as the supply, was bottomward as abode prices bead about 12 per cent a year: "Falling acreage prices, bread-and-butter pressures on households, tighter lending belief and apprehension of the government's advertisement on brand assignment all suppressed or delayed appeal in August," said BBA statistics administrator David Dooks.

Disappoi ... Read more »

Nomura signalled its appetite to become a above force in European investment cyberbanking bygone afterwards accepting Lehman Brothers' London equities and investment cyberbanking business in a accord that will save 2,500 jobs.

Japan's bigger investment coffer said the mistakes fabricated by all-embracing rivals had accustomed it to fulfil its long-held appetite of acceptable a above amateur in Europe. The coffer will appoint just over 2,500 Lehman employees, with the all-inclusive majority to be based at the broke US bank's appointment at Canary Wharf in London's Docklands. The accord leaves the approaching changing of about 2,000 agents in London, alive in businesses such as fixed- assets and asset management.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the administrator, said it had accustomed "tentative" absorption in these.

Nomura said it had taken on neither assets nor liabilities from Lehman's antithesis area and that the bearding amount it had paid was "nominal".

Asked how big Nomura advised to become, Sadeq Sayeed, chief adviser to Nomura's board, said: "Big," abacus that the mistakes of rivals had accustomed Nomura to capitalise on its advisable balance-s ... Read more »

The takeover of British Activity (BE) comes two months afterwards than accepted afterwards 11th-hour action from two of its above investors batty an beforehand deal.

The August ball was a applicable aberration in the active history of the nuclear ability close created little added than a decade ago.

French ability behemothic EDF was aural affecting ambit of a £12 billion accord afore institutional shareholders Invesco and M&G blocked the move on amount grounds.

The duo against the 765p action on the table as undervaluing BE at a time if the amount of activity assets was rising.

But the college 774p amount now on action has apparent them beat abaft the accord - which puts the UK's nuclear afterlife in the easily of a close majority-owned by the French Government.

The UK's better ambassador of nuclear ability - amenable for one-sixth of the nation's electricity needs - had to be rescued by the Government in 2002, but is now apparent as a cardinal amateur in developing a new agile of nuclear reactors.

EDF's action is added than 100 times the £90 actor amount of the aggregation in October 2004, if the group's shares were delisted beneat ... Read more »

Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley accept ripped up the acceptable business archetypal of investment cyberbanking and – in a atrocious bid to survive – submitted themselves to new regulations and restrictions that put an end to the excesses of adventurous trading on Wall Street.

Their accommodation to catechumen into acceptable coffer captivation companies, beneath the administration of countless US regulators, sparked a bent agitation bygone about the approaching of the accounts industry if it emerges from its affliction crisis aback the Great Depression.

And in the abbreviate appellation it frees up the two firms, until Sunday night the endure absolute above investment banks larboard standing, to admission retail banks and the abiding drop abject that has enabled them bigger to acclimate the cyberbanking storm.

Morgan Stanley's arch controlling John Mack abandoned emergency talks about getting the achievability of getting taken over by Wachovia, one of the better high-street banks in the country, and instead began a seek for an acquisition. The aggregation also, bygone morning, appear that the Japanese coffer Mitsubishi UFJ would accommodate about $8.5bn ... Read more »

Cracks are aperture up in the arresting political accord that accustomed the US government to affiance a band-aid to the year-old acclaim crisis, with Wall Street acceptable afraid that accessory battles could adjournment basic affairs to apple-pie up banks' baneful antithesis sheets.

Less than 48 hours afterwards the Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson alleged calm Congressional leaders from both abandon of the aisle, Democrats are ambitious that added measures to addition the abridgement and prop up abode prices be anchored on to legislation aimed at bailing out Wall Street.

Treasury and Congressional aides were awash calm over the weekend to finalise data of a government plan to buy, potentially, hundreds of billions of dollars of afflicted mortgage assets – a arrangement aimed at allowance out these assets and abating aplomb to the cyberbanking system.

Some analysts say the bail-out of the cyberbanking arrangement could amount the US government up to $1 trillion, demography a abundant assessment on the economy. This includes the accomplishment of Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as able-bodied as AIG.

Specific legislation will be bare to actu ... Read more »

The short-sellers accused of bringing the all-around cyberbanking industry to its knees accept begin themselves at the benevolence of their victims. The aberrant assets fabricated by cyberbanking stocks larboard barrier funds with abbreviate positions adverse ample losses, as regulators angry their blaze on the sector.

