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Foreign exchange used to be such a faff. When I was a child, a car trip from Austria, where I grew up, to Britain to see relatives would involve Austrian schillings, German marks, Belgian francs (especially bilious banknotes) and British pounds (both English and Scottish). The lack of choice in the market and high commission fees were the main irritants. I recall an article at university in the mid-1990s claiming that anyone leaving Britain with £100 and visiting all 15 countries in the EU, changing the money at each border and buying nothing else, would end up back in London with around £55. What a difference 30 years make. The lucrative forex market used to be the preserve of the banks, but a series of regulatory changes and improved technology…

“Aim raised a paltry £3m for fresh flotations in the last quarter. That is a 13-year low... and a sign of a wider slowdown in the City... In a good year, Aim helps growth companies raise hundreds of millions. Since its foundation in 1995 it has become home to 1,000 companies with a combined value of £90bn... But... figures from UHY Hacker Young show that only one company – LifeSafe Holdings – floated on the junior stockmarket in the last three months, raising just £3m in new equity... AIM’s woes are reflected in the FTSE 100 and FTSE 250. On the main market, new businesses have raised just £574m so far this year, according to Dealogic. That is a relative pittance and comes as foreign firms have taken over £41bn…

Shares in bakery chain Greggs jumped by 10% last week after an “upbeat trading statement”, when it reported a 9.7% annual rise in like-for-like sales in the three months to October, says Russell Horton in The Times. Sales had slowed in August but momentum returned in September, overcoming “considerable uncertainty in the economy”. Greggs’ CEO Roisin Currie says there is “no evidence” of consumers “trading down” from more upmarket rivals; indeed, analysts suggest it could be gaining market share from other chains. Greggs is ideally placed to benefit from the fact that “Pret is off the menu for many cash-strapped Brits”, says Rosie Murray-West in The Mail on Sunday. And it boasts a “toothsome valuation”. Still, the cost-of-living crisis “will force more of us to eat at home”, while post-pandemic…

Only 10% of global semiconductor production occurs in the US, says WirtschaftsWoche, so there is ample scope for boosting domestic production to reduce dependence on Asia. Texas Instruments will be the biggest beneficiary of this reshoring effort. It has started to build four new manufacturing plants in its home state to concentrate on chips for the car industry, where demand is especially high owing to the shift towards electric vehicles and self-driving cars. Texas is the leader in highly profitable analogue chips, which help turn temperature, pressure and images into digital information. Net income should reach €8.5bn for the first time this year. The stock also yields almost 3%.…

Washington has accused Opec of siding with Russia following the cartel’s decision to slash oil production last week to drive up prices, says Christina Lu in Foreign Policy. The decision theoretically benefits Moscow, which is heavily reliant on revenues from oil exports (see page 6). Saudi Arabia, whose crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) spearheaded the Opec move, wheeled out one of its “most seasoned diplomats”, Adel al-Jubeir, to say that the decision was not politically motivated, but rather based on market conditions as it braces for a possible recession and seeks to fund its huge state spending plans, says Samer Al-Atrush in the Financial Times. However, attempts at reassurance “fell on deaf ears”, and on Tuesday US president Joe Biden warned of “consequences”. The move is seen…

One of the biggest trends in the betting markets is the slow but steady recovery of Joe Biden’s price in the market for the next US presidential election. At one point in July, betting markets gave him barely more than a 10% chance to be re-elected in 2024. However, with £1.2m matched on Smarkets and £1.56 matched on Betfair, his odds have shortened to 5.8 (17.3%) – just behind Donald Trump, who remains the favourite at 4.8 (20.8%), and Ron DeSantis. Personally, I’m going to stick with my view that Biden (as well as his sitting vice-president Kamala Harris) represent great value to win in two years’ time. Barring some major disaster, it’s nearly impossible for members of a sitting president’s own party to dislodge him in the primaries. Meanwhile…

