Some highlights from Monday’s FTfm.
Big banks face contest in research
Independent research houses are elbowing aside the big banks to gain a foothold in the lucrative market for investment analysis. Tuesday’s Thomson Reuters Extel Awards, dubbed the City Oscars, will reveal independent houses are increasingly being favoured by European asset managers
Pension funds urged to enter Africa
Fund managers have used the launch of the South African based World Cup to bemoan UK pension funds’ resistance to investing in the continent. The £1.2bn Royal County of Berkshire pension fund is believed to be the only UK pension fund to have made a strategic investment to the continent via a small investment with the Morgan Stanley Frontier Fund
Weatherbys: Next jump financial services
The latest new entrant aiming to come to the rescue of those saddled with an underperforming bank is the UK’s Weatherbys Bank, a specialist in the horse-racing business. The Northamptonshire-based firm already runs a stripped-down private banking operation, offering deposit accounts and loans. But from October it plans to widen its scope to encompass financial planning and investment services
BP crisis highlights value of sustainability research
BP, according to its RepRisk score, has been a high risk investment for the past four years. Its score has been consistently around 60, compared with an industry average in single figures. RepRisk monitors global press and other publications for criticism of companies relating to their environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance
Time for procrastination is passing
Jonathan Davis questions whether it is right to warn that even starting to tackle the fiscal imbalances today dooms us to another recession, or even depression, as Paul Krugman says
Euro bondholder haircuts would help
If, or when, any euro area countries need to effect a systematic restructuring of their banking systems, the model would be the relatively well handled Nordic banking crisis. Shareholders in all countries were eliminated or diluted, writes John Dizard