03/08/2012

The Unconventional Becomes Conventional

Standard Life Investments, the global investment manager, believes that a lengthy period of Quantitative Easing (QE) is needed to support economies through years of fiscal tightening and debt de-leveraging.

03/07/2012

Euro treads water, at the deep end - Coutts & Co

We believe the potential for negative events in Europe will keep the euro on the defensive against the dollar and sterling, but the downside looks limited in the near term given investors in general are already broadly holding negative positions.

03/02/2012

HMRC pushes back

Following breaches in the Banking Code of Practice on Taxation, retrospective tax legislation is to be introduced.

02/23/2012

Paying the piper….

HM Revenue & Customs have now started to issue the £100 penalty notices to those people in self-assessment that did not submit their return by the deadline of 2 February 2012.

02/22/2012

Global Investment Banking Revenue to Drop 4%

The analysts upgraded their estimate for fixed-income, currencies and commodities sales to a 13 percent drop for the first quarter from a decline of 26 percent after a “material improvement” at the start of the year, the analysts said, while t

02/21/2012

Adviser confidence starts to rise

Advisers are feeling more confident about the UK economy but unemployment and government spending cuts are of growing concern, according to Skandia’s latest Adviser Confidence Barometer.

02/20/2012

Learning a lesson from the Americans

Following my comments about the missing financial infrastructure in the UK, I was recently comparing the US banking and financial structures with our own.

02/17/2012

Looking beyond the Greek tragedy

Central banks continue to ease policy and risk appetite amongst investors has increased. In the very near term however we remain somewhat wary that markets have rallied too strongly and that further profit taking and lower markets are quite possible.

02/15/2012

More pension tax changes to come?

As we predicted in our last Weekly Tax Brief, higher rate tax relief for pension contributions is once again in the firing line.