If anyone thought the cut to the 45% top rate of tax went down badly they have seen nothing yet. The fight over investment zones is going to be a lot more intense. With relaxed rules on planning, lighter employment regulations, and maybe a host of tax breaks, the zones are planned as free-trading entrepôts where entrepreneurs can try out new ideas and build new factories, warehouses and homes, freed from the restrictions that suffocate the country. Lots of people are going to hate that. The Treasury is already leaking that the tax breaks will cost too much money. The unions will put up fierce resistance to any loosening of labour laws. Plenty of voters, egged on by Labour and the Liberal Democrats, won’t like the idea of new buildings…

Conventional bonds have a fixed principal – also known as the face value or the par value – that the bondholder will receive when the bond matures. When inflation is high and maturity is a long way in the future, the real (inflation-adjusted) value of the principal will be much less when the bondholder gets paid than it is today. Assume that you hold a bond that will pay £100 in ten years’ time, but inflation over the next decade averages 5% per year. Then the £100 you get in ten years is worth just £61 in today’s terms. Investors can take into account how high they expect inflation to be when deciding what price they are willing to pay for the bond. But inflation forecasts are not very accurate,…

Central banks need reining in Gerard Baker The Times In democracies, we can kick out elected politicians but not the “unelected bureaucrats” who “really control the value of the world’s money”, says Gerard Baker. For all the “fiscal follies” on both sides of the Atlantic, “by far the biggest culprits” for the “mauling of the global economy” are the Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Bank of England (BoE). These “titans of global economics” failed to spot the seriousness of the inflation caused by supply-chain disruptions during Covid and “applauded” while governments pumped trillions into their economies, “adding fuel to the flames”. Belatedly, they have been “playing catch up” this year and in doing so have forced up interest rates “so aggressively they seem certain to induce…

blogs.lse.ac.uk Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng want to loosen immigration controls to boost growth, says Alan Manning. More people means a bigger economy. But what we really want is growth in GDP per capita, meaning higher average living standards. Pre-pandemic UK GDP per head was roughly £33,700. “An extra immigrant will raise GDP per capita if their contribution is above this figure,” and reduce it if it is lower. That contribution is not just measured by wages, but also the profits an immigrant creates for their employer, and other effects. “There is good evidence that higher-skilled migrants lead to more innovation” and productivity growth in the economy as a whole. But the growth effects generated by “lower-skilled immigrants… is much more debatable”. That’s worth remembering given the pressure to alleviate…

What is wrong with the property market? The fortunes of the sector are well illustrated by the dismal performance this year of TR Property Investment Trust (LSE: TRY). This £1.4bn trust invests primarily in the shares of property companies, with 62% of assets in Europe and 41% of these in the UK, plus 7% in direct UK properties. (The excess 10% represents borrowings.) Around 65%-70% of the trust’s portfolio has inflation indexation built in, says manager Marcus Phayre-Mudge. The dividend has grown at 8% a year for the last decade. Yet the trust’s shares have fallen 45% this year. They yield 5.2% and stand at a discount to net asset value (NAV) of 9%. Many of its underlying holdings also trade at significant discounts. Discount looks overdone There is a…

Markets are slumping as politicians, economists and central banks struggle to reassure anxious investors that they can control inflation and ward off a global recession. Returns from more than 80% of the 500 biggest US stocks are negative so far this year. These big setbacks can be opportunities for patient investors, however, with prices of decent companies now starting to look reasonable. Enter online-payment processor PayPal. Once it was one of the brightest stars that could do no wrong in the “fintech” sector – a group of financial companies using technology to reinvent how we move money, pay for things and invest. PayPal earns almost all of its money from enabling people to make payments to friends and family locally and overseas; and from merchants who let people pay them…

● “The darker months are boom time for shed thieves, so take some extra care while packing up your garden equipment and outdoor furniture this year,” says Imogen Tew in The Sunday Times. Thefts from sheds peak in winter, according to insurance firm Admiral. Claims are 82% higher between October and March than the rest of the year. The average claim is for £2,000, with bikes, tools and garden equipment the most likely items to be stolen. To safeguard your property, “fit strong padlocks... to shed doors that are strong enough not to be kicked through”. Putting locks or bars on windows and investing in some exterior lighting to deter crooks is also worth considering. ● Rising mortgage rates are prompting increasing numbers of homeowners to opt for a longer…

