NatWest shareholders have been urged to vote against the group’s executive pay plan at this month’s annual general meeting by an influential proxy adviser, just days after the UK government reduced its stake in the bank to below 50 per cent. Glass Lewis, the consultant whose recommendations are widely followed by institutional investors and passive
0 Comments
Did you imagine lockdowns in Shanghai and Shenzhen would drive up the cost of transporting goods from China to Europe? If you did, then you’d be wrong. Here’s what’s happened to the price of taking a 40ft container’s-worth of goods from the Far East to Northern Europe on short notice: The data comes courtesy of
0 Comments
Who doesn’t like a door wreath? At Christmas, it is the announcement to one and all that we are mince-pie ready and embracing festive fun. Come Easter, we are hopeful for a happy and sunshine-filled spring. Floral displays deliver on all this optimism, so why not garnish your front door with a spring wreath too?
0 Comments
Hello from New York. Reports are starting to show it was a punishing start to the year for the environmental, social and governance (ESG) investment sector. Cash into ESG funds fell to $75bn, the lowest level since the third quarter of 2020, according to a report published by the Institute of International Finance on Thursday.
0 Comments
Japan will ban Russian coal imports, joining EU and G7 allies to target the country’s energy sector for the first time following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. “I am banning imports of Russian coal. By gradually reducing the imports we will lower our energy dependence on Russia,” prime minister Fumio Kishida said on Friday, adding that
0 Comments
Ashmore and other emerging market fund managers face further hits to earnings and worsening outflows, as investors retreat over concerns about higher interest rates, the war in Ukraine and exposure to China. This year will be tougher for most investment managers across Europe as markets become more uncertain, say analysts at Bank of America. The
0 Comments
Abu Dhabi’s International Holding Company (IHC), a conglomerate spanning fisheries to healthcare, is investing $2bn in companies belonging to Gautam Adani’s infrastructure empire, as India pursues ambitious green energy targets. IHC’s investment comes less than eight weeks after India and the UAE signed a trade deal and as Adani seeks to fund his sprawling ports-to-power
0 Comments
The FT this week ran a brace of big reads on the sanctions slapped on Russia, how they happened and what the longer-term impact will be. It’s an important subject, and both pieces are worth reading at leisure. (Editor: that means after you’ve finished with this one.) However, FT Alphaville had some follow-up thoughts on
0 Comments
Julie Otsuka’s third novel The Swimmers is a slender but poignant portrait of a mind losing its grip. In an unnamed American city, a “little old lady” is drifting away from her family through the slow tragedy of cognitive decline — a passing into chaos foreshadowed by trivial domestic errors: “The jar of Pond’s Cold
0 Comments
When we started renting our converted 16th-century dovecote in 2019, I knew little of the ancient practice of dove rearing and how it has shaped pockets of the UK landscape over the past millennium. Although a small house, our cottage would have been a substantial dovecote. It is a perfect cube, with metre-thick walls made
0 Comments
Bailey’s Parade: Photographs by David Bailey A compilation of three key bodies of work, Bailey’s Parade covers the illustrious photographer’s 60-year career in 30 pieces. It will include some of his most acclaimed images from the 1960s, including “pin-up” portraits of Mick Jagger, Jean Shrimpton and Andy Warhol, as well as a series of colour
0 Comments
TalkTalk has asked investment bank Lazard to review its options after several groups, including Vodafone, approached the UK broadband company about potential deals, according to people briefed on the matter. British telecoms executives have long called for greater consolidation in the domestic broadband market, claiming that the array of companies supplying mobile and internet contracts
0 Comments
Maison François, London Until 17 April, fans of François O’Neill’s French-style St James’s brasserie can celebrate spring with a playful “Cochon de Pâques” – a limited-edition Easter egg in the shape of a pig (£30). Head pastry chef Jérémy Prakhin has hand-crafted the creature – which is filled with hazelnut gianduja – from chocolate supplied
0 Comments