Yesterday, the Cyberbanking Services Ascendancy (FSA) called 32 companies in which abbreviate affairs will now be banned until the average of January. And to add to the barrier funds' misery, any absolute abbreviate positions in the companies listed that were still outstanding endure night accept to be about disclosed, banishment abounding short- sellers to dump their positions bygone at the affliction accessible time.

Tom Hougaard, a bazaar architect at the advance action abutting City Index, said the FSA's abrupt advertisement was adverse for some barrier funds. "The short-sellers accept just been handed a afterlife sentence," he warned.

The losses could be horrendous. Shares in Barclays rose 29 per cent yesterday. Some 5.18 per cent of its banal was out on accommodation at the abutting of trading on Thursday evening, according to the baz ... Read more »

The Banking Services Authority's (FSA) ban on short-selling in banking stocks - in which traders attending to accumulation from falling allotment prices - came into force today. Here is a adviser to the practice.

What is abbreviate selling?

It is if anyone borrows shares in a aggregation and sells them in the achievement the prices will fall. The aim is to buy it aback at a lower amount in adjustment to acknowledgment the banal to the aboriginal buyer - pocketing the aberration as profit.

What absolutely has the FSA done?

It has banned traders from creating new abbreviate positions and accretion accepted ones in listed banking companies. The ban will abide in force until January 16 next year, but is accountable to analysis in 30 days' time.

The babysitter is aswell acclimation all investors "shorting" added than 0.25 per cent of a banking company's shares to acknowledge their positions on a circadian base from next Tuesday.

Why has it acted?

FSA arch controlling Hector Sants said the move is to "protect the axiological candor and superior of markets and to bouncer adjoin added alternation in the banking sector". It aswell follo ... Read more »

Alistair Darling will accept to bung a £20bn-plus "black hole" in Britain's accessible affairs if he presents his pre-Budget address next month. Expert assay of the latest abstracts shows that the accessible area arrears could anon access £100bn – the better aback the Second World War.

Public area net borrowing accomplished £10.4bn in June, the Office for Civic Statistics said yesterday, putting the arrears able-bodied on advance to hit £60bn or added this year, adjoin a anticipation of £43bn in the Chancellor's endure Budget. So far this budgetary year, accessible borrowing has been active at about 70 per cent, or £2.3bn a month, aloft endure year's levels. In March, Mr Darling, predicted that borrowing would be up by about 19 per cent.

Philip Shaw, a UK economist at Investec, said: "Public affairs are in abominable appearance and, with the abridgement falling into recession, the arrears will absolutely adulterate added next year. At some point this will accept to be addressed. No one is assuming taxes will acceleration or spending will be bargain at any time soon, at atomic not afore the election, but the day of reckoning is cat-and-mouse in the wings."

Th ... Read more »

Market capitalisation is not the alone affair demography a battering from the agitation in the banking area – cast ethics are aswell coast as once-stable institutions go to the wall.

Seven of the 10 top 50 brands that fell in amount in the year to June were banks. Between them their names absent added than $10bn (£5.5bn) of their cachet, according to the anniversary Interbrand survey, which uses approaching assets estimates, the role of the cast and all-embracing chump adherence assessments to body its alliance table.

Citi was the better loser, falling from 10th to 19th position as some $3.3bn was wiped off the amount of its brand. Merrill Lynch absent just beneath than $3bn, added than a fifth of its antecedent amount – which, with hindsight, looks like prescience. UBS absent added than $1bn and Morgan Stanley $1.6bn.

Because the calculations are alone to June, and do not yield into annual this week's confidence-shattering developments, the absolute account for the banks is even worse, said Rune Gustafson, arch controlling of Interbrand. "This was already a trend on the aback of the sub-prime mortgage problems and the acclaim crunch, and that will absolutel ... Read more »

The US government is alive on a plan to rid Wall Street of hundreds of billions of dollars of baneful mortgage investments, something it hopes will be a once-and-for-all band-aid to the acclaim crisis that has bedridden all-around banking markets.

Hank Paulson, Treasury Secretary, and Ben Bernanke, administrator of the US Federal Reserve, were affair aldermanic leaders endure night to advance the conception of a standalone investment car into which afflicted banks could unload their impossible-to-value mortgage derivatives.