● Savers with final-salary pension schemes will receive 25% less today compared with a year ago if they transfer their benefits to a new pension arrangement, new data from actuaries reveals. The fall reflects a sharp increase in gilt yields over the past year as interest rates have risen and concern about the UK’s debt has increased. While regulators advise most people against transferring benefits out of a final-salary plan, given that it offers guaranteed benefits, savers may do so if they have taken independent financial advice. But the “transfer value” offered in such cases is worked out according to several variables, including gilt yields, so it rises or falls over time. ● Almost 20,000 current and former teachers are to be offered the chance to join the Local Government…

LBG Media (Aim: LBG), a digital publisher, has posted a loss of £1.9m for the first six months of 2022. In the same period last year it made £5.6m after expanding its user base by 315 million people. The loss was incurred by aggressive expansion in the firm’s staffing levels. The market seems concerned that the investment may not pay off, notes Investors’ Chronicle. If young people are becoming disillusioned with the likes of Twitter and Instagram, there will be a smaller audience for LBG’s content-marketing on social media. The stock has lost 65% since it listed in December 2021.…

Boris Johnson The Rise and Fall of a Troublemaker at Number 10 Andrew Gimson Simon & Schuster (£25) It’s barely a month since Boris Johnson left Downing Street, yet the first account of his time in office is already out. But this new book from Andrew Gimson – who previously wrote Boris: The Rise of Boris Johnson in 2006 – is not a traditional biography, says Keith Simpson on Politics Home. Rather, Gimson puts “a thorough knowledge of British political history and a discerning eye for the foibles of leading politicians” to work in trying to fathom “the electoral appeal of a man so frequently dismissed as a charlatan and a clown”. He is prepared to give his subject the benefit of the doubt as he analyses the “conflicting…

£90m The street value of cocaine found washed up along Tan-y-Bwlch beach near Aberystwyth last week. The drugs were found in 30 1kg black bags tied to plastic tubs. A$5,000 The size of fines (£2,840) that could be levied on homeowners with “smelly bins” under a law passed by a suburb of the city of Perth, Australia. Residents of Victoria Park can be fined if a green bin intended for organic garden waste starts to stink. The local council claims the fine is needed to make sure residents sort their rubbish correctly. €270,000 The value of 180kg of baby eels from the critically endangered European eel species that were seized in Spain. The Spanish Guardia Civil has arrested 29 people for trying to smuggle the elvers in hand luggage and…

An illegal order to kill 17 million mink during the Covid-19 pandemic has brought down the Danish government, says Bloomberg. In 2020, prime minister Mette Frederiksen ordered the animals to be slaughtered after coronavirus was found on some farms. At the time, Denmark had the world’s largest population of mink, whose fur is used for clothing and furnishings. A support package for the country’s 3,000 farms cost DKK19bn (£2.2bn), yet the industry has now effectively been wiped out. There was no legal basis for the cull at the time, although the parliament later passed a bill authorising it. Public outrage grew after the decomposing bodies of the mink threatened to contaminate water supplies. Frederiksen avoided impeachment, but one of the parties backing her has quit and the country will hold…

Never mind falling stock prices, says David Brenchley in The Sunday Times. British blue-chips are on course to return a record amount of cash to shareholders this year. Data from AJ Bell shows that FTSE 100 dividends this year will total £81.5bn, up by 11% on 2021. Investors are also in line for a record £50.3bn in share buybacks, whereby a company buys its own shares. Buybacks offer firms a way to return cash to investors without committing to a regular dividend. Once special dividends are included, investors are in line for a record £133.4bn payday. This year has brought “meaty increases in dividends at Glencore, Shell, HSBC, AstraZeneca and BP”, says Russ Mould of AJ Bell. That “highlights the importance of the miners, oils and financials to the overall…

There is finally some good news on the inflation front, says Thomas Black on Bloomberg. Ocean shipping rates soared last year, a sign that global supply chains were buckling amid post-pandemic re-opening. But those troubled supply chains now seem to be healing. The cost to ship a container across the Pacific has tumbled from $12,424 a year ago to $4,252 now. US imports are still running above pre-pandemic levels, but monthly imports have been falling since a peak in March as consumers begin to tighten their belts and Covid-19 stimulus gets “flushed through the system”. Prepandemic Shanghai to Los Angeles container rates were about $1,500, so “judging by history, rates for maritime shipping have further to fall”.…

