Home Authors Nevill Boyd Maunsell

Nevill Boyd Maunsell

Compensation culture and endowments turn again

Buying a house with an endowment mortgage in the early '90s was surely one of the best investments ever. Read

Alliance & Leicester hit by dismal double whammy

Shares in Alliance & Leicester dived to a new all-time low yesterday when the mortgage bank coupled dismal results for 2007 yesterday with what amounted to a profit warning for this year. Read

Predators may be spotting bargains

Another day another bank. Barclays routed the gloomsters on Tuesday - though some remain unconvinced - then Alliance & Leicester weighed in yesterday with the kind of write-downs we had been dreading. Read

Disappointment over Cadbury's US demerger

Cadbury Schweppes shareholders are to get no special dividend or capital repayment when the American soft drinks operation is de-merged in the early summer to become an independent company listed on Wall Street under the name Dr Pepper Snapple. Read

The less-than-sweet taste left by Cadbury's deal

The credit crunch has all sorts of sideeffects you would never expect. Read

RBS, USA, ABN and other initial reactions

On Friday, February 1, this column noted the remarkable fact that The Royal Bank of Scotland's shares were yielding 8.4 per cent, getting on for double what it pays for your money on deposit. Read

Metalrax deal keeps Bacol open

Metalrax has sold the business of the loss-making subsidiary in Bromsgrove it was previously planning to close. Read

Zurich comes through the turmoil unscathed

Zurich Financial Services has come unscathed through the financial turmoil of the past six months. Read

Why King may regret ascending his throne again

There is widespread sense that the official measure of inflation, the Consumer Prices Index, has nothing to do with the real-life cost of living Read

Dodgy meter readings for the Chancellor

Last week National Statistics demonstrated its independence by allocating the Government's £50billion of cash and guarantees staked on Northern Rock to public sector borrowing - what used to be called the national debt. Read

Inflation leap set to stymie Bank of England on rate

Inflation is set to leap ahead next month, making it harder than ever for the Bank of England to cut interest rates again in the near future, due to a change in the way National Statistics accounts for the ups and downs of gas and electricity bills. Read

Big Beard Branson and Budget Day

Thirty-two tax-guessing days to Budget Day and the Office of National Statistics made nonsense of whatever sums Chancellor Alistair Darling was doing for his big day. Read

The £1.7bn Metronet saga and how we all pay for it

Set against £26 billion hard cash handed over to stop the run on Northern Rock, £1.7 billion for the creditors of Metronet may seem small beer. Read

FSA looks at liquid funds framework for banks

The Financial Services Authority is working on a new framework to govern the liquidity, as well as solvency, of banks and other financial institutions it supervises along with the Treasury and the Bank of England. Read

Decoupling and another new shocker

"Decoupling" is an ugly word, even for jargon. But in these dodgy months since the sub-prime shocker burst into the open last August, it has held out the least unpromising scenario available - the proposition that trouble in the USA could be confined to the States Read

Prop up the US banks and we might be OK

The stock market has just completed its worst January since the dot.com crash ushered in the bright new Millennium. Read

M&B shareholders want Carr out

Bitter shareholders in Mitchells & Butlers called one after another yesterday for the heads of the pub group's chairman, Roger Carr. Read

The King is dead lucky - long live the King style

So the Government has shied away from denying Mervyn King his second term as governor of the Bank of England - offences: questioning Chancellor Alistair Darling's memory of the Northern Rock fiasco and being glum about the economy last week while the Government would rather look on the bright side. Read

Mortgage approvals fall to nine-year low

Fewer mortgages were approved for house purchase in December than in any month since the Bank of England started collating these seasonally adjusted numbers in their present form in 1999. Read

Alliance & Leicester woes mount with £185m losses

News that Alliance & Leicester's losses from its credit market investments have rocketed to £185 million from £55 million during November and December, coupled with the indefinite departure for health reasons of its chief executive, was received badly on the stock market yesterday. Read

Author Profile

Nevill is The Birmingham Post's economics editor and based in the newspaper's London office.

Get Involved

We want your local stories, videos & pics.