Corporate Money articles from February 2000

Corporate Money archives from February 2000

Bonds.(increase in corporate bonds in Europe and the United Kingdom expected)(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The supply of corporate bonds in the UK and continental Europe is expected to rise. An increasing proportion of companies are shifting from equity to debt in order to finance their growth. But analysts point out that Europe's market for...

Equities.(decisions on interest rates will affect the market)(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The current criticial decisions on interest rates in the US and Europe will have a long-term effect on the relative attractiveness of the bond and equity markets. It is a question of risk perception. If institutional investors perceive little...

M&A.(mergers and acquisitions activity rising with help from the Internet)(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... There seems no limit to the value that the UK, European and US M&A sectors can achieve in 2000. A KPMG report (page 4 M&A focus) says cross-border M&A activity rose by 47 per cent in 1999 compared to 1998. The Internet `catalyst' is a driving...

Universities `go corporate' on finance.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... UK universities are adopting a more innovative and corporate approach to investing and borrowing. Keele University in North Staffordshire is using a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to issue bonds against the rental income from student...

Net loss.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
February 2, 2000... Financial services companies are not realising the full potential of e-business, according to a study by Arthur Andersen. Banks, insurers and asset managers risk losing business to online upstarts. Fewer than 25 per cent of the 200 companies...

Duty free.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The UK Treasury would gain from the abolition of stamp duty on British share dealing, according to latest research. The research, by London Economics, suggest the move would give the Treasury a one-off [pound]6bn increase in capital gains tax...

Standard selection.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The Internet is helping shape the German corporate revolution which is interesting UK venture capitalists. Proposals being debated for a new code include using the Internet for companies to issue invitations to general meetings and draw...

Eurogene reflects Biotech's higher profile.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The biotechnology sector is taking a higher profile. Eurogene, a privately held UK-based biotechnology company led by University of London professor John Martin, plans to raise [pound]15m in venture capital. Eurogene is developing a broad...

Shareholders support NatWest takeover.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... Large shareholders could undermine the National Westminster Bank's fight to stay independent. Some are dissatisfied with NatWest's rejection of the [pound]22.4bn Royal Bank of Scotland and [pound]23.4bn Bank of Scotland bids. Some institutional...

Dry cleaning.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... Semara Holdings? Never heard of them? The firm used to be called Sketchley, until its High Street presence, Sketchley Retail, the dry cleaning and photo processing business, was sold in July 1998 to Mister Minit. It also sold Utility Services...

Better to arrive.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... Consolidation in the passenger transport business continues with Arriva's [pound]34.7m recommended cash offer for unlisted MTL Services, the Merseyside-based independent bus company, which is 80 per cent employee owned. Arriva is taking on...

Checking out.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... Barney Carrell, who founded RTC (real time controls) in 1971 is resigning as chairman and bowing out after RTC is acquired by the much younger NSB Retail Systems in a recommended offer of 1050p for each RTC share, valuing the equity at...

Chemical brothers.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The [pound]1.2bn recommended cash offer by Swiss-based Clariant for the much smaller specialist chemicals firm BTP represents a "highly complementary combination of both companies' core technologies and chemical competencies in life science...

Personal products.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The highly dynamic and competitive world of superstores generates ever more specialist niche suppliers. Hexel, which has been acquired by Peter Black Holdings for [pound]19.2m, has been successful in supplying multiple retailers' needs for...

Groep prelude.(Brief Article)
February 2, 2000... The most important four letters in private equity spell the word exit. Profitable exits, though, are but the hoped-for prelude to bargain entries. NeSBIC Groep, the Dutch venture capitalist, has managed a disposal of nearly [pound]20m. This...

Bonds.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... European interest rates will have to rise to a more neutral level for the longterm good of Euroland. Bonds will, acording to analysts, reamin under pressure from the cyclical upswing. The key financing rate may be as high as 4 per cent by the...

Equities.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... The activities of Internet hackers may pose a threat to the shares of vulnerable companies. Corporations with `Net exposure' in Europe are reviewing their security following the FBI investigation into a series of US hacking incidents that have...

