It's that time of the year when the data providers release their deals data and, er, business journalists construct stories out of the information.
So, Reuters are running the line that "global M&A activity fell to a 3-year low in 2020" amid the pandemic. Below is the link:..
Hat tip to Michael O'Dwyer of The Daily Telegraph, who appears to have dug out a rather interesting tale about a foreign exchange broker. Below is the link:
One of Betaville's favourite business commentators today follows the theme I laid out yesterday about Hiscox but probably in a more eloquent style than myself.
I am off course referring to Alistair "acerbic" Osborne, a former boss and colleague from my days at The Daily Telegraph City desk, and his piece in today's The Times about Hiscox's refusal to pay out claims to small and medium-sized businesses. I have pasted the link below:..
A hearty congratulations goes out to former colleague Philip Aldrick, economics editor at The Times. Today he won the the Business and Finance Journalist of the Year award from the Society of Editors.
I have worked across the business desks of 'Fleet Street' for a quite a while and I couldn't think of a more diligent but understated journalist as Phil Aldrick, who I used to work alongside at The Daily Telegraph several years ago...
Clearly, there are more important things happening in the world at the moment than mergers & acquisitions.
In fact, the global crisis has effectively completely upended the dealmaking market, with Bloomberg reporting that many M&A bankers are trying to reinvent themselves as restructuring advisers...
It didn't take long for the Genteel Hustler, also known as William Turvill of the Mail on Sunday, to get hustling out in Vancouver, Canada.
Today the Genteel Hustler is bylined in the The Daily Telegraph, my former employer. Below is a link to the piece:..
Having worked as a financial hack for the last fifteen years I guess it wasn't too hard to predict there will be plenty of "prediction" pieces at this time of the year.
How else you do fill a newspaper, website or Bloomborg terminal during a news vacuum at the end/beginning of the year?
Perhaps the most bizarre prediction piece came from Matthew Lynn, a business columnist for The Daily Telegraph, my former employer...
Here is a story thay may resonate with some Betaville's core readers: Pageant Media, which owns HedgeFund Intelligence, is working with advisers on "strategic options".
Sources close to the situation said Pageant Media, which is controlled by entrepreneur Charles Kerr, is working with advisers from corporate finance firm Livingstone (now part of NM Rothschild), a move that could lead to an eventual sale of the business...
Take a bow Simon Duke, a former colleague from Betaville's jobbing freelancing days on The Sunday Times business section, and Katherine Griffiths, who I worked with on The Daily Telegraph some time ago, of The Times...
Tucked away in the back of the business section of my old employer - The Daily Telegraph - are some rather interesting comments from Gervais Williams, the respected fund manager, about the prospect of a pick up in dealmaking.
Williams, who runs the Diverse Income invesmtent trust - told Richard Evans, a rather nice former ex-colleague who writes the Questor column- that London-listed companies are at "unusually attractive valuations"...