Time to sell?
House prices up
The traditional summer lull doesn't seem to have hit the housing market with prices, as measured by Halifax, up by 1.4 per cent in July and 10.2 per cent over the past three months when compared to last year, which is the fastest rate of growth since September 2007. But, the tide may be turning among house owners, with the Halifax Housing Market Confidence Tracker showing 57 per cent of home owners believe the next 12 months would be the best time to sell their house, up from 32 per cent.
Dead deals
$100bn pulled
Wall Street suffered earlier this week when mega deals with a combined value of around $100bn fell apart within hours of each other. The biggest deal, Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox's $71bn offer for Time Warner, was pulled by Fox due to Time Warner's unwillingness to engage, although the brevity of the bid situation, just three weeks, surprised many given Mr Murdoch's reputation for bloody-minded tenacity in the past. A second deal, Japanese mobile phone operator Sprint's bid for rival T-Mobile US, also fell apart on the back of anti-trust concerns. One bid which is still likely to go through is US pharmacy group Walgreen's offer to buy up the rest of the UK chain Boots it does not already own for around $10bn.
Float fatigue
Property pulled
With many traders packing up their flip flops and thinking of the beach, those companies that failed to get their IPOs out of the door earlier this year may be beginning to regret it. The latest IPO to be pulled is that of Urban Exposure, a property company which had been looking to raise £500m for developments in the South East of England. Its failure follows that of property management companies Clipstone and Liberty Living in recent weeks. Despite a record £5.7bn raised in the opening six months of the year, a number of high profile IPOs have seen their shares fall back significantly following the float.
Factories hit
Pound hurts
The prolonged strength of the sterling appears to be hurting the UK's manufacturing sector with output from the UK's factory sector only recovering marginally, with a 0.3 per cent rise in June, following the 1 per cent fall in output in May. This means that UK factory output remains more than 7 per cent below its peak level of the first half of 2008, after which the recession kicked in. But activity in the dominant services sector of the economy kicked on in July when its Purchasing Managers' Index reading rose from 57.7 to 59.1, a shift which could increase the pressure for interest rate rises.
Sanctions sidestep
Iran oil deal
A number of European banks are facing a hit from the sanctions being brought in against Russia by the EU, UK and US. Lenders such as Raiffeisen, UniCredit, Commerzbank, Societe General and ING all have significant Russian loan books which could be compromised by sanctions and the recent slide in the value of the rouble, according to research by Berenberg. Meanwhile, Russia is refocusing its strategic priorities elsewhere, with a $20bn five-year trade deal with Iran close to fruition which would include significant oil purchases.
Electric shock therapy
New rules
The UK government is continuing its policy of targeting market abuse in the electricity generation sector. After many years of light touch regulation led to a public backlash against the utilities, the government has been tightening up its oversight of energy markets with the latest proposal that anyone found guilty of manipulating the energy market can now be punished by imprisonment, having only been able to fine transgressors previously.