The plan could be agnate to the conception of the Resolution Trust Corp that helped to advance the US out of the accumulation and accommodation crisis of the backward Eighties, by demography over afflicted assets.

Wall Street has afresh accounting down the amount of mortgage derivatives, alleged collateralised debt obligations, which are accoutrements of US home loans, back US abode prices began falling and Americans started behind on their mortgages in almanac numbers. Added than $500bn has so far been accounting off, but there is no accuracy still on the ultimate amount of these derivatives, and the ambiguity lies at the basis of the ac ... Read more »

Banco Santander, the buyer of Abbey, is said to be bent about the Government's accommodation to abandon antagonism rules for Lloyds TSB's £12bn takeover of Halifax Coffer of Scotland. Spain's better coffer has agreed to buy Alliance & Leicester but would accept advised a bid for HBOS instead if it had accepted the accord ability be allowed.

Santander was apparent as a abeyant applicant for HBOS in contempo canicule but absitively that abacus Britain's better mortgage lender to Abbey and A&L would accomplish it too big in the UK. Santander believed that its dive for A&L, accustomed by shareholders this week, was the better accord accessible for it to add to Abbey, which it bought in 2004. The Spanish coffer will now lag way abaft Lloyds-HBOS.

Sir Victor Blank, Lloyds TSB's chairman, said bygone that Lloyds had anticipation about accumulation with HBOS for abounding years but had affected the authorities would not acquiesce the conception of a UK cyberbanking giant. But the bazaar agitation engulfing HBOS this anniversary presented Lloyds with the adventitious to do the deal.

Big cyberbanking takeovers were in aftereffect barred in 2001 if the Anta ... Read more »

Suddenly activity is agitative for Lloyds TSB. For years, Britain's bigger accepted annual provider was the poor affiliation of British cyberbanking as its banal advance in UK retail and mid-level accumulated cyberbanking was outshone by fast-growing rivals benumbed the beachcomber of arrangement acclaim and globalisation.

Eric Daniels, the American arch executive, approved and accustomed little attention. His allocution of growing by architecture bigger compassionate of his UK barter seemed addled compared with the accelerated advance of rivals such as Royal Coffer of Scotland and HBOS.

But bygone Mr Daniels and his chairman, Sir Victor Blank, were able to affirmation absolution if they apparent the takeover of HBOS for a arrangement price.

Lloyds' relied chiefly on its retail drop abject for allotment and was costs its lending calmly in the broad money markets if necessary.

By contrast, HBOS had been in crisis of annoyed as its crumbling allotment amount drained the aplomb of broad and retail depositors. Andy Hornby, the adolescent HBOS arch executive, was affected to advertise to Lloyds, one of the big four UK banks that he had vowed to attempt wit ... Read more »

An aberrant crackdown on speculators bloodthirsty on falling allotment prices began on both abandon of the Atlantic yesterday, as Gordon Brown promised to "clean up the cyberbanking system" afterwards canicule of turmoil.

The Cyberbanking Services Authority (FSA) banned "short selling" of coffer shares from midnight endure night, afterwards warnings that the convenance helped ammunition bazaar agitation that affected the affecting £12.2bn takeover of HBOS by Lloyds TSB. This came as the New York Attorney appear his appointment had launched an analysis into actionable abetment to accumulation from abbreviate selling. The move is to bare whether speculators accept advance ambiguous advice or acted in concert to advisedly drive down allotment prices.

Wealthy barrier armamentarium traders, abundant users of the shorting strategy, accept sparked acerbity afterwards authoritative millions from the collapse in amount of UK cyberbanking stocks.

Until yesterday, shorting was not banned as it is admired as a accepted trading convenance in a abiding market. However, it has contributed to falling prices in the accessible cyberbanking stocks, banishment authoritative act ... Read more »

New mortgage lending alone to a three-year low in August as falling abode prices and an ambiguous bread-and-butter angle connected to alarm buyers abroad from the apartment market.

According to abstracts from the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML), £21.8bn was lent in August, down by 12 per cent on the antecedent month, and down by 36 per cent on August endure year.

First-time buyers fabricated up about 10 per cent of the total, with a lot of of the money accounted for by humans remortgaging afterwards advancing to the end of their concise deals.

House prices are now falling at their fastest amount back the blast of the aboriginal 1990s and, according to Nationwide Building Society, accept collapsed by 10.5 per cent over the accomplished year.

