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Lehman picture still out of focus

Creditors of Lehman Brothers' European operations hold their first committee meeting next week but PwC, the administrators of the collapsed bank, have warned they are still some way from confirming exactly what they hold

Bidders warming to Woolworths

The repercussions of Woolworths’ collapse washed across the high street on Thursday as supermarkets scrambled to switch to other suppliers, administrators fielded calls from potential buyers and political blows were traded

Government to own majority of RBS

The government is to own 57.9 per cent of the Royal Bank of Scotland after shareholders bought only a tiny proportion of the new shares being offered by the bank

FRC alerts directors to the corporate reporting challenges arising from current economic conditions

The FRC recognises that the global liquidity squeeze and its impact on the wider economy increases the challenges for directors in preparing corporate reports this year

At least 100 killed in Mumbai attacks

More than 100 people were killed, including several foreigners, and hundreds injured in Mumbai after gunmen turned India’s financial capital into a war zone on Wednesday night, shooting guests in luxury hotels and setting off explosions in one of the worst terrorist attacks in the country’s history

Woolworths falls into administration

Woolworths fell into administration on Wednesday, putting 30,000 jobs at risk and marking the bleakest day so far for retail in the financial crisis

Businesses defy credit crunch with short-term fixes, finds KPMG survey

A KPMG survey of Chief Financial Officers (‘CFOs’), conducted by CFO Europe magazine, has found that companies are focusing on short-term fixes to relieve the pressure of the credit crunch

UK GAAP still used by half of companies

Deloitte says UK GAAP is still used in the parent company financial statements of over half of listed companies. Its report ‘Right to the end’ analyses financial statements taken from 130 UK listed companies, 30 of which were investment trusts

ICAS calls for stability, with simple tax measures to build confidence

Responding to the Pre-Budget Report, The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland (ICAS) welcomes new tax measures aimed at helping business through the current crisis, but criticises the chancellor for introducing unnecessary complexity to the system

Treasury moves to boost bank lending

Chancellor Alistair Darling is drawing up a package of measures to boost lending to business, amid warnings that banks risk the ultimate sanction of full nationalisation unless they reopen credit lines to struggling companies

MPs get emergency budget debate

The shadow chancellor has secured the emergency House of Commons debate he had demanded into Chancellor Alistair Darling's "crisis" pre-Budget report. Speaker Michael Martin said it was an important enough issue to prompt a three-hour debate on Wednesday

VAT rise to 18.5% scrapped at last minute

The government considered raising value added tax to a record 18.5 per cent, it emerged last night, prompting the Conservatives to claim they had unearthed a “secret Labour tax bombshell”

Tax hit to fund £20 billion fiscal stimulus

Taxpayers face six years of austerity, paying for the consequences of recession and a £20 billion fiscal stimulus unveiled on Monday by Alistair Darling as he detailed the most dismal Budget outlook seen since 1993

Scepticism and worry greet business measures

Last year’s pre-Budget report was regarded as disastrous by Britain’s business leaders, with higher taxes for entrepreneurs, staff in employee share schemes and foreigners working in the UK

Highlights of the chancellor’s speech

Some of the detail from the Pre-Budget Report

Citi soars as $300 billion bail-out is agreed

Global stock markets rebounded on Monday after the US government moved to stave off a crisis in confidence in Citigroup by providing the beleaguered bank with $20 billion in additional capital and arranging $306 billion in credit guarantees

Darling unveils live now, pay later package in Pre-Budget Report

Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling today unveiled a plan to inject £20 billion of public money to stimulate the economy and mitigate the effects of recession, paid for by a massive programme of government borrowing.

Darling to raise taxes for wealthy

Alistair Darling, Chancellor, is to target the wealthy with a new top rate of tax to help pay down soaring government borrowing, as he prepares to unveil a £12.5 billion VAT cut to encourage Britain to shop its way out of recession in today’s pre-Budget report

Citigroup gets $20 billion bail-out

The US government rode to the rescue of Citigroup, entering an agreement to backstop up to $306 billion in problematic assets and injecting $20 billion in capital to restore confidence in a bank that defines the term “too big to fail”

Scotland facing worst recession since the Eighties

Scotland is facing its worst recession since the early 1980s, according to the Ernst & Young Scottish ITEM Club annual forecast, which sees the country’s GDP contracting by 0.4 per cent next year

BDO set to scoop up work from the 'Big Four'

The dominance of the "Big Four" in traditional accounting work is set to boost mid-tier rival BDO Stoy Hayward as it scoops up restructuring work they cannot take on, according to its head

