Nevill Boyd Maunsell - Birmingham Post

City View: Nevill Boyd Maunsell: Logic turned on its head

Birmingham Post — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 12:36:00 GMT

It was another of those wonderful bad news is good news days. Ever since it started setting interest rates in 1997, the first rule at the Bank of England has been not to frighten the horses – never to let the markets think the Bank knows something dreadful that nobody else does.

Financial: Midlands backs Bank’s decision to pump extra £50bn into economy

Birmingham Post — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 23:00:00 GMT

The Bank of England’s surprise decision yesterday to pump another £50 billion of “printed” money into the economy, on top of £125 billion already deployed, was widely welcomed in the West Midlands yesterday.

Financial: Aviva marks return to profit with a dividend cut

Birmingham Post — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Aviva marked a return to profit in the first half of this year with a dividend cut, reversing a policy which maintained its total dividend for the loss-making year of 2008.

City View: Nevill Boyd Maunsell: A quiet August? Don't bet on it!

Birmingham Post — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 23:00:00 GMT

August used to be the month when nothing happened – except that the First World War broke out in August 1914 and the Second World War became inevitable in August 1939.

Financial: L&G upbeat despite huge dip in half-year profits

Birmingham Post — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Legal & General’s half-time profit was almost wiped out by £351 million of “negative investment variances” in a £20 billion bond portfolio, which supports annuities whereby it has to pay life-time incomes to pensioners.

Commercial Property: Construction hope high despite sector still struggling

Birmingham Post — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Hopes that house-builders might be starting to share in the pick-up elsewhere in the British economy went back on hold yesterday when an authoritative survey showed house-building activity shrinking at a faster pace last month.

City View: We will all pay – and that’s a VAT

Birmingham Post — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 11:52:00 GMT

Now we know what the American Fed’s Bernanke has got that the Bank of England’s Mervyn King hasn’t got. An exit strategy. Well, if has one, the governor isn’t telling.

Commercial Property: Bigwood's July property auction to put 95 lots under hammer

Birmingham Post — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Birmingham’s biggest property auction house is anticipating widespread interest in its July sale at Warwickshire County Cricket ground today with 95 lots to be sold on the day.

Commercial Property: Birmingham office helps boost DTZ's revenue

Birmingham Post — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

While the worldwide recession drove the global property adviser DTZ £79.7 billion into the red during its year to April, its revenues from professional services rose by eight per cent.

City View: Nevill Boyd Maunsell: Retired bankers or Spanish bankers needed?

Birmingham Post — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

There is nothing about it in Sir David Walker’s ingenious report, but have you noticed who is advertising most aggressively for your money just now? Every weekend brings a new barrage of ads from Abbey, Alliance & Leicester and Bradford & Bingley.

Manufacturing & Skills: Oil exports boost Britain's May trade figures

Birmingham Post — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

A surge in oil exports in May, when imports of all kinds fell by more than £1 billion, gave Britain the best monthly trade numbers for three years.

Financial: Most first-time buyers now rely on parents' help

Birmingham Post — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Four out of five first-time homebuyers under the age of 30 are calling on the “Bank of Mum and Dad” to raise deposits that now average nearly £36,000, according to the Council of Mortgage Lenders.

Financial: Bank of England delays corporate easing increase

Birmingham Post — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

The Bank of England offered to buy £380 million of corporate bonds after failing to announce any increase in its £125 billion corporate easing programme yesterday.

Other UK business news: Housing market stabilising as 'underlying pace of price decline is easing'

Birmingham Post — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Halifax, Britain’s biggest mortgage lender, took the occasion of a 0.5 per cent fall in its measure of house prices to highlight evidence that the housing market is stabilising.

City View: Nevill Boyd-Maunsell: We're a long way off panic in the streets

Birmingham Post — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

People who reply to surveys seem, sometimes to know something that the rest of us don’t know.

Manufacturing & Skills: Fall in manufacturing output wrecks post-recession hunch

Birmingham Post — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Hopes that British industry could be leading the way out of the recession have suffered a severe setback with official numbers showing the manufacturing output fell by 0.5 per cent between April and May.

Other UK business news: Most firms 'have no jobs for graduates'

Birmingham Post — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

More than two-thirds of employers will have no jobs to offer this summer as this year’s school leavers and new graduates try to find a place in the world of work.

City View: Nevill Boyd Maunsell: Rising unemployment bad news for green shoots

Birmingham Post — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Time was when the stock market attracted unflattering headlines by shooting up on news of rising unemployment.

Financial: Mortgage and loans grip eases - Bank of England

Birmingham Post — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

The credit crunch is losing some of its grip on mortgages and bank loans to businesses, but the squeeze on credit cards and other unsecured lending remains as tight as ever.

City View: City View: Productivity for most, profitability for some

Birmingham Post — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Every four years I deride the Americans for taking 18 months to elect a President. We do the job in a three-week campaign, don’t we? And there is no shilly-shallying afterwards. The removal van calls at No 10 next morning for the loser’s knick-knacks.