Brexit concerns have bitten into the UK’s lead as Europe’s top financial services location for investors, new research shows. The UK’s financial services industry has retained its title as Europe’s most attractive location for international investment, but its lead has narrowed due to fears over the impact of Brexit, according to a report by professional services firm EY.
Reuters
The aggregate real disposable income of UK households has fallen for three quarters in a row for the first time since the 1970s, according to the Office for National Statistics. The ONS said that the inflation-adjusted compensation of the household sector fell 1.4 per cent in the first three months of 2017, reflecting spiking inflation and weak pay growth.
Macrobond, The Independent
The owner of the farm which provides Wimbledon with its strawberries has said she hopes there is a “mechanism” for European citizens to work seasonally in the UK after Brexit. Marion Regan, who owns Hugh Lowe Farms in Kent with her husband Jon, relies on seasonal labour to make sure Wimbledon is supplied with fresh strawberries throughout the tournament.
Reuters
Consumer confidence is now almost back down to the lows seen in the wake of last June's Brexit referendum, adding to a picture of a wilting consumer in the face of fast rising inflation and weak wage growth. The latest GfK Index slipped to -10 in June, down from -5 in the previous month, its lowest since last July.
Philip Morris International, the world’s second largest tobacco company, has said it wants people to quit the habit. Peter Nixon, UK and Ireland managing director for the global tobacco giant said “We are absolutely serious - one day we want to stop selling cigarettes.”
Chinese business magnate Jack Ma said that evolving technologies are likely to pose a threat to more than just the job market and could in fact trigger a Third World War. In an interview with CNBC, the billionaire chairman of Alibaba said that world leaders have a duty to educate people to prevent the pain caused by a rapid rise in automation and artificial intelligence.
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Nomura picked Frankfurt as the headquarters for its European Union operations after the UK leaves the bloc, people with knowledge of the matter said. Japan’s biggest brokerage will start preparations this month to form a base in the German financial centre, one of the people said, asking not to be identified as the matter is confidential. It will seek regulatory approval and find office space before transferring fewer than 100 employees from London to the city, according to the person.
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The reckless rise of artificial intelligence is going to be much more disruptive for the London technology scene in the longer run than Britain’s departure from the EU, according to musician, entrepreneur and philanthropist will.i.am. Speaking at an event celebrating his collaboration with Atom Bank, an app-based digital-only bank launched last year, the founding member of The Black Eyed Peas said that by 2030, Brexit will be “an old school thought” for the UK’s rapidly evolving tech industry and AI will present a much more acute challenge.
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Some of the world’s poorest countries will be hit hardest as climate change affects marine fisheries all over the world, according to a new study. The global fishing industry produces a total catch worth of about $90bn (£71bn) but the warming ocean temperatures are causing many valuable species to shift their usual ranges.
Lisa Murray
An American firm is promising the return of supersonic passenger aviation, with transatlantic airfares “about the same price as today’s business class tickets”. Boom, based in Denver, says London-New York will cost £2,000 one-way and take just 3 hours 15 minutes. With a planned cruising speed of 1,451mph, the plane is almost 100mph faster than Concorde.
George Clooney is selling his US tequila brand Casamigos to British beverage company Diageo for almost $1bn (£790m). The London-based distiller will initially pay $700m (£553m) for Casamigos and possibly an additional $300m (£237m) based on the performance of the brand over the next decade. The purchase will be Diageo's biggest since it bought United Spirits for $3.2 billion (£2.5 billion) in 2014.
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Britain's biggest carmaker Jaguar Land Rover will hire 5,000 staff as it boosts its skills in autonomous and electric technology, a welcome business endorsement as Prime Minister Theresa May starts Brexit talks after a botched election. JLR, which employs more than 40,000 people globally, said it would hire 1,000 electronic and software engineers as well as 4,000 additional personnel including in manufacturing, most of whom will be based in Britain.
Internet giants will face increased pressure to tackle online extremism as European leaders were expected to back a UK-led drive for tougher internet regulation. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson will lead calls to ensure there is “no safe space for terrorists” to plot attacks and share radical material online when he attends a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg on Monday.
Reuters
While the end of free movement is presented by politicians as ‘taking control’, for employers it means quite the reverse – it means a loss of control, it means new barriers to recruitment and, for some, the risk of irreparable damage. In our research at the National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR) before and after the referendum vote we’ve detected a gradual change in outlook among employers.
AP
Internet giants will face increased pressure to tackle online extremism as European leaders were expected to back a UK-led drive for tougher internet regulation. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson will lead calls to ensure there is “no safe space for terrorists” to plot attacks and share radical material online when he attends a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg on Monday.