Renault and Nissan are in talks to rejig their alliance, says Russell Hotten in The Times. The move “could involve the Japanese carmaker investing in a new electric-vehicle venture” planned by Renault, while the French firm may cut its 43% stake in Nissan – “a source of unease at the Japanese company for years”. Moves to restructure the ties between the two groups have been gathering momentum since the arrest of Carlos Ghosn, the former CEO of Renault and Nissan, in Tokyo four years ago. The companies are also under “increasing pressure” from attempts by rivals “to forge alliances in preparation for an era of electric cars”. In theory, the best option would be for Nissan and Renault to follow the industry-wide trend for consolidation and carry out a “full…

CALB, a Chinese supplier of lithium batteries for electric-vehicle (EV) makers, listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange last week. The shares sold for HK$38, the bottom of an indicated range that stretched to HK$51. CALB raised HK$10.1bn ($1.3bn), marking the third-largest initial public offering (IPO) in Hong Kong this year. The shares drifted downwards in their first five days of trading, a better showing than the 34% first-day slump by EV-manufacturer Zhejiang Leapmotor Technologies, which had floated the week before. IPO proceeds in Hong Kong are down 75% for the year thanks to China’s downturn and the territory’s isolation.…

● Tesco’s cut in its forecast profits for this year is not cheerful news for investors, says Nils Pratley in The Guardian. Earnings are now expected to be at the bottom of the previous £2.4bn-£2.6bn range. Yet it could have been much worse. “Nobody gets a free pass in retail-land these days, but the country’s biggest supermarket chain still comes with defensive qualities”. Tesco’s size and buying clout help stop it losing customers to discount chains. The basic rate of pay for shop-floor staff is going up for the third time in 13 months, while shareholders get a dividend hike (and the shares now yield 5%). Juggling these different “stakeholder” interests is clearly tricky, but CEO Ken Murphy (pictured) seems to be managing. “On the tentative assumption that the energy…

“We’re not at risk of a collapse today in the financial system,” says John Paulson, the hedge fund manager who made $25bn for his clients and himself by shorting mortgage securities during the 2008 financial crisis. Yes, the US housing “may be a little frothy” and prices may come down or plateau, but fears of a collapse in the market are unjustified because the situation is different from 2008, he tells Bloomberg First, the underlying quality of mortgages is far better. “[In 2006-2007] there was no down-payments, no credit checks, very high leverage… [now] you don’t have the degree of poor credit quality in mortgages that you did at that time.” Second, banks aren’t as highly leveraged as they were. At the time, “the average capital in your major banks…

“We’ve done 15-minute gigs for above £20,000… we did a gig for someone who won massive at the races. He called us and said: ‘Can you get down here now?’... He was in a private box with six of his friends... Taking your top off and shaking your belly — it’s the most lucrative work there is.” Lagi Demetriou (pictured), half of the chubby father-and-son Greek-dancing duo Stavros Flatley, quoted in The Sunday Times. The act was discovered on Britain’s Got Talent in 2009 “If you’re going to sell out, sell out big.” Oona Doherty, choreographer, on performers supplementing stage work with advertisements, quoted in The Guardian “Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” Warren Buffett, quoted in the Financial Times “I used to…

project-syndicate.org Are businesspeople “more like heroes or villains?” asks Daron Acemoglu. In truth “they are often both”. The great 19th-century “robber barons”, such as John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie intimidated rivals, monopolised industries and were “downright brutal... toward any workers who [asked] for higher pay”. Yet they used their gains to fund substantial philanthropic efforts. More recently, many tech entrepreneurs “started as idealistic outsiders”, but nowadays Big Tech is “synonymous with market domination [and] tax avoidance”. Rather than fixating on the morality of the businesses themselves, consider their environment. Both Bill Gates and Mexican telecoms tycoon Carlos Slim tried to make “as much money they could”, but the latter could “get away with much worse behaviour than Gates owing to the differences between the Mexican and US legal and…

