Britain has asked its medicine regulator to assess the vaccine for a temporary supply, which could mean it’s rolled out in the country before the end of the year.
Another 1,300 pub sector job cuts were announced today as Mitchells & Butlers became the latest operator to respond to the coronavirus crisis.
M&B, which owns brands including All Bar One and Harvester, said it had made 1,300 workers redundant and closed a small number of sites owing to reduced trade.
It said that the cuts had come “despite our best efforts to protect as many jobs as we can”, and represented only 3 per cent of its total workforce of 43,000.
News of the cuts came as Fuller, Smith & Turner confirmed its previously announced decision to cut about 350 jobs, although it said it had managed to redeploy about 250 workers whose jobs were at risk of redundancy. Most of the big pub groups have laid off staff: Greene King cutting 800 jobs, Marston’s cutting 2,150 and JD Wetherspoon losing about 550.
The M&B job cuts came as … Read the rest
The Canadian dollar continued to consolidate this week’s gains in an uneventful and quiet overnight session. USD/CAD traded narrowly in a $1.2993-$1.3012 range and is trading in Toronto in the middle of that band.
The Canadian dollar is benefiting from widespread, positive risk sentiment, which has led to substantial gains in AUD/USD and NZD/USD. The news of successful coronavirus vaccine tests unleashed a torrent of demand for the so-called “risk assets,” and helped to send crude oil prices skyrocketing.
West Texas Intermediate (WTI) the North American crude oil benchmark price touched $46.20 yesterday, a 37% increase from where it was at the start of November. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countires and friends played a large role in the price surge after they leaked plans to extend existing production levels until March 2021.
AUD/USD and NZD/USD led the move higher because of their close trade relationship with China and … Read the rest
Prior to 1980, the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 maintained a strict separation between our banking system and our capital markets. However, financial regulators opened loopholes in Glass-Steagall during the 1980s and 1990s, allowing banks to engage in securities activities and permitting nonbanks to offer bank-like products.
“Universal banks” (banks engaged in securities activities) and “shadow banks” (nonbanks offering bank-like services) dominated our financial markets after Congress repealed Glass-Steagall in 1999. Universal banks and shadow banks played leading roles in the toxic subprime lending boom that led to the financial crisis of 2007–09.
In response to the financial crisis, the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve bailed out big banks as well as large shadow banks (including AIG, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs). Federal agencies also protected short-term financial instruments that functioned as substitutes for bank deposits, such as money market mutual funds, commercial paper, and securities repurchase agreements … Read the rest
There’s one thing that most people are agreed upon: Christmas is not likely to be the same this year.
Netflix will boost its spend on making TV shows in the UK to $1bn (£750m) this year as the streaming giant maintains the breakneck pace of its production pipeline despite the coronavirus pandemic.
Netflix, which makes shows such as The Crown and Sex Education in the UK, has increased its budget by 50% from the £500m it spent on British-made films and TV shows last year. Netflix UK had originally estimated a spend of about £400m last year, but ended up investing about £100m more.
The BBC’s total annual content budget across TV, radio and online hit £2.3bn in the year to the end of March. Within this, spend on TV content was £1.6bn. ITV spends about £1.1bn annually on content for its portfolio of channels.
Netflix’s UK budget has been invested in making more than 50 TV shows and films in 2020, against the backdrop of a UK production … Read the rest
Hedge fund bulls say Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) is on its way to a $2-trillion market cap after gaining 400% this year … It’s already worth 5X the combined value of giants Ford and GM, and it’s an industry disrupter that’s making millionaires out of anyone who ties-in with them.
And the auto industry disruption tie-ins are many, varied… and potentially lucrative.
From new EV startups and batteries or fuel cells …
To ride-sharing with an ESG twist and car subscription companies that are challenging our ideas of ownership.
The ideas are racking up, and the growth runway potentials are phenomenal.
EV startup NIO (NYSE:NIO) has gained over 1500% this year.
EV charging stock Blink (NYSE:BLNK) has gained 1400% YTD.
Now, mergers and consolidations are the name of this game as all the tie-ins fight for market share.
EV startup Fisker (NYSE:FSR) opted to go public, and acquired Spartan Energy (SPAQ).
Food … Read the rest
The 2020 holiday season is going to be a little different, to say the least. We won’t be traveling. We won’t be hosting cocktail parties or soirees. And many of us won’t be able to visit our loved ones. But what we can still do is give a special gift, and let those near and dear to us know we’re thinking about them.
Photograph by Jarren Vink; Styling by Alex Silva
The Homebody
Explore a world of new tastes.
Clockwise from top left:
Our Place The Always Pan The pan that took Instagram by storm. Sauté, steam, sear, or sizzle; $150.
Poketo Jazz up a picnic or dinnertime at home with these designer bamboo plates in a variety of bold designs; $48 for four.
Group Partner Faces Planter Whimsy up a houseplant. Designed in Brooklyn and made in Portugal. ;$65.
Sabah Shearling Babas Turkish-made slippers for warming winter toes; … Read the rest
Ex-bankers Mickey Down and Konrad Kay talked to CNBC about channeling their own experiences of the financial sector into writing hit TV show “Industry.”
The chancellor, Rishi Sunak, has snubbed calls to support thousands of small businesses in England on the brink of collapse that would have benefited from financial help in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, according to an all-party group of MPs.
Hairdressers, cleaners and people who started self-employment before the pandemic hit are amongmore than 1 million workers who have missed out on government support in England, the Treasury select committee said.
This contrasts with efforts made in all the other countries of the UK to fill in the gaps left by the furlough scheme and the self-employment income support scheme, which only applies to those who have registered as self-employed since April 2018.
In a letter to Sunak highlighting the committee’s growing frustration with the Treasury’s stance, the committee’s chair, Mel Stride, called on the chancellor to adopt measures the MPs set out in a report published in the summer … Read the rest