Monday newspaper round-up: Royal Bank of Scotland, ITV, House prices

21st Sep 2009 06:25

Royal Bank of Scotland is to consider a £3bn-£4bn share issue to reduce the stake it would hand to the government for joining its toxic assets insurance scheme and has approached its biggest investors about the idea.Plans are "tentative" and Stephen Hester, RBS's chief executive, is still "putting out feelers" to its shareholders about a "modest-sized" share issue, according to a person familiar with the situation. Such a decision would see RBS join Lloyds Banking Group in scrambling to raise capital to limit the use of what banks involved in the government's new asset protection scheme view as a costly "bad bank" programme, the FT reports.Peter Fincham, ITV's director of television, has emerged as a potential compromise candidate for chief executive of the independent broadcaster as the dispute over Tony Ball's pay demands escalates. Mr Ball, the former boss of BSkyB, in which News Corporation, parent company of The Times, owns a 39.1% stake, was expected to have been confirmed as the new chief executive of ITV last week, the Times reports. House prices have risen by 0.6% this month, a report from Rightmove suggests today, though the online estate agency warns that lenders' caution and poor stock levels continue to threaten the market. Rightmove's monthly housing survey, which is based on asking prices on the website rather than on completions, also reveals that the value of properties across much of the UK are continuing to fall. While overall prices in England and Wales have risen during September, only three areas of the country saw gains, the Independent reports.An attempt by British consumers to rein in spending after the harsh lessons of the recession could limit growth and therefore depress household income further, the Bank of England warns today. It says in its latest Quarterly Bulletin that household decisions to spend or save will have major consequences for the economic outlook, because consumer spending accounts for two-thirds of total spending in the UK, the Telegraph reports.The cash for bangers scheme is set to earn the Treasury a major windfall, The Daily Telegraph has learned.nitial industry estimates suggest the Government will make at least £100m profit out of the scheme. It was introduced to try to stem the tide of falling demand which had seen shifts cut and waves of redundancies in an industry on which 800,000 jobs depend, the Telegraph reports. The head of the body that oversees global banking regulation has issued a stern warning that the world cannot afford to slip into a "complacent" assumption that the financial sector has rebounded for good. Speaking before this week's G20 meeting in Pittsburgh - when the world's leading politicians will seek to define a common direction for the future control of the sector - Jaime Caruana, general manager of the Bank for International Settlements and a former governor of Spain's central bank, said the market rebound should not be misinterpreted, the FT reports.Corporate Britain should be protected from proposed sweeping reforms on bonuses and risk-taking, according to the Institute of Directors (IoD). In its first detailed response to Sir David Walker's review of banks' bonus culture and risk practices, the IoD will say today that some of his proposed measures are too draconian and should not be forced on companies outside the financial sector, the Times reports.National Express could have survived as an independent company if it had better managed its relationship with the Department for Transport, its former chairman David Ross has said. The comments come as the troubled bus and rail operator prepares to accept a £765m bid by a Spanish-led consortium. The Spanish Cosmen family, which owns 18.6% of the group, and private equity firm CVC have until Friday to complete the due diligence and either make a 500p per share offer or walk away, the FT reports. Cyber criminals have created a highly sophisticated Trojan virus that steals online banking log-in details from infected computers. The Clampi virus, which is spreading rapidly across hundreds of thousands of computers in Britain and the United States, infects computers when users visit websites that host a malicious code, the Times reports. European commercial property owners face a wave of complex debt refinancings and restructurings that pose a threat to the sector, according to bankers and industry groups. Senior bankers and industry representatives in the UK used a meeting with the Bank of England in the summer to highlight the problems caused by billions of pounds worth of debt that needs to be refinanced or has breached banking agreements, the FT reports.