GMB accuses owner TDR Capital of mismanagement as sales at supermarket fall 6%
The GMB union has called on the owner of Asda to take “urgent action” to protect jobs amid signs the supermarket is “in a fight for survival”.
On Tuesday data revealed sales at Asda fell 6% in the three months to 4 August, despite continuing grocery price inflation, taking the retailer’s share of the UK take-home grocery market to 12.6% – the lowest level in at least 13 years.
Continue reading...Man says wife died of allergic reaction at Disney World but company claims streamer’s terms block him from filing suit
Attorneys for Disney World are seeking to dismiss a wrongful death lawsuit brought by a husband over the death of his wife last year because of the terms and conditions he agreed to when signing up for Disney+ streaming service several years earlier.
In February of this year, Jeffrey Piccolo filed a wrongful death suit against Disney on behalf of his wife, Dr Kanokporn Tangsuan, a medical doctor from New York who died last year. His lawsuit claims that her death was a result of suffering an allergic reaction while dining at a resort restaurant in Disney Springs at the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida.
Continue reading...The average mortgage holder is parting with more than a fifth of their pre-tax income, double what they were spending in the 90s
Mortgage holders are spending well over 20% of their pre-tax income on their loans, representing one of the highest levels on record, data compiled by Commonwealth Bank shows.
It has rocketed in recent years amid rising interest rates and high living costs to a level last seen two decades ago when frothy property prices took hold before the 2008 global financial crisis.
Continue reading...Tomato and pepper growers call for UK to strike deal with EU to avoid disruption and duplicate testing
Vegetable growers in the UK have said crops could be adversely hit this year after post-Brexit border changes resulted in delays to seed imports.
Trade bodies representing UK tomato and pepper growers said new rules for seed imports from the EU were causing delays of up to six weeks for deliveries, disrupting their growing schedules and finances.
Continue reading...Landowners unwilling to sell would face compulsory purchase orders if site could host ‘quality housing scheme’
Councils and public bodies in England are to be handed powers to compulsorily buy cheap green belt land as part of the new Labour government’s drive to build 1.5m homes by 2030.
Green belt landowners who are unwilling to sell would face compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) that would force them to hand over their land if the site could host a “quality housing scheme” in the public interest.
Continue reading...Airport says ETA scheme introduced by Conservatives is ‘devastating’ for competitiveness
Heathrow airport has said it experienced a 90,000 decline in passenger numbers on routes included in a £10 a person government scheme.
It described the electronic travel authorisation (ETA) system as “devastating for our hub competitiveness”.
Continue reading...Catherine Mann says Britain should not be ‘seduced’ by price rises easing to the BoE’s target
The UK should not be “seduced” into thinking the battle to calm inflation is over despite price rises easing to the Bank of England’s target, according to an interest rate setter at the central bank.
Catherine Mann, a member of the Bank’s monetary policy committee, said the underlying price pressures in the economy remain strong and showed that the central bank needed to take a tough stance when it sets interest rates.
Continue reading...Controversial mining project is a political fault line in Balkan country over fears about environmental impacts
Thousands hit the streets in Serbia’s capital Belgrade Saturday to protest against the rebooting of a controversial lithium mine set to serve as a vital source to power Europe’s green energy transition.
Before the rally, two leading protest figures said they were briefly detained by security officials who warned that any moves to block roads during the protest would be viewed as illegal.
Continue reading...Coffee and bakery chain says devices to be worn by managers will ‘only be turned on in specific circumstances’
Pret a Manger has become the latest high street staple to deploy body-worn cameras for some of its staff.
The coffee and bakery chain began trialling body-worn cameras in a select number of shops in London last month. A Pret spokesperson said this was done as a new safety measure. “These are only being worn by team leaders or managers, and are only turned on in specific circumstances,” the spokesperson said.
Continue reading...Surge caused by rebound in market activity very likely to influence payouts for European outposts of banks
Bonuses for Wall Street’s investment bankers are forecast to jump as much as 35% this year – although experts have warned that payouts could be knocked by stock market volatility and an economic slowdown in the US.
Fresh predictions suggest that staff across a range of financial firms – including hedge funds, asset managers and investment banks – will see payouts rise for the first time in two years. It follows a rebound in business confidence and market activity, with companies more willing to take risks amid easing inflation that has started to translate into lower borrowing costs.