M&A.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... Royal Bank of Scotland looks like winning its battle with Bank of Scotland for National Westminster Bank. Shareholder confirmation may not take place until the end of this month and the merged bank's policy is still to be clarified. One effect,...

UK is the investment attraction of Europe.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... The UK is fast becoming the investment attraction centre of Europe. Overseas companies raised their spending on UK acquisitions to a record [pound]33.8bn in the last quarter of 1999, according to government statistics. And the Alternative...

Jiway joins the online trading revolution.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... The online trading revolution in Europe has taken on a new global dimension with the launch of Jiway, a Euro100m exchange concept, by the OM Group of Sweden and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. Per Larsson, board director of Jiway and CEO of OM...

Engineering competes with the `.coms'.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... The unfashionable engineering sector has been given a major boost by Ernst & Young research. E&Y is upbeat after a survey which suggests investors are "warming to a sector without a `.com' in sight." The booming Internet technology sector...

Combine harvesting.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... Corporate partnerships are being set up to unlock Internet potential through "technology expertise" combinations. The link between Reuters and Multex, online intermediary, to set up a financial portal for European private investors, is one of...

Net deals reach new high as Reuters goes for online private investors.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... Internet deals are reaching a new high. Reuters is targeting the private investor and readying a [pound]500m war chest to take its financial news services online. The private investor is becoming one of the most sought-after online targets and...

Trackers scent big problems.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... European companies are big - and getting bigger. And, if the trend continues, a massive problem is going to follow for tracker funds. The use of portfolios which replicate the components of an index is growing because of lower costs and...

Fidelity hears siren song of UK pensions.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... Fidelity Investments is the latest institution to target the expected soaring demand for pension management in the UK. The market, currently valued at [pound]46bn is expected to reach [pound]103bn by 2011 with the new stakeholder pensions...

Squaring the circle.(Brief Article)
February 9, 2000... "You had your chance and you blew it in a misguided policy of diversification in the 1980s!" That's the nub of Lafarge's withering criticism of Blue Circle in launching its [pound]3.4bn cash offer for the British-based cement maker. The hostile...

Equities.
February 16, 2000... Stock exchanges in Europe should benefit as UK pension funds look to diversify outside a home stock market subject to influences that may introduce undesirable volatility. Pension funds are likely to step up exposure in Europe (see focus Page...

Warburg top.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... Warburg Dillon Read has regained its position as the No1 securities house for research in the eyes of UK publicly-quoted companies. The 16th annual broker survey by market research consultancy Consensus Research International says WDR has also...

Widows and Mercer target institutions.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... Two UK investment forces plan an aggressive expansion of asset management. William M Mercer, the world's largest investment consultancy is posed to become the first big league UK consultancy to establish a fund management arm. And Scottish...

ukp20bn switch.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... William M Mercer is readying a range of multi-manager funds for small and medium pension funds which are expected to switch up to ukp20bn from traditional pooled funds over the next three years. Mercer has specialised in advising pension...

Look to Europe advice taken.
February 16, 2000... Investment consultant William M Mercer sent a strong signal to the UK pension fund sector as it moved firmly into asset management. It urged British pension funds to switch assets from the UK to overseas equities. Mercer, the world's...

Big problem looms as Super firms dominate Europe bourses.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... Super companies are exerting domination over Europe's stock exchange and indices and tracker funds may never be the same again. Mergers in Europe are having a massive impact on the approach to passive investment funds and the composition of...

Cleaning up.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... Semara Holdings? Never heard of them? The firm used to be called Sketchley, until its High Street presence, Sketchley Retail, the dry cleaning and photo processing business, was sold in July 1998 to Mister Minit. It also sold Utility Services...

Point of Care.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... The POC (Point-of-Care) sector of the health market is growing rapidly and is estimated to be worth US$1bn world-wide. In contrast to the hospital laboratory sector, the POC market is fragmented. But in one of the first moves towards...

