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More Bad News for Banks and their Investors

If there are any private investors still invested in major UK listed banks, last week (w/e 30/1/2016) was yet another for disillusionment. In the Financial Times, Lex hit the nail on the head when he said "The one-offs keep on coming. If one did not know better, one might suspect them of being two-, three-, or more-offs". He was referring to Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), but other banks likewise posted bad news during the week. Let's take them in turn: RBS ...

UK Share Ownership Structure – Not Fit for Purpose

The Editor of Investors Chronicle commented on the recently published BIS Paper on the structure of UK share ownership in this week's edition (see the last article on our blog for more background). He had this to say: "The Department [BIS] finally seems to be coming around to the view that it is, quite simply, not fit for purpose - a view we have held for some time and which I am regularly encouraged by readers to push further. So well ...

BIS Release Paper Showing the Mind-Boggling Complexity of the Intermediated Shareholding Model

The Government BIS Department have released a Research Paper entitled "Exploring the Intermediated Shareholding Model". It shows in 160 odd pages the existing share registration models in the UK and the underlying systems that support shareholder rights (including voting). In essence it demonstrates perfectly the need for reform. It shows that private investors often do not know what rights they have in nominee accounts or indeed that there are alternative ways of holding shares. Even if they are aware they should have ...

Broken Brokers and Nominee Accounts

There is a great letter from a reader in this weeks Investors Chronicle on the subject of nominee accounts. Under the title "Broken Brokers", Jonathan Crozier says he used to work for Pritchard Stockbrokers who are one the brokers that went bust covered in previous articles. He complains about the low level of compensation under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (currently £50,000) which he says is a ludicrously low figure for Mr Average. But this is the paragraph that made the most ...

Home Retail Group Trading and Disposal

As a follow up to my blog post on the possible Sainsbury/Home Retail deal yesterday, here are some comments on the Home Retail Group trading statement issued this morning. Total sales at Argos increased 0.9%, but like-for-like sales were down 2.2% in the period as a result of reduced store footfall and growth in digital transactions. Homebase total sales were down 4% but like-for-like grew by 5% - this mix arises from an "aggressive store closure program". But the killer in their statement ...