Upmarket US pet-food maker Freshpet has hired bankers to explore a potential sale under pressure from activist hedge fund Jana Partners, says Barron’s. Jana took a 10% stake in Freshpet last month and said that it would be engaging with the firm’s board and management about operational improvements as well as the possibility of finding a buyer. Freshpet specialises in dog and cat food that needs to be kept refrigerated and is marketed as fresh and healthy. In August, the company posted a larger-than-expected second-quarter loss of $20.6m for the period, and cut guidance for the year from over $55m to $48m, blaming cost inflation. The shares are down by around 70% from an all-time high in April 2021.…

A bleak winter is looming, with energy prices soaring and warnings of three-hour blackouts this winter as our supply is rationed. Last week the government scrapped plans to launch a £15m energy-saving public information campaign. That may save the government some money, but are you on track to do the same? There are hundreds of tips in the newspapers and online on how you can cut your energy bills, but some of them are simply not worth the effort. Others, however, can make a significant impact on your bills. Here are the best ones. A good way to reduce your energy bills substantially without noticing any real difference to your home’s temperature is to change the settings on your boiler. According to Nesta, a charity promoting innovation across several sectors,…

Public-policy analysts are calling it the “Great Un-resignation”. More than 700,000 retired Britons – 6% of pensioners – are considering returning to work because they are struggling to get by on their pension income, market research group Opinium reveals. However, going back to work may not have as much of a positive impact on people’s finances as they expect. There are several reasons to be cautious. First, while returning to work will boost your income, this will reduce your eligibility for any means-tested benefits you currently claim, including pension credit, housing benefit or council-tax support. In extreme cases, you may simply be replacing state benefits with income from earnings but not actually increasing your disposable income. “Your net gain may be small – do your sums carefully” In addition, bear…

AVI Global Trust seeks to invest in high-quality assets held through unconventional structures and trading at discounts to their net asset value (NAV). We aim to benefit from NAV growth and discount narrowing, achieving long-term returns in excess of global equity markets. We mainly invest in three types of company: family-controlled holding companies, closed-end funds and asset-backed special situations, such as cash-rich Japanese companies. These are united in a common philosophy: quality assets at discounted valuations. Thinking in generations, not years One such holding company we believe to be attractive is Aker ASA (Oslo: AKER), the Norwegian company that trades at a discount of about 25% to NAV, despite having produced compounded returns of 22% a year since it floated in 2004. Controlled by Kjell Røkke, Aker has a strong…

Trust Hernan DiazPicador (£16.99) If you’ve ever studied financial history – or indeed any other type of history – you’ll know that it’s frequently difficult to establish the exact truth about past events, as people’s accounts never completely align. What’s more, when the legend and the truth conflict, the former tends to win out, even if the latter turns out to be more interesting. Hernan Diaz’s second novel, Trust, hinges on the differences between fact and fable as a central element in this tale of a fictional financier and his troubled marriage in 1920s New York. The book is structured as a collection of four different manuscripts. The first part, “Bonds”, is a best-selling novella (within the story) about a financier, Benjamin Rask, who masters the market, only to see…

Opec+ has given US president Joe Biden “the middle finger”, says Jim Geraghty in National Review. The alliance of oil-producing countries, led by Saudi Arabia and Russia, has defied US pressure and announced that it will cut production by two million barrels per day (mbpd) from November – roughly 2% of global output. Oil prices jumped in response. Brent crude reached $98 a barrel early this week, having risen 12% since the start of the month. Opec’s move drew a furious reaction from the White House. It accused the group, which accounts for about 40% of global oil output, of “aligning with Russia”. Opec+ members say the cuts are needed to pre-empt softening global demand, which could otherwise herald an oil price crash. Opec’s cuts are “deeply humiliating for Joe…

Even by the standards of Elon Musk, last week “was one for the ages”, says Sarah Needleman in The Wall Street Journal. His carmaker, Tesla had “one of its worst weeks”, with vehicle delivery figures falling short of Wall Street’s expectations; on the other hand, his “rocket company ferried astronauts to the International Space Station”. However, the biggest news is that his business empire “appeared to be on the cusp of expanding to include one of the best known social-media networks”, Twitter. In a “surprise about-face” he now says that he plans “to go forward with the $44bn takeover of the business almost three months after trying to abandon the transaction”. Given Musk’s form, the move may be “another wheeze to play for time”, with the planned trial to determine…

