^FTMC - FTSE 250
| Previous close | 20,040.54 |
| Open | 20,040.54 |
| Volume | 0 |
| Day's range | 20,028.12 - 20,104.00 |
| 52-week range | 17,054.70 - 20,648.60 |
| Avg. volume | 322,775,090 |
- Yahoo Finance UK
Good news for Brits as inflation falls to lowest rate since 2016
Inflation slowed to 1.7% in August, new figures show, below forecasts. It means more money in the pocket of Brits.
- Yahoo Finance UK
UK government opens national security investigation into £4bn defence deal
Business secretary Andrea Leadsom announced the investigation of Advent's takeover of Cobham on Wednesday.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Housebuilder CEO gets £890,000 pay rise as Help to Buy boom continues
David Thomas enjoyed a 30% rise in his pay package as Barratt Developments made a record profit.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Pro-Brexit Wetherspoon boss tells Boris: Don't break law for no-deal Brexit
Tim Martin said the prime minister shouldn't break law requiring him to write to the EU 'but he should try and leave.'
- Yahoo Finance UK
Twitter's UK profit jumps — but tax bill falls
Twitter’s UK tax bill fell from £2.4m in 2017 to just £41,000 last year, due to deferred credits and employee share awards.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Wetherspoons boss attacks 'Oxbridge' Remainers for 'frustrating' Brexit as sales rise
Tim Martin criticised 21 rebel Tory MPs who voted against the government to block a no deal Brexit.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Ex-Barclays innovation head: There's 'opportunity to re-think value'
Kirsty Rutter, who left the bank in May, said company valuations should take into account environmental and social impact.
- Yahoo Finance UK
What to Watch: Morrisons' sales fall, Co-op warns on Brexit, and ECB ahead
A daily overview of the top business, market, and economic stories to watch in the UK, Europe, and abroad.
- Yahoo Finance UK
John Lewis warns on no-deal Brexit as it loses £25m in six months
Chairman Sir Charlie Mayfield blamed Brexit and said no deal would have a 'significant' negative impact.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Cigarette giant behind Lucky Strike cuts 2,300 job amid shift to vaping
British American Tobacco said the job cuts would allow it to invest in 'next generation' products like vaping and tobacco heating.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Pension fund anger at Sports Direct's Mike Ashley: 'There’s a problem here'
'I’m hoping that everybody wakes up, smells the coffee, realises there’s a problem and fix it,' a major pension fund representative said.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Surprise £32bn takeover bid from Hong Kong for London Stock Exchange
LSE shares soared after Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing said the move would 'redefine global capital markets for decades to come.'
- Yahoo Finance UK
What to Watch: Bovis and Galliford Try talks, athleisure boost JD Sports, and Germany stimulus
A daily overview of the top business, market and economic stories you should be watching today in the UK and abroad.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Recession fears fade as UK unemployment falls to lowest rate since 1970s
Average UK wages are also rising, with the biggest leap in pay since 2008 over the past year.
- Yahoo Finance UK
UK government urged to pass law against class discrimination
The TUC says firms should report on their 'class pay gap' and class discrimination should be treated in the same way as discrimination based on gender, ethnicity or disability.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Recession fears ease as UK economy grows faster than expected
The ONS published its monthly GDP estimate for July, showing growth of 0.3%.
- Yahoo Finance UK
The single biggest issue driving the UK property market 'is not Brexit'
The latest Halifax figures also reveal house prices have barely changed in six months.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Wetherspoon knocks 20p off pint in no-deal Brexit stunt
The pub's chairman Tim Martin said leaving the EU by 31 October"will reduce prices in supermarkets and pubs."
- Yahoo Finance UK
Britain suffering financial crime 'epidemic', watchdog warns
Charles Randell, the chair of the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority, warns there's 'a very serious epidemic' of financial crime in the UK.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Worst case scenario Brexit has improved, Bank of England's Carney says
Prep done for a no-deal Brexit since last year means the impact of falling out of the EU is now likely to be less harmful than first thought.
