Tuesday paper round-up: Barclays, Sterling, Arm

29th Sep 2009 06:18

Barclays is in talks to buy the banking division of Standard Life. The move is part of its strategy to snap up businesses while its rivals try to rebuild their balance sheets after the financial crisis. Standard Life is talking to several parties, but Barclays is understood to be the most likely bidder. Standard Life bank has savings balances of £5bn, mainly through the growth of self-invested personal pensions (Sipps), and about £9.7bn in mortgages, the Times writes.The pound dropped further on Monday as it emerged that Mervyn King had just visited Sweden, where the central bank has imposed a radical negative interest rate policy on its banking system. Sterling dropped against a basket of other currencies, extending its recent run of falls. It came as the Bank of England confirmed that its governor had met with Riksbank officials during a visit late last week to talk to the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, the Telegraph reports.Britain's embattled manufacturing industry has welcomed the £100m extension to the car scrappage scheme announced by Lord Mandelson. The Business Secretary pledged to provide funding for an additional 100,000 cars and vans, at the Labour Party conference in Brighton, the Times reports.CNOOC, one of China's three energy majors, is trying to buy 6bn barrels of oil, equivalent to one in every six barrels of the proven reserves in Nigeria, sub-Saharan Africa's biggest crude producer and a major supplier to the US. The attempt could pitch the Chinese into competition with western oil groups, including Shell, Chevron, Total and ExxonMobil, which partly or wholly control and operate the 23 blocks under discussion. Sixteen licences are up for renewal, the FT reports.Jessops, Britain's largest photographic and camera retailer, will today come under the control of its bank, pension fund and an employee trust under a debt-for-equity swap that will leave investors with less than 5p in the pound.HSBC will take a 47% stake in return for forgoing £34m of debt. The company said that the move would save 2,000 jobs, the Times reports.Dell, the number two personal computer maker, will announce on Tuesday a high-end line of laptops that include microprocessors designed by the UK's Arm Holdings, a first for the company. The machines will run Microsoft's new Windows 7 operating system on an Intel chip most of the time. But the Arm chip and a version of the free operating system Linux will be used for instant access to some functions as soon as the laptop is turned on, the FT reports.ITV shareholders have reacted in anger to the collapse of its search for a new chief executive, called the situation a "total shambles". One of ITV's largest shareholders was furious after the company terminated talks with the preferred candidate Tony Ball on Friday, the Independent reports. There are still doubts about the recovery in commodity prices, according to the chief executive of mining giant Anglo American, who yesterday warned that the soaring price rises of some metals in the last few months is unlikely to be sustained, the Independent reports.The board of Independent News & Media has approved a plan to cut its group debts following agreements with its creditors. As part of the plan, INM will carry out a debt-for-equity swap that would see its bondholders swap €123m of bonds for an about 46% stake in the company, followed by a rights issue of around €90m at 5 cents, the FT reports.A trade dispute over tariffs on cheap Chinese shoes is brewing at the European Commission as Italian and Spanish footwear manufacturers prepare to fight for continued European protection against Far Eastern imports. The Commission is considering an extension of anti-dumping duties put in place in 2006 to protect the European Union's footwear manufacturers from import surges, the Times reports.GLG Partners, one of London's largest hedge funds, has launched a new fund to invest in the debt of troubled UK and European companies. The fund will be one of the most significant launches in London so far this year, as a growing number of hedge fund managers and investors turn to so-called distressed strategies in pursuit of potentially huge returns, the FT reports.Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, promised swift income tax cuts and a reform of corporate and inheritance tax on Monday but warned her Free Democratic partners in Germany's next government not to expect a more radical shift towards free-market economic policies. Ms Merkel said she would now push forward with the business-friendly tax policies she had not managed to implement as head of a grand coalition with her rival Social ­Democrats, the FT reports.