Value of hope.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... Like the Internet, biotechnology creates huge amounts of hope value. Keele-based Cobra Therapeutics, which has been acquired in a recommended deal by ML Laboratories for an initial ukp8m in shares, made a loss after tax of ukp4.7m in 1998, had...

Bright idea.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... Wassall, the mini conglomerate linked with Knutsford a few weeks ago, has now received a welcome ukp627m bid from players of real substance - the formidable Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. KKR has had the bright idea of putting together Wassall's...

Dispensing cash.(Brief Article)
February 16, 2000... First the US, then the UK. That's the pattern. Internet companies are increasingly active as electronic intermediaries between consumers, billing companies and banks in the US. Analysts predict the practice will catch on in the UK. The trend...

Friendly societies home in on advantages.
February 23, 2000... Far away from the glamour world of on-line banking and the Internet there is still an older financial services economy, the friendly societies, based on home visits by salesmen collecting weekly amounts of hard earned cash for pensions, savings...

Bank soothes rate fears.
February 23, 2000... The Bank of England's latest quarterly inflation report forecasts that economic growth, which has picked up sharply over the last year, will accelerate in the coming months, but then moderate. Underlying inflation, now 2.1 per cent, will stay...

PwC plans split.
February 23, 2000... A report by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, which noted more than 8,000 instances of PricewaterhouseCoopers staff and partners holding shares in audited clients, in contravention of the US regulations, has led to PwC outlining moves...

Earlybird Durlacher flies high on dot.coms.
February 23, 2000... The Internet has had a powerful effect on the share price of Durlacher Corporation, the small technology investment bank. Last year it was the market's best performing stock and last Friday the shares hit a new high valuing the company at...

Blue Circle builds defence against Lafarge.
February 23, 2000... As expected, Blue Circle Industries has come out fighting as it mounts a strong defence against Lafarge's opportunistic hostile bid of 420p a share for the UK-based cement manufacturer. The cash offer values Blue Circle at ukp3.4bn. The offer...

CGU and Norwich team up to form British insurance `champion'.
February 23, 2000... The financial services world was in renewed turmoil this week with the agreed all share, nil premium merger between CGU and Norwich Union. The alliance will create the UK's largest insurance group with world-wide premium income and retail...

VW to change accounting.
February 23, 2000... Volkswagen, Europe's largest carmaker, plans to adopt International Accounting Standards, or GAAP, the US financial reporting code in 2001 in an effort to become more shareholder friendly. The planned change in accounting policies follows...

Siemens to refocus?
February 23, 2000... Siemens, the German technology group, was reported in the new Financial Times Deutschland to have adopted a 10 point plan to turn the company into a more narrowly focussed company, halving its turnover to about Euros68.5bn. The plan indicates...

Bonds drop, equities soar.
February 23, 2000... The flight to equity investment is having a big impact of the bond market. According to JP Morgan, Euros154bn was invested in the bond market in 1998. Last year the figure fell to a mere Euros16bn and the figure is set to continue. Last year,...

UK leads European private equity boom.
February 23, 2000... Strong public-to-private deals are becoming an integral part of the blossoming UK venture capital scene. Research by Arthur Andersen Corporate Finance shows there were 42 such deals valued at ukp3.5bn in 1999 compared with 27 deals worth...

Bra brands.
February 23, 2000... With a cast of high profile women's lingerie brands, such as Wonderbra. Pretty Polly, Berlei and Gossard, Sara Lee Corporation's ukp103.8m hostile bid for Courtauld Textiles has human as well as business interest. The 100p a share cash offer...

Cash injection.
February 23, 2000... The agreed merger of AMEC and the Canadian engineering group AGRA, represents the first time that Canadian shareholders have been offered the opportunity to hold exchangeable shares in a UK-based company. The merger will be achieved via a cash...

Equity & Bond Issues; UK equity issues, domestic and international bond issues - week ending 20/02/00.
February 23, 2000... Peel Holdings Market:: into bond market Amount (m): 610.00 Rating: AAA-BBB Coupon: five tranches Maturity: 13 to 39 years Lead managers: Deutsche Bank ; Royal Bank of Scotland The issue is securitised on the...