Runaway borrowing to trigger tax rises

Annual public borrowing is set to rocket towards £120 billion over the next two years – far higher than City forecasts – forcing Alistair Darling to announce plans for deferred tax rises and public spending curbs when he presents his pre-Budget report

RBS bosses apologise to investors

A profuse and candid apology to investors in the Royal Bank of Scotland for its troubles was delivered by its chairman and outgoing chief executive on Thursday

Prime Minister hears evidence from small business panel ahead of Pre-Budget Report

The Forum of Private Business (FPB) attended a forum with the Prime Minister to drive home the struggle faced by small businesses in the economic downturn

High street spending defies forecasts

The volume of UK retail sales in the three months to October was flat – better than economists expected and in sharp contrast to gloomy industry surveys

Darling lifeline for small companies

Alistair Darling, chancellor, will next week throw Britain’s struggling small and medium-sized companies a credit lifeline, in an admission that the £37 billion bank bail-out has so far failed to boost lending to business.

RBS shareholders vote on bail-out

Shareholders of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) will vote later on Thursday on whether to accept a £20 billion ($29.9 billion) government bail-out. The government is expected to gain up to 60 per cent of RBS, if the deal goes ahead

FSA wants 'rumour policies' to counter market abuse

Market traders should have "rumour policies" to combat abuse, the UK regulator warned as it once more said that unfounded gossip was behind at least some of the recent wild swings in banks' share prices

Jock Lennox to leave Ernst & Young

Jock Lennox, who lost out to Mark Otty in the race to become Ernst & Young chairman in 2005, has decided to retire from the Big Four firm. Lennox, who is a member of the Council of The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland, has already lined up a non-exec role at Oxford Instruments

Lloyds TSB vote on HBOS takeover

Shareholders in Lloyds TSB are to vote today on the proposed takeover of Halifax Bank of Scotland (HBOS). If approved, the takeover will create a UK banking giant with 145,000 staff and 3,000 branches

Retreat by Barclays fails to end revolt

Barclays was facing renewed shareholder anger in spite of moves aimed at heading off a revolt over its plans to raise more than £7 billion in fresh capital from Middle Eastern investors

UK employers unite against crucial issue

Business on Tuesday opposed Conservative leader David Cameron on the crucial issue of the best immediate economic response to the recession, echoing the prime minister’s assertion that unfunded tax cuts were urgently needed to fight the recession

UK inflation falls for first time in 15 months

Consumer prices tumbled in October, justifying the Bank of England’s 1.5 percentage point interest rate cut this month and opening the door to further reductions in the costs of borrowing

Citigroup cuts 52,000 more jobs

Citigroup took radical action on Monday to cushion the blows of the financial turmoil and revive its flagging share price, announcing plans to axe 52,000 jobs, or one in seven employees, and slash costs by about $10 billion (£6.6 billion)

Darling to set out bank rescue terms

Alistair Darling will on Tuesday spell out the detailed terms of the government’s £37 billion ($55 billion) bail-out of Royal Bank of Scotland, HBOS and Lloyds TSB, in an attempt to reassure shareholders ahead of two crucial votes this week to approve the government-backed capital raisings

IASB Chairman welcomes moves towards IFRS in North America

Sir David Tweedie, chairman of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), has welcomed actions by authorities in the Mexico, Canada and the US regarding their adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs)

Building societies and overseas banks targeted in tax probe

A fresh onslaught on offshore tax evasion is to be mounted by UK Revenue & Customs early next year when it targets customers of 25 building societies and foreign banks with British operations

World leaders unite to restore growth

World leaders pledged to shore up global growth, avoid protectionism and move quickly on regulatory reform at the conclusion in Washington at the weekend of the Group of 20 summit to address the economic crisis

Employers forecast severe UK recession

Britain is set to enter a recession as severe as that of 1991, with the economy shrinking by 2.5 per cent from its peak before reaching a trough late next year, according to a sharply revised forecast from the CBI employers’ body

Kroll restructuring businesses spun out in two MBOs

The London-based restructuring businesses of Kroll, an arm of the US risk and insurance group Marsh & McLennan (MMC), have been spun out in two management buy-outs

Buy-out bosses await downturn bargains

Two-thirds of private equity bosses have stopped investing amid the crisis in financial markets, preferring to wait for the economic downturn to throw up more attractive deals, according to a survey published on Monday

Signs of turmoil grow as G20 looms

Evidence of global economic turmoil mounted on Thursday as leaders of the G20 group of nations began to arrive in Washington for this weekend’s summit

