December 2, 2009 • 11:54 pm 0
Hi all
On the day Google say everyone will have to pay for news, here at recession2009 will try and still supply free news to all.
If you like what you see here we are starting a new website soon.
hopefully operating early next year
Happy blogging & free news to all
Filed under: recession
• 11:46 pm 0
The Yorkshire and Chelsea building societies have confirmed they will merge to create a large rival to the UK’s biggest society, the Nationwide.
The deal would create a society with 2.7 million members, a network of 178 branches and assets of £35bn.
The merger is considered a rescue for Chelsea, which lost significant sums it had invested in failed Icelandic banks.
The merger needs to be agreed by the societies’ members, who will not receive a windfall from a deal.
The two societies will retain their brand names under the proposals, but the enlarged society will be called the Yorkshire Building Society.
Most of the Chelsea’s head office in Cheltenham will close, with the enlarged society being run from the Yorkshire’s head office in Bradford.
Filed under: banking sector, bbc , banking sector, banks, bbc, britain, Chelse, UK's biggest society, Yorkshire, Yorkshire and Chelsea building societies agree merger
November 25, 2009 • 2:01 pm 0
The Chancellor, Alistair Darling, has defended the Bank of England’s secret loans to RBS and HBOS in an emergency statement to parliament.
Mr Darling said that any disclosure or leak of the operations would have seriously jeopardised the financial stability of the system as a whole.
He added that there had been no cost to the taxpayer.
It emerged on Tuesday that the two banks were secretly given £61.6bn last autumn to keep them afloat.
Both banks had repaid the loans by January 2009.
Filed under: British Goverment, banking sector, bbc , Alistair Darling, £61.6 bn, banking sector, banks, bbc, business, HBOS, rbs, secret bank loans, UK, UK economy
• 1:52 pm 0
The Bank of England has revealed for the first time that it lent Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and HBOS £61.6bn in emergency funding last autumn.
Bank governor Mervyn King told a committee of MPs it “was to prevent a loss of confidence spreading through the financial system as a whole”.
The money was repaid in full by January this year, he added.
A spokesman for the prime minister said it was “a powerful reminder” of how the banking system had nearly collapsed.
Filed under: British Goverment, banking sector, bbc , banking sector, banks, bbc, Billion $, business, capitalism, HBOS, rbs, recession, rescue loans, secret bank loans
October 23, 2009 • 1:30 pm 2
Will the UK be out of recession from Friday 23rd October, or will the financial and fiscal results show we are still very much in recession.
The UK economy unexpectedly contracted by 0.4% between July and September, according to official figures, meaning the country is still in recession.
It is the first time UK gross domestic product (GDP) has contracted for six consecutive quarters, since quarterly figures were first recorded in 1955.
But the figures could still be revised up or down at a later date, because this figure is only the first estimate.
GDP measures the total amount of goods and services produced by a country.
Filed under: British Goverment, Changing recession, blog , 23rd of October, business, end of recession, end of UK recession, news, UK, UK economy, will the UK be out of recession soon
• 12:40 pm 0
Will the UK be out of recession from Friday 23rd October, or will the financial and fiscal results show we are still very much in recession.
The UK economy unexpectedly contracted by 0.4% between July and September, according to official figures, meaning the country is still in recession.
It is the first time UK gross domestic product (GDP) has contracted for six consecutive quarters, since quarterly figures were first recorded in 1955.
But the figures could still be revised up or down at a later date, because this figure is only the first estimate.
GDP measures the total amount of goods and services produced by a country.
Quarterly growth of 0.2% had been expected in the figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), although expectations had been tempered by recent figures showing no growth in retail sales in September, and a 2.5% decline in industrial output in August.
 |
ANALYSIS
 Hugh Pym, BBC chief economics correspondent
There’s no disguising how grim these figures are. Almost every City analyst expected there to be positive growth in the third quarter. Instead it was negative. That means the recession in the UK is the longest since modern records began in the 1950s. Germany, France and Japan have all come out of recession technically and the UK hasn’t. The decline has continued. And the markets didn’t really like the look of that. The foreign exchange markets have been selling the pound. There’s every indication that it’s going to be a long hard slog for quite some time to come as the British economy tries to turn itself round.
|
The unexpected decline in the services sector was the key factor behind the drop, with the distribution, catering and hotels sector performing particularly badly.
