Barclays

The case for keeping business taxes low

6 March 2021 9:00 am

Why should business pay tax at all? That’s a provocative but forlorn question to ask in Budget week. Business pays…

Britain’s economic fate doesn’t depend on Heathrow

7 March 2020 9:00 am

Hit-and-miss, heavy-handed, but a necessary use of justice to deter repetition. That was my summing-up, last year, of the Serious…

Coronavirus is a chance to buy cheaper – but it comes with a health warning

29 February 2020 9:00 am

If anything, stock markets have been slow to respond to the spreading coronavirus outbreak. Stories of Chinese supply interruptions, from…

Facebook’s new currency is not to be trusted

29 June 2019 9:00 am

Friends of former Barclays chief executive John Varley — I don’t mean ‘people who speak to the media on his…

We need an inquiry into the Elizabeth Line farce

27 April 2019 9:00 am

If you know my personal history with Barclays, you may be wondering whether I’m for or against Edward Bramson. To…

History will judge UK ministers harshly for the Irish backstop

10 November 2018 9:00 am

We may or may not hear news soon of a settlement of the Irish border issue that will allow Brexit…

So farewell Toys ‘R’ Us, the predator that became the prey

31 March 2018 9:00 am

I remember the arrival of Toys ‘R’ Us in Britain, because as a young banker in 1984 I was tasked…

Running a bank’s tough. That’s no reason to start handing capital back

3 March 2018 9:00 am

A mixed bag of annual results from the big banks. RBS, still 73 per cent owned by the taxpayer, recorded…

Investors were right to sell Carillion shares when they spotted trouble ahead

24 February 2018 9:00 am

The fallout from Carillion’s bankruptcy spreads in slow motion — just as the outsourcing and construction giant’s finances gradually stretched…

Portrait of the Week: Oxfam faces losing funding as crisis grows over abuse claims

17 February 2018 9:00 am

Home The Charity Commission said it would hold a statutory inquiry into a scandal in which Oxfam staff paid for…

Could the Serious Fraud Office put an end to Barclays as we know it?

17 February 2018 9:00 am

The Serious Fraud Office has upped the stakes in the case of the controversial $3 billion Qatari financing that saved…

The truth about Brexit? One professor’s guess is no better than another’s

26 August 2017 9:00 am

Removing all trade and tariff barriers as part of a hard Brexit would generate ‘a £135 billion annual boost to…

The death of investment banking as we know it? Bring it on

30 April 2016 9:00 am

Oh woe. Investment bank profits are evaporating after a disastrous contraction of trading revenues reflecting zero-to-negative interest rates, weak commodity…

An object lesson in PR from David Cameron and Justin Welby

16 April 2016 9:00 am

I don’t think there is a Royal College of Public Relations, but if there were, it should teach a course…

Portrait of the week

5 March 2016 9:00 am

Home An official analysis by the Cabinet Office said that if Britain left the EU it would lead to a…

Sell the London Stock Exchange if you must. But not to Frankfurt!

5 March 2016 9:00 am

The London Stock Exchange is no longer the red-hot crucible it once was, given the multifarious ways by which shares,…

France can’t build its own new nuclear power stations, let alone ours

6 February 2016 9:00 am

Amid all the turmoil in global energy markets, we should not lose sight of the UK power programme that we’re…

After the Black Friday flop, shops can get back to what they do best

5 December 2015 9:00 am

The high street flopperoo that was ‘Black Friday’ may have something to do with terrorism fears, or even the downturn…

The spectre haunting George Osborne

17 October 2015 8:00 am

Rather more attention was paid last week to the strange position of George Osborne’s feet than to the dark shape…

Some good came out of the negotiating chamber this week, but it concerned Iran rather than Greece

18 July 2015 9:00 am

As an occasional lecturer on the abstruse topic of the efficacy of sanctions in conflict resolution, I find myself much…

Which behaved worse: callous Thomas Cook or cynical Barclays?

30 May 2015 9:00 am

Which is worse, morally and reputationally — to be Thomas Cook, shamed by its refusal to show proper human concern,…

Watch out: Standard Chartered is even trickier to manage than credit default swaps

7 March 2015 9:00 am

One day you’re an elder statesman, chairing top committees and pontificating on Question Time, and the next you’re out in…

Santander’s secret: to conquer the world, stay like a small-town bank

20 September 2014 9:00 am

Four years ago, I wrote that I knew no dark rumours about Santander, the rising force in UK high street…

Rona Fairhead will be good for the BBC – but who was so keen to nobble her rival?

6 September 2014 9:00 am

Hats off to Rona Fairhead, the former Financial Times executive who will succeed Lord Patten as chairman of the BBC…

‘Dark pools’ are just another conspiracy of bankers against the public

5 July 2014 9:00 am

It was at the Mansion House dinner last year that a City gent two seats away announced himself to be…