The arguments for reference were always illogical, and sometimes flakey. Not that this stopped some influential people putting the case. Having bought into the stock apparently in the belief the bid would not be referred to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, he then lost his nerve and sold the stake at a substantial loss. Had he waited, he would now have been handsomely in the money The arch-speculator is clearly losing his touch. George Soros wasn’t the only one who got it wrong on Trafalgar’s £1.2bn bid for Northern Electric but he did it on a more substantial scale than others. Some financial data in this column in yesterday’s edition may have appeared incorrectly due to transmission problems We.
The price reflects a loss for GKN of £59.6m on the £152.6m book value of its investment. The disposal means GKN has no further involvement in steel making. City sources last night said the offer price would be little more than 150p compared with initial hopes of 200p, which would have valued the company at £600m
Market report page 34. British Steel is to acquire the remainder of GKN’s stake in steel manufacturer UES holdings for £93m British Steel already owns 83.9 per cent. The flotation price of Albright & Wilson, the Midlands chemical group, is virtually certain to fall well below expectations. Huw Roberts, at NatWest Markets, expects sterling to drift lower, but not to fall much more near-term.. Politics are undermining sterling.”Some analysts were more positive.
He said: “As far as international investors are concerned, the British Government is slipping on every banana skin it can find.”John Shepperd, Yamaichi’s chief economist, said: “The pound will stay vulnerable The economy is in good shape. It will not give the Bank of England a lot of credit for pre-emptive interest rate rises.”Another pessimist about the pound’s prospects was Adrian Cunningham, currency analyst at UBS. Figures released on Monday showed industry’s costs are growing at the fastest rate in 13 years. The retail price index for January will be published today.Steve Barrow, currency analyst at Chemical Bank, said: “If the inflation figures are disappointing, the market will look at Britain as another peripheral European economy. In its view there are no fundamental problems with the economy.