Three to buy Tesco The Mail on Sunday Tesco is “dealing with a long shopping list of problems”, including the rising cost of food, evident in smaller basket sizes. The company has to adapt to changing circumstances “without losing share to discounters such as Aldi and Lidl”, which might affect margins and profits. However, the group increased its interim dividend by 20% and is returning cash to shareholders via a buyback. The company has “plenty of cash, good relationships with suppliers and... real expertise in offering value to customers”. That makes the shares a buy for those willing to sit through the turbulence. 205p Crestchic Shares Industrial manufacturer Crestchic’s shares have rallied by 40% over the past three months but they still trade on just 9.9 times analysts’ latest earnings-per-share…

Following an explosion on the Kerch Strait Bridge, which links occupied Crimea with Russia, Vladimir Putin has launched missiles against cities and critical civilian infrastructure across Ukraine. On one level, the Russian strikes are “entirely in line with the vindictiveness and indifference to civilian suffering with which Ukrainians have become familiar over eight years under Russian attack”, says Simon Smith in The Guardian. However, it should also be seen alongside the decision to appoint Sergei Surovikin – notorious for his brutality when supporting Bashar al-Assad’s regime in the Syrian war – as commander of Russia’s invasion forces. Putin is sending a message “that he’s listening more closely to those who have “called for a tougher, (even) more ruthless offensive approach”. The change of leadership comes after “a singularly disastrous few…

MoneyWeek goes to press on Wednesday evening and it’s impossible to know what state the UK government bond market will be in by Friday. At various times today, reports have suggested that: i) the Bank of England will definitely not continue buying bonds next week and pension funds have three days to sort out their finances; ii) that it will not buy more bonds outright but will focus on easing the liquidity crunch beyond Friday through its new Temporary Expanded Collateral Repo Facility (more than a decade of crises has exhausted the supply of snappy acronyms); and iii) that it may continue buying bonds after all. No wonder that everybody is confused and bond yields have again risen above 5% for the 30-year gilt (as of now – by Friday…

fee.org Proponents of modern monetary theory (MMT) have gone quiet, says Kellen McGovern Jones. MMT, which “contends that the government can spend as much as it wants… because it can always print more money to pay for its agenda”, became fashionable in policy and media circles in the late 2010s. Then Covid-19 took it from being “the obscure fascination” of “tweedy professors... to the seemingly deliberate policy” of major central banks and governments (though none openly admitted it). The “spray and pray” approach of “shooting bundles of cash into the economy” and paying people not to work has had the predictable effect of stoking serious inflation, somehow combining all the worst aspects of the “1970s, social welfare, and the 2008 crisis” rolled into one. “Ironically, now that MMT has been…

■ More than 20 institutional clients of fund manager Abrdn have had their accounts partially frozen due to failures in anti-money laundering (AML) processes, says Oliver Shah in The Sunday Times. An audit found that documentation for some clients in two of its Luxembourg-based umbrella funds was missing. Abrdn has now suspended around 23 accounts while it resolves the issue, 18 of which were affected because they were “high risk” (some were said to be connected to “politically exposed people”, such as government officials). The problem has led to tension with Martin Gilbert – the former co-CEO of Abrdn – who sat on the boards of the Luxembourg funds, says The Sunday Times. Gilbert has now stepped down from both roles, says the Financial Times, although Abrdn says this is…

For many stockmarket investors, the past few months have been a horror story. In particular, shares in cyclical industries – those whose sales and profits are closely tied to the economic cycle – have cratered as fears mount that a nasty recession is imminent. Packaging may appear, at first glance, to be a highly cyclical business. In simple terms, if demand declines for goods, there is less need for something to wrap them in. On that basis, it’s no wonder the sector has taken a pounding over the past year. Yet is this a completely merited assessment? As a case in point, take international packaging company, and FTSE 100 member, DS Smith (LSE: SMDS). “Online shopping has made the sector interesting again” It originated from a box-making operation started by…