PM calls for world tax cuts to beat the slump

Gordon Brown arrived in the United States last night with a message to the world's wealthiest nations to cut taxes and aid economic recovery

Hedge fund chiefs blame the system for financial crisis

Some of the world’s top-earning hedge fund managers told Congress on Thursday that they broadly agreed that largely unregulated financial vehicles ought to be subject to greater disclosure, though they warned of excessive regulation

UK minister claims non-execs contributed to financial crisis

Non-executive directors contributed to the financial crisis by failing to challenge the management of many top banks, said Paul Myners, the UK’s City minister, as he urged institutional investors to take a bigger role in training and empowering corporate board members

King backs fiscal boost as pound sinks

The pound plunged to new lows against the euro on Wednesday after the Bank of England issued its bleakest assessment of the economy in 15 years. Mervyn King, the Bank’s governor, gave the green light for the government to use tax cuts or a rise in public spending to limit the recession, and official forecasts indicated interest rates still had further to fall

Scottish economy heading for recession and doldrums

Scotland will plunge into recession next year according to an authoritative analysis which predicts the economy will spend years in the doldrums

IASB warns over Brussels threat

More interference from Brussels could kill off the dream of a single system of global accounting by threatening the credibility of the organisation that makes the rules, a broad group of UK investors and accountants has warned

Graduates face career crunch in economic downturn

In a survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers, 81 per cent of graduates and students say they are more concerned about their job prospects than they were this time last year, mirroring the outlook for experienced recruitment in the UK

IASB chairman warns on risk to rules

Sir David Tweedie considered resigning over European political interference, he said on Tuesday as he warned further meddling in accounting rules risked destroying the long-running project towards developing a single global set of accounting standard

Barclays’ Mideast deal hit by dissenters

Some of Barclays’ biggest shareholders have threatened to vote against the bank’s planned £7 billion capital raising unless it improves the terms of the deal that would leave it almost a third owned by Middle Eastern investors

Late filing of accounts rises 25%

British companies are struggling to meet their deadlines for filing accounts to Companies House, according to the UK body in charge of collecting such data

Auditors approve EU accounts for first time in 14 years

The European Commission finally got its annual accounts past the European Court of Auditors this week, after 14 years’ worth of attempts. But while auditors concluded the accounts were a “fair presentation” of the Commission’s financial position, it said there were unacceptable spending errors in all but two of the seven policy areas covered under the €114 billion (£93 billion) budget

Brown signals imminent tax cuts

Gordon Brown on Monday gave his firmest signal yet that the government is planning imminent tax cuts to bolster the economy, in what he hopes will be a concerted global effort to stimulate demand

Scottish bankers’ HBOS plan dismissed

Some of HBOS’s biggest investors have poured cold water on an attempt by two of Scotland’s most prominent bankers to preserve the independence of the UK’s biggest mortgage lender

Pension scheme deficits worsen

UK final salary pension schemes have dipped even deeper into the red because of falling share prices, says the Pension Protection Fund (PPF). Its latest snapshot of the finances of nearly 7,800 private sector schemes shows that in October their collective deficit stood at £97.3 billion

Accountants come out on top as preferred source of financial advice for small businesses

New research reveals that, in the UK, small firms trust their accountants more than their bank managers when it comes to seeking financial advice, with the majority admitting to seeking such advice fewer than four times per year

Bankers appeal to HBOS investors over Lloyds

Two of Scotland’s most prominent bankers are to appeal to HBOS shareholders to preserve the bank’s independence as officials warned it could be in effect nationalised if its takeover by Lloyds TSB fell through. The Financial Times reports that Sir Peter Burt and Sir George Mathewson, former chief executives of Bank of Scotland and Royal Bank of Scotland respectively, are planning to meet big investors in HBOS to discuss their proposal to remove the bank’s current management

Wall Street jobs axe threatens 70,000

The financial industry is bracing for a fresh round of job cuts as Wall Street banks slash costs to cushion the blow of further market turbulence and deepening economic woes in 2009

China authorises ‘massive’ stimulus package

China announced on Sunday a “massive infrastructure spending programme” as part of a new fiscal stimulus plan aimed at boosting the country’s rapidly slowing economy

Consumer confidence falls to record low

Consumer confidence has fallen to new record lows, according to the latest consumer confidence survey from market research company Nielsen and the British Retail Consortium (BRC)

Labour wins Glenrothes by-election

Labour on Thursday night staged a big by-election upset by winning the Glenrothes by-election, a result that confirms Gordon Brown’s political revival and is likely to ignite speculation over a possible early general election

