From the outback to the City April 8, 2010 YOU wouldn’t expect the Australian outback to be the breeding ground for one of the City’s best-known entrepreneurs, but it was for Ian Gowrie-Smith. He’s the first man in his family not to be a farmer for five generations. The flamboyant entrepreneur made his name back in the 1980s and 1990s setting up companies including [...]
Facebook’s share scheme’s new rules April 8, 2010 USUALLY insider-trading rules are associated with large financial institutions, but earlier this week Facebook, the privately owned social networking site, had to implement its own insider trading policy. Facebook, which issued stock to its employees up until 2007, established the new policy to ensure that employees would not get into a legal wrangle with the [...]
GOING GLOBAL April 8, 2010 Q. I think there could be a market for my business overseas, but how easy is it to expand internationally? A. Even though it is getting more and more accessible to do this, it is not an easy process if you want to do it properly. Tony Cohen, head of entrepreneurial business at Deloitte, says [...]
Poor performance among miners pushes FTSE down April 7, 2010 WEAKER miners and energy stocks, weighed by falling commodity prices, outweighed gains in defensive tobacco firms and drugmakers to drag Britain’s top share index down 0.3 per cent by the close yesterday. The FTSE 100 index ended 18.29 points lower at 5,762.06. Volume was thin as many traders extended their Easter holidays, with just 74 [...]
Wall St slides on Fed rate concerns April 7, 2010 US STOCKS fell in a broad late-day drop yesterday after a top Federal Reserve official said interest rates should not stay low for much longer, giving investors an excuse to take profits. A speech by Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank President Thomas Hoenig drove afternoon selling after he said keeping interest rates too low for [...]
Get a shortcut to hedge fund gains with ETFs April 7, 2010 FOLLOWING a terrible 2008, hedge funds managed to bounce back last year both in terms of assets under management and performance. In 2009, the Credit Suisse/Tremont hedge fund index recorded annual performance of 18.57 per cent compared to a loss of 19.07 per cent the previous year, largely as a result of the financial crisis. [...]
Covered warrants help you play the election April 7, 2010 IF there is one thing that markets hate, it is uncertainty. With some polls pointing to a hung parliament after the election, many traders are tempted to take their money off the table until it is clear who is in charge of the British economy. If that means waiting until a second election – a [...]
LISTED PRODUCT NEWS April 7, 2010 INVESTING IN THE EAST Societe Generale launched 51 new covered warrants at the start of this month. Now investors can trade call and put warrants on Hong Kong’s stock index the Hang Seng, the Nasdaq 100 and Japan’s Nikkei 225 index. The Hang Seng has been fairly volatile this year and remains below the recent [...]
THE TIPSTER April 7, 2010 THE weekly US inventory data may have shown a surprise build up in oil stocks, but with global demand set to keep ticking higher as the recovery gains pace then yesterday’s dip back to the $86 per barrel mark is likely to be nothing more than a short-term blip. Oil at $100 could be around [...]
INVESTORS’ GLOSSARY April 7, 2010 HAIRCUT Rather than something you might get done at the hairdressers, this type of haircut applies to collateralised agreements in the financial markets. In a lending agreement, the lender may subtract a certain percentage from the value of the assets that are being put up as a collateral to reflect the risk associated with holding [...]
