Sunday newspaper round-up: HSBC, bank charges, ITV, Dairy Crest

18th Oct 2015 16:00

(ShareCast News) - HSBC has swung back in favour of keeping its headquarters in the UK, after some placatory watering down of planned reforms within the banking industry. The bank, which had threatened to move out of Britain, has been placated by Chancellor George Osborne's decision to reduce the bank levy and give more leeway on plans to force banks to ring-fence their retail and investment businesses, the Sunday Times reported. Stuart Gulliver, the bank's chief executive, has managed to get "pretty much everything he wanted out of the government", a high-level source told the paper. Across the banking sector, lenders could be told to introduce charges for current accounts or spell out the hidden fees imposed on customers, when the Competition & Markets Authority (CMA) reports on its investigation into the supply of personal current accounts and of banking services to small and medium-sized enterprises. Provisional results are due to be announced on Thursday, with report expected to suggest that, rather than levy hidden fees on customers' current accounts, banks could simply introduce a flat fee for the service instead, the Sunday Telegraph reported.Northern Rock's £13bn 'Granite' loan book could be sold by the government to New York-based investment firm Cerberus, currently mired in a scandal over Ireland's own bad bank. The decision by UK Asset Resolution (UKAR) to choose Cerberus as the preferred buyer for this loan book could prove controversial, the Sunday Times said, as it is undergoing a probe over its €5.7bn purchase of similar loans from Ireland's Nama.Plans for its own Greek bad bank have been shelved by the Greek government in favour of selling a €100bn portfolio of dodgy loans to a group of investment companies, including Spanish real estate loan servicer Aktua and US private equity giants Bain Capital. The Sunday Times said the expected sale comes as Greece's four largest banks - National Bank of Greece, Piraeus, Eurobank and Alpha - undergo a review to determine how much capital each needs from the €25bn set aside to recapitalise the sector. Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras aims to complete the health check by the end of this month in order to open discussions with creditors on relief for the country's €320bn of debt.The European Central Bank will lay the groundwork for further, stronger economic stimulus measures this week in order to fight back against deflation, with some economists predicting easing policies to be announced on Thursday. The bank's governing council is set to meet in Malta this week and, while it is not expected to deliver any new firepower, the Sunday Telegraph said, members of the committee are expected to leave the door open to offering more support by the end of the year.ITV has warned that if the government follows through with its current discussions and privatises fellow public service broadcaster Channel 4, it would harm the whole British £3bn television production sector, including itself. The Sunday Telegraph reported that a senior ITV source said the company was concerned that independent TV producers could struggle if Channel 4 was run by a profit-focused owner. The ITV source said: "We would be concerned if any change in C4's ownership were to have a negative impact on the independent production sector, which is such an important part of the wider UK creative industries."Despite the 85% collapse in its share price since its 2012 peak, the chances of Africa-focused Tullow Oil being taken over are "incredibly slim", chief executive and founder Aidan Heavey told the Sunday Times in an interview. "Even if I got up in the morning and decided to sell the business, you have to get approval for all the countries in Africa where we operate. We have very special relationships in Africa. They view Tullow very differently from other companies. The African countries realise their destinies and ours are pretty well linked."The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) "has no tools to be a swing producer anymore", its former president has said. Speaking to the Sunday Telegraph, Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah highlighted the drop in Opec's market share, from nearly 60% in the 1990s to the just over 30% it holds now. He also predicted that plans to restore a $70 per barrel price floor fir crude, which is due to be discussed by Opec energy experts in Vienna this week, will prove impossible without the support of both Russia and Mexico, neither of which are Opec members.Volkswagen could be slapped with a £30bn law suit by shareholders following the infamous emissions scandal, it has been revealed. Litigation finance group Bentham has hired law firm Quinn Emanuel to prepare a class action in Germany for Volkswagen investors. Quinn Emanuel's co-managing partner told the Sunday Telegraph: "We estimate shareholders' losses could be €40bn as a result of VW's failure to provide relevant disclosure to the market and gives rise to questions about fundamental dishonesty."Dairy Crest's sale of its milk division to Germany's Muller will be given the regulatory go-ahead this week, the Sunday Times reported, after it was ruled that the deal was unlikely to result in milk prices increasing. Having sold this unit, the group will be focused on its cheeses and spreads business and could become a takeover target.UK retailers are set for a fiercely competitive Black Friday this year with sales forecast to top £1bn on the day of 27 November alone. But, the Mail on Sunday reported, experts and executives warned the discounting frenzy could be a real threat to profitability. US giant Amazon is expected to begin offering discounts from November 1, with an early retreat into discounting to compete with this by the rest of the market could prove devastating.Motorway service station company Welcome Break has been put up for sale, with companies including 3i Infrastructure and Carlyle Group already examining its accounts, the Sunday Times said. Welcome Break, which is owned by the Appia Investments consortium, is likely to sell for roughly £700m, sources said.The UK steel industry needs "life-saving surgery" to take it out of the current "crisis", including energy costs, business rates costs and fair trade, UK Steel has warned. His comments come amid expectations Tata Steel is planning to announce 1,200 job cuts, just weeks after the closure of SSI's plant in Teesside.A much-praised law proposed by the government to protect businesses from insurers which take too long to pay out on claims, could cripple the insurance industry according to Lloyd's of London. In a letter to the Treasury seen by the Sunday Times, Lloyd's chief executive Inga Beale argued the proposed rule should exclude insurance for companies making more than £9m sales and that the new rules would "open the door to speculative and vexatious claims against insurers for losses that were never covered in the first place".