The UK economy’s reliance on the service sector, and financial services in particular, may be the reason why it is still in recession when partners such as France and Germany exited earlier in the year.
The economy contracted 5.2% compared with the same period last year, which was marginally better than the record figure of 5.5% in the previous three months.
It has now contracted 5.9% from its peak before the recession began.
The worse-than-expected GDP figures are likely to make the Bank of England consider extending its policy of quantitative easing.
Quantitative easing is the central bank’s policy of printing money and using it to buy bonds from banks and other companies to help stimulate the economy.
“Back in August we had a worse-than-expected second-quarter GDP number and that is the reason that the Bank of England extended the quantitative easing programme,” Bronwyn Curtis from HSBC told the BBC.
‘Awful’
The £175bn already announced for the quantitative easing programme will have been spent by next month, so the strength of the third quarter GDP number will be important in deciding whether to extend it.
Indeed, at the Bank’s current rate of spending, it is expected to have spent the whole £175bn in the next week.
Struggling to find work in the recession
As the next Monetary Policy Committee meeting, at which quantitative easing decisions are taken, is not until 4 November, that would leave it with a week with no extra cash to pump into the economy.
The figures were “awful with no positive news” according to James Knightley at ING.
“This clearly suggests that the likelihood of an expansion in quantitative easing by £50bn or so over the next quarter is rising, although [it] is not a foregone conclusion.”
‘Help for business’
The pound fell more than a cent against the US dollar following the release of the figures, with traders particularly concerned that the UK may turn out to be the only major economy still in recession.
It is also worrying that the decline has continued despite the stimulus measures that the government and the Bank of England have introduced.
“Continued intervention – including help for businesses to access finance, and incentives to promote investment – is still needed,” said David Kern, chief economist at the British Chambers of Commerce.
“Above all else, business confidence must be nurtured, to ensure that recovery is not further delayed.”
‘Deeply disappointing’
Chancellor Alistair Darling said he had never expected to see growth before the end of 2009.
Chancellor Alistair Darling: ”Confidence is beginning to return”
“Our job is to support the economy as we come through towards recovery,” he said.
“[Growth] will come – I’m confident about that – and I’m confident that businesses and people generally will begin to see a difference, but it will take time.”
Shadow chancellor George Osborne described the figures as “deeply, deeply disappointing”.
There are many millions of people who will be deeply concerned to see that Britain is still in recession six months after France and Germany came out of recession,” he told the BBC.
“It destroys the myth that Britain was better prepared.”
Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable said the figures were “a cold blast of realism”.
“We’ve had a lot of talk recently based on a booming stock exchange and prices of luxury houses in London that somehow this problem was at an end, and it isn’t,” he said.
One of the measures expected to be a particular help in the final quarter of the year is the change in VAT.
The rate of VAT is due to return to 17.5% from 15% at the beginning of January and consumers are expected to step up their purchasing ahead of that increase.
Sourced from The BBC
Filed under: British Goverment, banking sector, bbc, recession , banking, banking sector, bbc, business, capitalism, downturn, Friday 23th October, news, recession, UK out of recession, will the UK leave Recession, world
October 22, 2009 • 1:23 pm 1
Research says that effects of downturn will not hit some parts of Britain for several months – and that local councils need to prepare for this ‘aftershock’
The full cost of the worst global downturn since the second world war has yet to hit Britain’s local and central government finances, new research reveals .
Analysis by data company Experian shows that the recession – in terms of unemployment, debt, fraud and increasing demand for public services – will not hit some areas of the UK for another seven months and, in some places, will be felt for many years after growth resumes.
Experian found that the south, from Kent through to Cornwall, was feeling the least impact from the recession; the midlands, Wales and the north-east the severest impact; with Scotland between the two extremes.