Rex
Amazon, the e-commerce behemoth that sells everything from toothpaste to tennis shoes, has announced it will purchase grocery store Whole Foods for $13.7bn (£10.7bn). The Seattle-based retailer will buy the popular health food chain for $42 per share, pending approval by its shareholders.
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Ivanka Trump has come under fire again after workers at a factory making clothes for her brand in Indonesia described an environment of “verbal abuse” and poverty wages. More than a dozen workers at the factory in Subang told the Guardian that they regularly work unpaid overtime and are paid one of the lowest minimum wages in Asia, despite production targets that are impossible to meet.
AP
The EU has launched antitrust investigations into Nike, Universal Studios and the owner of the Hello Kitty brand, over their licensing and distribution practices within the single market. In a statement, the European commission said that it was looking into whether the three companies were illegally preventing retailers from selling certain goods licensed by them across borders and online, thereby breaking competition rules.
The “daddy of all burgers” has arrived, just in time for Father's Day. Morrisons launched the huge, one pound, 18cm monster, which should satisfy even the hungriest of dads, on Wednesday. Each one is made by butchers in-store using 100 per cent British beef seasoned with paprika, sage and parsley. Morrisons claims it is the biggest beef burger money can buy in a UK supermarket, and it costs just £3. Shoppers will have to be quick however, as the oversized patties are only available until Sunday.
PA
Verizon Communications said on Tuesday it closed its $4.48bn (£3.51m) acquisition of Yahoo's core business and that Marissa Mayer, chief executive of the internet company, had resigned. The completion of the acquisition marked the end of Yahoo as a stand-alone internet company, a tech pioneer once valued at more than $100bn.
REUTERS
Thames Water has been hit with a £8.55m penalty for failing to reduce leakages, regulator Ofwat said on Wednesday. A “cluster of significant bursts” meant that Thames Water’s leakages increased by five per cent since last year, according to the company’s annual report. This brought the leakages up to 677 million litres per day, exceeding the 630 million target.
PA Wire
The pound traded near a two-week high against the dollar on Thursday morning, as the first voters took to the polls in the UK’s general election. Sterling was recently trading little changed against the dollar at around $1.2955, not far off its $1.2970 peak hit on Wednesday, which was the currency’s highest level since 25 May.
Reuters
UK car manufacturing plummeted by almost a fifth in April, as the timing of Easter ate into the number of production days in the month.
Reuters
High street stalwart Marks and Spencer has reported a more than 60 per cent fall in pre-tax profit in the year to the end of March, hurt by a decline in clothing sales and higher costs from opening new food stores. Pre-tax profit came in at £176.4m for the year, while sales were broadly steady at £10.6bn. Food revenue was up 4.2 per cent.
Reuters
Tech behemoth Apple has been named the most valuable brand in the world for a seventh consecutive year. The highly-regarded ranking, compiled by Forbes magazine, puts the iPhone makers’ brand value at $170bn, a 10 per cent increase on figure for 2016 and well ahead of second-placed Google, whose brand value has risen $19.3bn from last year to just under $102bn, according to Forbes. Tech peer Microsoft nabbed third spot, with a value of $87bn, followed by Facebook at $73.5bn. Consumer goods giant Coca-Cola rounds out the top five with a value of $56.4bn.
Reuters
A large, diamond ring is expected to fetch £350,000 at auction 30 years after its owner paid £10 for it at a car boot sale, thinking it was a costume jewel. The “exceptionally-sized” stone was presumed not to be real because 19th Century diamonds were not cut to show off their brilliance like today's gems. And so the owner, unaware of its value, wore it for decades, while doing everything from the shopping to the chores.
PA
Jean-Michel Basquiat’s painting of a skull sold for $110.5 million at Sotheby’s in New York, setting an auction record for American artists and providing a windfall for the daughter of two collectors who purchased it for $19,000 in 1984.
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The company that owns the Peppa Pig brand has announced that it is producing 117 new episodes for the popular children’s cartoon. The new series will air from spring 2019 and take the total number of Peppa Pig episodes to 381.
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A buy-to-let tycoon who banned “coloured people” from his properties “because of curry smells” is facing legal action brought by the equality watchdog. Millionaire Fergus Wilson, who reportedly owns close to 1,000 properties in Kent, sent an email to a local letting agency informing them of the ban. Commission chief executive, Rebecca Hilsenrath, said: “We have asked the court if it agrees with us that Mr Wilson’s lettings policy contains unlawful criteria and, if so, to issue an injunction. “As this is now formal legal action we will release further information at a later date.”
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