- Yahoo Finance UK
UK chancellor unveils spending spree at fastest rate in 15 years despite Brexit
Chancellor Sajid Javid claims the government is 'turning the page on austerity,' with more cash for the NHS, police, schools and social care.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Why October is the 'worst time' of the year for a no-deal Brexit
A retail chief also warned a no-deal Brexit will threaten the availability, shelf life and cost of some fresh food in the UK.
- The Guardian
Marks & Spencer to drop out of FTSE 100 for first time
Exit of founding member of top City share index is latest sign of retailer’s declining fortunes. Marks & Spencer is to be demoted from the FTSE 100 for the first time in the latest sign of the declining fortunes of the retailer, which was a founding member of the leading City share index. Relegation to the FTSE 250 comes as the company is closing 120 stores as part of an overhaul designed to shore up profits. M&S’s demotion reflects a share price at nearly a 20-year low as a long-running sales slump at the retailer’s clothing arm is compounded by the high street crisis affecting rivals including Debenhams and House of Fraser. The FTSE 100, which was established in 1984, contains the UK’s biggest listed companies by market value, with membership considered a mark of business prestige. The index is reshuffled four times a year according to share price movements, allowing a handful of companies to move up and down. Tony Shiret, an analyst at the stockbroker Whitman Howard, said: “It is significant [for M&S] in the sense that it is a fairly objective measure of the diminished scale of the company.” M&S shares closed down 1.5% at 187p, valuing the company at £3.6bn. A decade ago, M&S was making a £1bn annual profit but the latest figure was below £100m on the back of more than £400m of restructuring costs relating to the revamp being led by the company’s chair, Archie Norman, who is highly regarded for turnarounds during his career including at Asda and ITV. Losing its FTSE 100 status means M&S shares will no longer be held by the investment funds that only track the index of Britain’s highest-value companies, forcing them to dump the stock. Norman has previously been sanguine on the matter, saying: “When I went to ITV we dropped out of the FTSE 100, the sky didn’t fall in.” Last year, he told shareholders M&S had bigger problems because it was facing an existential threat as retail shopping moved online. “This business is on a burning platform. We don’t have a God-given right to exist and unless we change and develop this company the way we want to, in decades to come there will be no M&S,” Norman warned. Nick Bubb, a retail analyst, said M&S had been in the relegation zone for some time. “M&S has been declining remorselessly for many years, as a result of weak and arrogant management, and stronger, more focused competition [such as Primark]. The problems have mainly been on the clothing side, where M&S tries and fails to be all things to all people in the mid-market,” he said. M&S – which was founded on a Leeds market stall in 1884 – was late to adapt to the rise in online shopping, hampered by its legacy of 300 clothing stores. Many of the chain’s shops predate the second world war and are no longer in the right place or are the wrong size for their local market. Norman is putting the company through its biggest shake-up in a generation. He has paid £750m for a 50% share in Ocado’s retail arm and, from autumn next year, M&S products will replace Waitrose-branded goods in shoppers’ deliveries. But investors are split on the merits of the deal, with some arguing the company has taken an expensive route into the fast-growing online grocery market. But Norman, who is working closely with the company’s chief executive, Steve Rowe, has had his work cut out reviving the M&S clothing business, which remains the country’s biggest in sales terms despite seven years of decline. In July, M&S sacked its clothing head Jill McDonald after she failed to get a grip on the biggest job in high street fashion. At the time, Rowe – who is now running the business – revealed buying errors meant key products such as jeans had sold out, resulting in the poorest stock levels “I have ever seen in my life”. With FTSE 100 membership purely a function of market cap size, Bubb said: “Other companies have grown bigger and M&S has got smaller. Life will go on after the exit from the FTSE 100 and in some ways, a lower profile might help M&S.”
- Yahoo Finance UK
UK firms may not all receive £16m no-deal support until after Brexit
Analysis by Yahoo Finance UK suggests the government has left firms with just days to apply if they need the cash before Britain leaves the EU.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Javid gives £210m to nurses despite Brexit spending spree warning
A think tank warned Chancellor Sajid Javid's apparent £15bn headroom for a spending spree could be 'more illusion than reality.'