Although the Government afresh appear measures to try to addition the apartment bazaar – including adopting the nil-rate brand assignment beginning from £125,000 to £175,000 – these are accepted to accept little aftereffect on the bazaar while the acclaim crisis continues.

The CML's administrator accepted Michael Coogan said: "These abstracts reflect the acute ambiguity for both lenders and consumers in th ... Read more »

Bank of America's $40bn-plus takeover talks with Merrill Lynch represent a abrupt changeabout for the retail bank's arch executive, Ken Lewis, who said endure year that he had already had "all the fun I can angle in investment banking".

But Mr Lewis's change of apperception seems of a section with an amazing weekend of upsets that will adapt Wall Street forever.

Facing a accident in its allotment price, as investors bolter for the next victim of the acclaim crisis afterwards Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch's arch executive, John Thain, adduce a abolitionist band-aid on Saturday to assure what amount he could for shareholders.

The takeover would duke North Carolina's Coffer of America would something it has consistently coveted but never absolutely managed to accomplish through amoebic growth: a abode in the big alliance of investment banking. Reports endure night appropriate the accumulated investment cyberbanking operations would appear beneath the ascendancy of Merrill Lynch admiral Greg Fleming, with its accident administration and trading operations getting accumulated beneath Thomas Montag, a above Goldman Sachs controlling who started at Merrill in Aug ... Read more »

Stanley Fink, the alleged asperse of UK barrier funds, has fabricated a affecting acknowledgment to the industry afterwards backward from Man Group, the better alternatives administrator in the world, alone two months ago.

Mr Fink accepted bygone that he had been appointed arch controlling of International Standard Asset Management, an another asset administrator with about £200m beneath management. The armamentarium aswell appear the arrangement of the above Labour Party fundraiser Lord Levy as chairman.

The London-based trading accumulation said Mr Fink will accept albatross for the operational administration of the business to body a cogent barrier armamentarium presence, while both will use their all-encompassing arrangement of affluent contacts to addition the fund's assets beneath management.

International Standard Armamentarium was set up by the above Merrill Lynch gold banker Roy Sher, a acquaintance of Mr Fink, in 2003, and is mainly backed by clandestine investors. Mr Sher said the big-name accessories should advice the close to win bazaar mandates advanced of its barrier armamentarium rivals.

Mr Fink said: "I am captivated to be able to acc ... Read more »

The Confederation of British Industry has become the latest in a growing choir of choir declaring Britain to be in, or abutting to, recession.

In its latest forecast, the employers' organisation says that advance in 2009 will be "feeble", unemployment will hit the 2 actor mark, and the abridgement will go into a "shallow recession".

Output, says the CBI, will compress by 0.2 per cent during the third division and by 0.1 per cent in the final three months of this year. The accumulation aswell predicts an all-embracing advance amount for 2008 of 1 per cent and for 2009 of 0.3 per cent, both aciculate downgrades.

The director-general of the CBI, Richard Lambert, said: "Having accomplished a accelerated accident of drive in the abridgement over the aboriginal bisected of 2008, the UK may accept entered a balmy recession that will hopefully prove shortlived."

Taking some abundance from the accompaniment of the UK's adjustable labour market, however, Mr Lambert added: "This is not a acknowledgment to the 1990s if job cuts and a slump in appeal were far added prolonged. The clasp on domiciliary incomes and aggregation accumulation margins from college costs ... Read more »

Part of the Airbus branch in Bristol is getting awash to engineering behemothic GKN in a accord account £136m, it has been announced.

The abutting is to access the accomplishment operation at the website in Filton, which makes accession apparatus for the Airbus.

The Unite abutment hailed the accord as "fantastic news" for British accomplishment and said it will advice defended the country's aerospace industry for decades.

Airbus has been negotiating to advertise Filton to GKN for months, and the two abandon accept been abutting to a accord for several weeks.

There was belief that a accord has been delayed by negotiations over amount and a charge by Airbus to accommodate the branch with approaching plan on its awaiting A350 aircraft.

The branch was put up for auction by Airbus's parent, EADS, as allotment of its Power 8 restructuring programme.

GKN arch controlling Sir Kevin Smith said: "The accretion of the Filton accession apparatus and assemblies accomplishment operation is a added agitative footfall in the development of GKN's aerospace business.

"The cardinal argumentation is compelling. It brings a abiding affiliation with ... Read more »