Lenders snub calls to cut rates

All but two UK banks snubbed government calls to pass on Thursday’s dramatic interest rate cuts to new customers and more than 20 lenders withdrew deals that would have slashed borrowers’ monthly mortgage repayments

IASB questions relaxing of fair value accounting

European banks’ accounting practices have worsened as a result of the easing of fair value accounting standards, says Sir David Tweedie, head of the International Accounting Standards Board

Transparent accounting rules could restore confidence amid crisis: UN

The head of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has called for revising accounting and reporting standards to boost investor confidence amid the current global financial crisis, which he warned is spreading like a “pandemic”

Bank slashes rates to 3%

The Bank of England slashed interest rates by 1.5 percentage points to 3 per cent in a wholly-unexpected move on Thursday as it cited “marked deterioration in the outlook for economic activity at home” in the teeth of “the most serious disruption for almost a century” in the global banking system

Obama hits ground running

Barack Obama on Wednesday moved swiftly to capitalise on the momentum from his historic victory by announcing a string of senior appointments aimed at reassuring the markets and ensuring a confident transition to the presidency in January

Obama promises ‘new dawn’ after historic win

Barack Obama promised a “new dawn of American leadership” after he was elected the first African-American president of the US amid international acclaim and record turnout on Tuesday

UK plc battens down the refinancing hatches

A siege mentality is taking hold of swaths of British companies, as chief executives drop spending and expansion plans in the face of deepening reluctance by banks to lend them money

Demand for lawyers grows as job losses rise

Hard-pressed employers are gearing up to announce a ‘flood’ of redundancies, short-time working and lay-offs judging by the number of calls to legal experts seeking advice on how to avoid compensation claims

Obama elected US president

Barack Obama was elected president of the US on Tuesday night and declared a “new dawn of American leadership”, but warned the country of sacrifices and difficulties in the years ahead

FSA plans tighter scrutiny of retail banking

Banks could soon find their retail operations coming under tighter scrutiny from the Financial Services Authority under proposals that would severely curtail the industry’s freedom to regulate itself

RBS chief blames predecessors for bail-out

The new chief executive of the Royal Bank of Scotland blamed his predecessors for fostering a “bull market culture” that helped force the banking group into accepting a £20 billion ($32 billion) government bail-out.

Businesses 'pay more for credit'

Small businesses are having to "pay through the nose" for credit, according to a survey carried out by the Federation of Small Businesses. Its survey found that 27 per cent of firms have faced rises in the cost of existing finance, loans or overdrafts in the past two months

Obama and McCain in final US election push

Barack Obama and John McCain on Monday night wound up their presidential campaigns in a whirlwind of rallies and speeches even as new data underlined the scale of the economic crisis awaiting the winner

Lloyds raises HBOS savings to £1.5bn

Lloyds TSB has raised by half the estimated cost savings it could extract from its acquisition of HBOS. The revised estimate came as HBOS, the UK’s biggest mortgage lender, issued a gloomy trading statement underlining the difficulties it would face if it stayed independent

PwC to hire in China, invests for long term

PricewaterhouseCoopers is planning to hire about 2,000 graduates in China in 2009, part of its long-term plan to expand in the country despite the global credit crunch, according to its top China head

IASB and FASB to discuss global crisis

The International Accounting Standards Board and the US Financial Accounting Standards Board will meet to identify financial reporting issues brought to attention by the global economic crisis

BT looks at raising retirement age

BT is seeking changes to its final salary pension schemes, including raising the retirement age from 60 to 65 and basing benefits on the average, rather than the final salary, earned before retirement

Lloyds TSB and HBOS seeking £17 billion

Lloyds TSB and HBOS have announced plans, backed by the Government, to raise up to £17 billion as they go ahead with their proposed merger. Lloyds wants to raise £4.5 billion from investors and HBOS is seeking £8.5 billion. If the shares are not taken up, the Government will acquire them

Redundancy fears haunt labour market

A survey of 721 UK employers reveals that the UK economy should be braced for yet more redundancies in the year ahead, with older workers set to bear the brunt. The CIPD/KPMG Labour Market Outlook ‘Redundancy Special’ reveals that more than a quarter of employers (26 per cent) have contingency plans to make new or further redundancies in the next twelve months in addition to those already planned

Deloitte study warns worst yet to come

Deloitte warns the brunt of the fallout from the credit crisis is yet to be felt, despite the latest measures by the UK Government and other world jurisdictions to recapitalise the banking systems

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