Latest News Headlines UK

Money Week

After Sotheby’s is sold for $3.7bn, investors should bid on these other art market disruptors

French-Israeli telecoms billionaire Patrick Drahi is to pay $3.7bn for Sotheby’s (NYSE: BID) , the New York-listed auction house through his holding company, BidFair. Investors will get $57 a share, representing a 61% premium on the most recent closing price. That’s a lot of money for an old ...

today 15:23 open_in_new
Forget Sotheby’s – investors should bid on these art market disruptors instead

Sotheby’s got snapped up yesterday. French-Israeli telecoms billionaire Patrick Drahi is to pay $3.7bn for the New York-listed auction house (NYSE: BID) through his holding company, BidFair. Investors will get $57 a share, representing a 61% premium on the most recent closing price. That’s a ...

today 11:11 open_in_new
It’s decision time for the US Federal Reserve

This article is taken from our FREE daily investment email Money Morning. Every day, MoneyWeek's executive editor John Stepek and guest contributors explain how current economic and political developments are affecting the markets and your wealth, and give you pointers on how you can ...

today 09:05 open_in_new
Kier scraps its dividend – how much lower can its share price go?

Shares in construction services company Kier Group (LSE: KIE) hit a fresh low today, as the company scrapped its dividend payout and announced plans to cut 1,200 jobs in the UK, and to sell its house-building and property businesses.

More importantly, the company’s net debt was a ...

yesterday 17:20 open_in_new
What does Lufthansa’s profit warning mean for airline stocks?

German airline Lufthansa (Frankfurt: LHA) warned on profits this morning, after it reported falling sales at its budget carrier brand, Eurowings and rising fuel costs. The share price fell by more than 10%.

In effect, competition between short-haul operators in Europe, combined with a less ...

yesterday 15:14 open_in_new
BlackRock Latin American Trust: the tide is turning for Brazil

The BlackRock Latin American Trust is grabbing the bull by the horns. Investors should, too.

“Brazil is the country of tomorrow and always will be,” said Charles de Gaulle. Investors appear to agree with him, focusing their emerging markets (EM) exposure on Asia. In the 1990s, there ...

yesterday 15:14 open_in_new
Why you should keep the faith in Kier Group

Engineering firm Kier Group has hit trouble, but the core business looks sound, says Matthew Partridge.

The turmoil at Neil Woodford’s main UK fund has caused the share price of the companies in its portfolio to slip. The thinking is that as soon as the temporary restrictions on ...

yesterday 15:14 open_in_new
Profit from the growth of cities in China

A professional investor tells us where he’d put his money. This week: Damian Taylor, portfolio manager Asia at Martin Currie, highlights three promising stocks

Urbanisation is an important driver of economic growth in China. City dwellers typically have larger disposable incomes, while ...

yesterday 14:11 open_in_new
The bull market’s secret weapon

The analysts at Montanaro Asset Management have a lovely chart in their client presentations (sadly, it’s not publicly available). It looks at the average number of months a bull market has lasted in the UK and then at the average returns those bull markets have produced. The numbers ...

yesterday 13:08 open_in_new
Help to Buy has been a waste of money

This article is taken from our FREE daily investment email Money Morning. Every day, MoneyWeek's executive editor John Stepek and guest contributors explain how current economic and political developments are affecting the markets and your wealth, and give you pointers on how you can ...

yesterday 11:02 open_in_new
Great frauds in history: Sarah Howe

Sarah Howe was born around 1826 in Providence, Rhode Island, in the US, and worked most of her early life as a fortune-teller in Boston. In 1875 she was arrested several times for fraud, usually for taking out multiple loans secured by the same asset, and then refusing to repay them. In 1879 she ...

yesterday 08:56 open_in_new
Don’t raid your pension savings to buy a property

Should you be able to raid your pension savings to fund the purchase of your first home, as housing minister James Brokenshire (pictured) has suggested?

The short answer is no. While pension savings might be an attractive target for homebuyers needing a deposit, raiding the piggy ...

2019-06-16 16:02 open_in_new
Why the big tech companies should be broken up

Rather than wait and be at the mercy of regulators, the big tech companies should begin the process of breaking themselves up, says Matthew Lynn.

The calls for the big tech companies such as Amazon, Facebook, Google and Apple to be split apart grow ever louder and more ferocious. It’s an ...

2019-06-16 11:50 open_in_new
Chart of the week: Switzerland the safe haven

Investors rattled by the prospect of a global slowdown and a worsening trade war are heading for Switzerland; the local stockmarket index has just hit a new record.

The politically stable country compares favourably to the shaky eurozone and increasingly fraught global geopolitical ...

2019-06-16 10:47 open_in_new
How Britain became a global leader in tech stock “unicorns”

The UK has more billion-dollar technology companies, or “unicorns”, per capita, than China has. That’s cause for celebration, but they need nurturing. Simon Wilson reports.

Theresa May opened London Tech Week – which has grown since its debut in 2014 into Europe’s biggest ...

2019-06-15 15:53 open_in_new
Employees: brace yourselves for a pension-scheme buyout

Your company’s final-salary pension scheme could be sold to an insurer. And while the merits of such a deal may not be clear cut, they can have their advantages.

Insurance company Legal & General (L&G) is to take over the pensions of 33,000 members of engineering giant ...

2019-06-15 15:53 open_in_new
The charts that matter: the US dollar continues lower

Welcome back. Don’t forget to sign up for more information on the MoneyWeek Wealth Summit on 22 November. Make sure you hear about the tickets first when they go on sale – sign up for our free updates, right here.

No new podcast this week, but if you missed Merryn and I talking about ...

2019-06-15 11:41 open_in_new
Brent crude oil: back in a bear market

Oil prices are back in a bear market, says Matthew DiLallo on Motley Fool. The price of Brent crude oil had rallied 50% since the start of the year to a high of $75 a barrel in April. But price falls of as much as 5% last week took cumulative losses since May past the 20% level that marks a bear ...

2019-06-14 17:47 open_in_new
Government admits it has got its state pension sums wrong

Approximately 360,000 people have been given incorrect forecasts of their state pension benefits, the government has confirmed.

Some 3% of all online forecasts issued to savers since 2016 are incorrect, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) says, often overstating what people ...

2019-06-14 16:44 open_in_new
Currency Corner: what does Boris Johnson’s pending victory mean for the pound?

Just before we get started today, I took part in a webinar last week with Alex Edwards of currency specialist OFX, and MoneyWeek’s John Stepek – we enjoyed a wide-ranging discussion about global trade, Brexit, and the effect on the foreign exchange markets. You can watch the whole ...

2019-06-14 14:38 open_in_new
What does the tension in the Gulf of Oman mean for oil?

This article is taken from our FREE daily investment email Money Morning. Every day, MoneyWeek's executive editor John Stepek and guest contributors explain how current economic and political developments are affecting the markets and your wealth, and give you pointers on how you can ...

2019-06-14 13:35 open_in_new