Local authority areas that would be hit hardest, it said, were Blaenau Gwent, Kingston-upon-Hull, Inverclyde, Glasgow and Wolverhampton. Areas that would suffer the least included the City of London, Kensington and Chelsea, and Westminster.
Charlotte Hogg, managing director of Experian, said: “The tremors of the recession may have been felt in many households and businesses, but local and central government now needs to brace itself for the aftershock.
“So far, the public sector has been cushioned by government investment and spending. But with unemployment rising, revenues falling and the need for public spending cuts, local authorities need to think how they can do more for less.”
Over the next 10 years, Experian expects London, Edinburgh and Leeds, as well as a number of other major northern cities, to prosper the most. However, many Scottish locations such as Dumfries and Galloway, East Dunbartonshire, South Ayrshire and Argyll and Bute as well as English local authorities including Copeland, Malvern Hills, Weymouth and Portland, West Somerset and Stafford will take much longer to recover from recession due to persistent unemployment and deprivation problems.
According to the research, the people who will experience the greatest levels of financial stress are young single people on limited incomes who rent small flats from local councils or housing associations, and older pensioners who have found their retirement incomes eroded by inflation and are dependent on state pensions.
Filed under: British Goverment, The Guardian, banking sector, bbc, blog, news, recession , bbc, Britain's local and central government finances, business, downturn, global downturn, households, news, recession, UK public sector, worries effected areas, worst global downturn since second world war
• 12:57 pm 1
Reforming UK banking through regulation is not enough and a fundamental rethink of how banks are structured is needed, the Bank of England governor has said.
Mervyn King: “Scale of support to the banking sector is breathtaking”
Some banks may have to split their core business from riskier practices, so they do not get too big to be allowed to fail, Mervyn King said in Edinburgh.
The UK government and G20 leaders want to cut banks’ risks through regulation and making them hold more capital.
But Mr King said it was a “delusion” that this alone would stop failure.
Filed under: banking sector, bbc , banking sector, banks, bbc, Billion $, britain, business, capitalism, Mervyn King, reforming, regulation, world
October 10, 2009 • 11:04 am 1
Prime Minister Gordon Brown has painted an optimistic prediction for the economy, saying it was “simply not true” that tough times are ahead.
Mr Brown told the Daily Telegraph that the action the government had taken was bringing the economy around.
“We’ve said that the economy will grow by 1.5% next year and more people are moving towards our position,” he said.
Mr Brown’s assessment of the rate of recovery contrasts with the Treasury’s forecasts for annual growth of 1.25%.
And the IMF has made a prediction of 0.9%.
Mr Brown said: “If you have a growth policy for Britain, get unemployment down, get the economy moving forward, then Britain can have upgrowth,” he said.
“I think people have moved closer to our view that Britain is capable of coming back to growth at a higher rate next year than people were originally assuming, and higher rates in the future.”
Filed under: British Goverment, Conservatives, bbc, recession , bbc, business, consumer, downturn, Gordon Brown, Labour, Labout, optimistic over UK economy, Prime minister, Prime Minister Gordon Brown, recession, Tory, UK, UK economy, w recession
October 7, 2009 • 11:59 am 0
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8293978.stm
HSBC boss: ‘The industry collectively owes the real world an apology’
The entire banking industry “owes the real world an apology”, the chairman of HSBC has said.
Stephen Green told BBC World Business Report that a change in culture was needed to improve the public’s perception of bankers.
He also said that London was secure as a major financial centre, but would lose market share as Asia developed.
Last month, HSBC announced that its chief executive Michael Geoghan would move to Hong Kong from London.
But Mr Green said the bank’s decision did not mean it was turning its back on London.
“Two-thirds of our business is in Asia. It’s where we think the centre of gravity of the world’s economy is shifting,” he said.
Filed under: banking sector, bbc , apology, banking, banking sector, banks, bbc, hsbc, money
allaboutgrub
news The Guardian Environment from The Telegraph News | Mail Online The Sun The Mirror Results from the questions – Do you think the banks should pay bonuses?
Comment made regarding my blog