Continue reading...Annual results underline fears cost-of-living pressures will limit spending – including on side tables and lamps – so much that the economy will shift into reverse
What do sales of six-seat modular sofas and matching buffet tables tell us about the financial health of households and the broader economy? Quite a lot, it turns out. And, according to market professionals, it does not look good.
Annual profit at Sydney-headquartered furniture retailer Nick Scali fell almost 20%, according to results released on Friday. Crucially, sales order growth for the past two months has turned negative, down 1.2% from the prior year.
Continue reading...President accuses social network’s owner of using it to ‘incite hatred’ after country’s disputed election
President Nicolás Maduro said he had ordered a 10-day block on access to X in Venezuela, accusing the owner, Elon Musk, of using the social network to promote hatred after the country’s disputed presidential election.
Associated Press (AP) journalists in Caracas found that by Thursday night posts had stopped loading on X on two private telephone services and the state-owned Movilnet.
Continue reading...Nuclear site awaits sentencing over breaches that it admitted could have threatened national security
Sellafield has apologised after pleading guilty to criminal charges relating to a string of cybersecurity failings at Britain’s most hazardous nuclear site, which it admitted could have threatened national security.
Among the failings at the vast nuclear waste dump in Cumbria was the discovery that 75% of its computer servers were vulnerable to cyber-attacks, Westminster magistrates court in London heard.
Continue reading...Zoopla puts average viewing time at 49 minutes, as eye tracking study shows focus on mirrors and plants, not floors and walls
A fifth of homebuyers spend less than 20 minutes looking at a home before deciding to make an offer, with viewers more likely to focus on artwork and furniture than structural features, research suggests.
The average time for looking around a property before settling on buying it was about 49 minutes, according to a survey of people who have attended viewings in the past five years.
Continue reading...Survey reveals net fall in permanent jobs last month amid lengthening slowdown in employment market
The UK’s largest employers have warned the jobs market is cooling amid a slowdown in wage growth in July and a fall in vacancies, extending an almost two-year downturn in hiring demand for permanent staff.
Figures from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and the accountancy firm KPMG showed a fall in permanent staff placements in July as large employers made more redundancies and hired fewer new starters.
Continue reading...More than 95% of investors urged commodities firm to keep highly profitable fossil fuel arm to help maximise shareholder cash
Glencore has scrapped plans to spin off its coal business after shareholders urged the commodities company to hold on to the highly profitable but heavily polluting division.
The FTSE 100 company said that an overwhelming majority of its shareholders favoured retaining the coal business over its plan to list the division as a separate company on the New York stock exchange.
Continue reading...Danish company, which also makes Ozempic, faces increasing competition from US rival Eli Lilly
Novo Nordisk has cut its annual profit expectations after posting weaker-than-expected sales of its weight-loss drug Wegovy, fuelling investor concerns over growing competition and sending its shares lower.
The Danish drugmaker’s market value has soared over the past year, making it the most valuable company in Europe, on the back of the success of its obesity and diabetes injections Wegovy and Ozempic, used by celebrities including Elon Musk and Oprah Winfrey. However, the company is facing increasing competition from its US rival Eli Lilly’s drugs Zepbound and Mounjaro.
Continue reading...‘Pioneering’ facility will extract precious metal from up to 4,000 tonnes of scrap circuit boards a year
The Royal Mint has unveiled a “pioneering” factory that will recover gold from electronic waste, creating a more sustainable source of the precious metal for the coin manufacturer’s luxury jewellery line.
The factory in south Wales, which has been under construction since March 2022, is designed to extract gold from up to 4,000 tonnes a year of circuit boards sourced in the UK from electronics including phones, laptops and TVs.
Continue reading...Niesr forecasts raise doubts over chance of further cuts by Bank of England before end of year
The UK’s economic recovery will accelerate over the next year, forcing the Bank of England to keep interest rates higher for longer, according to the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (Niesr).
Signalling that bets on further interest rate cuts before the end of the year could be misplaced, the thinktank said a modest economic recovery and the threat from persistent inflationary trends should make the central bank more cautious about reducing the cost of borrowing.
Continue reading...Shares on Wall Street and in Asia and Europe start to recover after Monday’s rout
Shares on Wall Street rose and many Asian and European markets staged a recovery after this week’s global stock market rout, but analysts warned: “We might not be out of the woods.”
The FTSE 100 index in London rose 18 points, or 0.2%, on Tuesday to close at 8,026.69, after losing 166 points, or 2%, on Monday, its biggest one-day points drop in more than a year.
Continue reading...