Treasury to shelve plans for VAT on funds March 7, 2025 Ministers are looking to block a proposal from HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) to apply VAT to investment funds following warnings from City bosses. According to a report in the Financial Times, the customs body had been trying to end the carve-out that allowed third-party fund management operations to be free from the 20 per [...]
Rate-setter calls on Bank of England to adopt ‘activist’ approach to rates March 6, 2025 The Bank of England should adopt a more activist approach to setting interest rates in order to deal with the “substantial volatility” affecting geopolitics and financial markets, a rate-setter has said. Catherine Mann, an external member of the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), argued that rate-setters should be more willing to vote for more radical [...]
European bond rout worsens ahead of pivotal defence summit March 6, 2025 European bond yields continued to climb on Thursday as traders weighed expectations of higher borrowing from major European economies, which is expected to boost defence spending. German bonds suffered their worst day since the immediate aftermath of the fall of the Berlin Wall on Wednesday, after soon-to-be Chancellor Friedrich Merz laid out a bumper package [...]
Profit slumps at Page Group and Robert Walters as jobs market collapses March 6, 2025 The slowing jobs market has forced two of the UK’s largest recruiters to reveal painful last-year performances in which profit and revenue nosedived. Page Group and Robert Walters both posted double-digit falls in overall revenue for the year ended 31 December. The latter’s earnings plunged 16 per cent to £892m, while Page Group’s dropped 13.5 [...]
Schroders to bear down on costs in major strategic overhaul March 6, 2025 Storied investment giant Schroders has unveiled a new three-year strategy alongside its full year results in an attempt to attract new business and and reign in spiralling costs. The FTSE 100 investor has promised to deliver £150m of annual net cost savings, of which it claims to have already delivered £20m in the first three [...]
Digital nomads costing UK economy £3bn a year March 6, 2025 The UK is missing out on over £3bn of consumer spending and £320m of lost VAT a year because of the rising popularity of ‘digital nomad’ schemes among British citizens. According to a fresh study from Public First, the modish regimes – which promise professionals long-term work visas without having to become fully-fledged tax residents [...]
UK growth outlook slashed amid tax and trade ‘double whammy’ March 5, 2025 The Chancellor’s growth agenda was dealt a fresh blow on Thursday after the British Chambers of Commerce slashed its forecast for the UK economy due to the tax and trade “double whammy” afflicting UK businesses. The business group now expects the UK economy to grow by just 0.9 per cent in 2025, a hefty downgrade [...]
Will western brands return to pariah state Russia? March 4, 2025 It was the sight that heralded a new geopolitical era. Hundreds of Russian punters standing in a disorderly queue and braving the bitter Moscow air to sample their first bite of the latest big import from America. The iron curtain – having been chipped away slowly for years – had fully fallen just two months [...]
Bosses fear workers’ rights overhaul more than National Insurance hike March 3, 2025 Employers are more worried about the government’s upcoming reforms to workers’ rights than the widely condemned National Insurance rises announced in the October Budget, a fresh poll has revealed. More than a third (34 per cent) of bosses cited the far-reaching overhaul to employment rights as the biggest challenge facing their organisation in 2025 despite [...]
Reeves urged to ‘urgently’ unlock pension capital to boost pre-IPO firms February 28, 2025 Rachel Reeves should use the multibillion pound surplus in public sector pensions to give the UK’s most-promising scale ups crucial capital that will prevent them from listing abroad, a top accounting firm has said. Blick Rothenberg issued a rallying cry to the Chancellor to use her upcoming Spring Statement to lend some much-needed support the [...]
