Potash Corp said BHP was trying to ‘sow seeds of doubt’ about the company’s ability to conduct business. Photograph: David Stobbe/Reuters The increasingly acrimonious battle for control of Potash Corp of Saskatchewan turned even nastier after the fertiliser company accused its suitor BHP Billiton of “highly unethical” behaviour in tapping up its clients. In a [...]
Archives
Alliance Boots offloads £300m of pension liability to specialist PIC
Alliance Boots has offloaded the pension liabilities of 3,000 former Alliance UniChem staff to the specialist Pension Insurance Corporation. Photograph: Newscast/PA Private-equity-owned healthcare and pharmacies group Alliance Boots has offloaded £300m of pension liabilities to a specialist pensions insurance group in a bid to cap its pension responsibilities. The Pension Insurance Corporation (PIC) is taking [...]
Candover Investments winds itself up after writedowns
Candover Investments has announced plans to wind itself up. Among the assets the private equity firm will be selling is Ferretti, the Italian luxury yacht group. Candover Investments today became the latest high-profile victim of the financial crisis, as the private equity firm announced plans to wind itself up, selling its remaining assets and returning [...]
First-time buyers shut out of the housing market as mortgages dry up
Drop in mortgage lending is blocking first time buyers from the housing market. Photograph Manor Photography/Alamy Mortgage lending fell sharply in July, fuelling concerns that Britain’s banks are turning away first time buyers and preventing a recovery in the property market. According to Bank of England figures net lending fell sharply from June’s £518m to [...]
Fashion designers need to be entrepreneurs
A Holly Fulton design. There used to be a perception that to be a British designer of note you needed to begin your career as a tortured genius; slaving away in an east London squat. Today things are different. Since I started editing Elle six years ago, there has been a realisation among new British [...]