When the Bank of England first started to raise interest rates banks were criticised for being slow to pass the rises on to savers. A year later savers are finally starting to feel the benefit of dearer money. You can now get as much as 4.75% interest on your savings. But don’t assume you will get the best rate if you lock your money away for the longest possible time. At present short to medium-term fixes are offering as good if not better rates than five-year bonds. For example, the top rate of 4.75% is offered by Nationwide on its three-year bond. The best five-year bond pays less: 4.61%. But we wouldn’t recommend locking your money away for three years. A better option may be Vanquis Bank’s one-year bond, which…

Pension providers with outdated IT systems and low standards of customer service are costing savers thousands of pounds and causing unnecessary delays, research warns. Consumer group Which says that the pension industry’s failures are undermining the flexibilities introduced by the pension-freedom reforms in 2015. One problem is that taking advantage of those freedoms is not possible with many older pensions. In a survey of its members by Which, 17% said they had been told they would need to move their savings to a new plan to withdraw cash directly from their funds. Many reported problems with customer service as they tried to set up these income-drawdown arrangements. Which also warned that the most expensive providers were charging almost nine times as much as the cheapest to administer income drawdown plans…

Oil and gas explorer and producer Energean (LSE:ENOG) has seen its share price rise in recent weeks because it is about to start piping gas from its flagship Karish project off the coast of Israel, says Investors’ Chronicle. It is thought that with the field fully operational, it could produce 200,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed) a year at peak production. This year the group is set to produce a total of 62,000 boed; high prices will raise earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortisation and exploration expense by 25% to $1.8bn. The stock has jumped by 54% in the past year.…

Robert Citron was born in Los Angeles in 1925. He attended the University of Southern California as a pre-med student, before switching to business studies and then dropping out in his final year without a degree. After working as a loan manager and a car salesman, he became a deputy tax collector for Orange County in California in 1960. By 1973 he was the combined tax collector and county treasurer, which put in him charge of investing the funds that the county received. What was the investment? During the 1980s Citron boosted Orange County’s returns by buying bonds, and then using them as collateral to buy more bonds. This leveraged bet that short-term interest rates would remain below long-term rates paid off handsomely during the 1980s, earning Citron such a…

2019 Chianti Rufina Riserva, Vigneto Bucerchiale, Fattoria Selvapiana, Tuscany, Italy (£35.99, thewinereserve.co.uk; £38.25, mothervine.co.uk) This month’s 2019 release of the pioneering Chianti Rufina Riserva Bucerchiale marks the 40th vintage since Francesco Giuntini took the plunge, with the help and confidence of legendary wine consultant Luigi Veronelli, and decided to make a single property, un-blended, top-flight wine, even though there was no market in the world for such a creation. As Francesco celebrates his 90th birthday and his son Federico runs this incredible estate with unerring accuracy, his grandson, Niccolò, now makes this wine. This exquisite Sangiovese is harvested from a slow-ripening, southwest facing vineyard called Bucerchiale, which benefits from typically cool Rufina nights. It is pure, supple and amazingly refined with thrilling cherry and cranberry tones over a deeper, darker…

Bringing Down Wirecard Available on Netflix Anybody interested in a blow-by-blow account of the collapse of German fintech Wirecard will almost certainly have read Money Men, the book by Financial Times journalist Dan McCrum, who played a key role in exposing the fraud at the heart of the company. So Netflix’s new documentary Skandal!, which tries to tell a complex story in 90 minutes, is aimed primarily at those less familiar with the case. Skandal! is inspired by Money Men, so it’s not surprising that McCrum and the Financial Times are given prominent roles. However, other characters also get the chance to put their side of the story, including the band of short sellers who brought the fraud to McCrum’s attention, while nearly compromising the entire investigation at one point.…

Belarus’ president Alexander Lukashenko is reportedly imposing a ban on price rises in response to “exorbitant” inflation. “How dumb can these people be?” is a frequent question here at the Bonner Private Research headquarters. We plumb the depths of it, but our cord is never quite long enough. Everybody knows that price controls don’t work. They are followed by shortages… and ultimately higher prices. In the 1990s, we were invited to Belarus to advise the government after the collapse of the Soviet Union. We sat around an immense meeting table with some immense Belarusians. After a few rounds of vodka, it was obvious that we were ill-suited to the job. On our side, we had no clue what to tell them. And on theirs, they wouldn’t have been able to…