The former Lloyds TSB manager charged with stealing almost £1 million from her employer has been found not guilty. Ania Wadsworth was alleged to have manipulated the accounts at the bank’s Golders Green branch between 2002 and 2007, to conceal a series of thefts amounting to £921,717. She confessed to taking the bulk of the [...]
Virgin Money has appointed Sir Brian Pitman, a former chief executive of Lloyds TSB, as chairman. The 78-year-old is regarded as one of the UK’s most experienced bankers and was involved in Virgin’s attempt to acquire Northern Rock, prior to nationalisation. The group has also made two non-executive appointments to the board: Colin Keogh, who [...]
Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking has announced a pair of senior appointments. Fiona Paulus has been named as the firm’s new head of Coverage & Investment Banking UK, with Andrew Nason becoming senior banker and head of the UK Financial Institutions Group (FIG). In her newly created position Paulus will become responsible for the [...]
Zenith Bank Plc has announced the appointment of Godwin Emefiele as managing director/chief executive designate. The appointment is effective from 1 August, pending the regulatory green light from the Central Bank of Nigeria. Emefiele has played a key role in developing Zenith Bank during his 19 years with the firm, including the last nine as [...]
Aozora Bank has announced its financial results for the first nine months of its financial year. The bank recorded consolidated ordinary profit of 7.5bn yen and consolidated net income of 7.3bn yen. This marks an improvement on the six-month period, when net income of 6.5bn yen was recorded. The figures achieved far outstrip the bank’s [...]
Research commissioned by The Co-operative Bank reveals that three in four women will not embark upon impulse buying this year. The findings also show that three in five women intend to spend less on clothing in 2010 and four in ten less on fashion accessories and eating out. The continuing difficulties of the economy, which [...]
The Reserve Bank of New Zealand has elected to retain the Official Cash Rate (OCR) at 2.5%. Governor Alan Bollard has said that little has changed since the December policy statement, with global activity continuing to improve most especially in China, Australia and Asia’s emerging economies. However, the Governor stressed that sustained growth was by [...]
Piper Jaffray Companies has released its financial performance figures for both the final quarter of and full-year 2009. The firm made net profits of $12.3m, or $0.63 per diluted common share, for the quarter, a huge turn around from the net loss incurred in Q4 2008 of $153, $9.76 per diluted common share. It also [...]
Thomas Weisel Partners Group, Inc. has released its financial results for the fourth quarter and full-year 2009. The firm reported a net loss of $13.7m, $0.42 per share, for Q4, a substantial improvement on the 2008 Q4 net loss of $66.1m, equivalent to $2.08 per share. For 2009 as a whole a loss of $62.2m, [...]
Investment bank Lazard Ltd. has announced the appointment of Felix Rohatyn as special adviser to Chairman and CEO Kenneth M. Jacobs, with effect from 1 February. The announcement marks the return of Rohatyn to Lazard, where he previously worked for more than four decades until 1997. Latterly, he has led Rohatyn Associates, his own private [...]
This week has seen the launch of a new advocacy group which claims 72% of British savers have not been supported or given a fair deal. According to research from Save our Savers, the Government and policymakers bear the brunt of public blame, but respondents also want financial product providers to do much more to [...]
Members of Yorkshire and Chelsea building societies have voted in favour of a merger. A majority of 86.68% of savers and 85.44% of borrowers at Yorkshire passed resolutions to merge with Chelsea today, while a majority of 91.70% of savers and 90.07% of borrowers at Chelsea had already sanctioned the move, earlier this month. The [...]
Sberbank has released its financial results for the 12 months of 2009. Before provisions, operating income soared by 30.2%, compared to 2008, and net interest income had improved by even more, rising by 36.4%. Net fee and commission income was up 10%, and the bank also managed to reduce expenses from 2008 levels by 2.8%. [...]
The Governor of the Bank of England is in favour of tackling global banks that are too big to fail by creating national subsidiaries, the BBC reports. Addressing the Treasury Committee yesterday, Mervy King described dealing with the failure of multinational financial institutions as “very difficult” and recommended “a simple, clear, broad-brush approach” that would [...]
The Board of Administration of German bank BayernLB has today approved the appointment of Gerd Häusler as chief executive officer, effective from 15 April. Presently Häusler is deputy chairman of the Board of Administration, a position he has held since August last year. His career began with the Darmstadt branch of Deutsche Bank where he [...]
The Bank of Japan’s Policy Board has announced that it has elected, unanimously, to retain the country’s interest rate at 0.1%. The Bank of Japan has reported that the nation’s economy is beginning to improve, but is not yet endowed with sufficient momentum for a self-sustaining recovery in private demand domestically. Exports, production and private [...]
Global investment bank Nomura has announced it is establishing a Macro Strategy Research Team led by Jim McCormick, and has made a pair of appointments with Dr. Nick Firoozye becoming European Interest Rates Strategy head and Ann Wyman leading European Emerging Markets Research. The appointments have been made as part of Nomura’s strategic plan for [...]
