In brief: Facebook shares tumble & 700,000 customers hit by errors at Nationwide
FINANCIAL TIMES
Cameron and Osborne court investors
By George Parker and Chris Giles
David Cameron and George Osborne launched a concerted effort on Thursday to persuade investors that the government would stick to its tough debt reduction plan, as the eyes of the world turned on London ahead of the 2012 games...Mr Cameron opened a global investment conference – timed to coincide with the Olympics – with a promise that the coalition would “go on and finish the job” of eliminating Britain’s structural deficit: a task he wants to complete by 2017.
CITY A.M.
Cameron to top bosses: back UK Plc
By Julian Harris
Business leaders from some of the largest companies in the world have begun arriving in London for a showcase event to boost investment into the UK, timed to coincide with the Olympic Games...Prime Minister David Cameron spoke at the Global Investment Conference, attempting to assure the assembled heavyweights that Britain is “back open for business”.The Prime Minister received kind words from business leaders such as Schmidt, but also came under fire for some coalition policies.
THE SUN
What a load of rubble
Build boss: Don’t trust ‘dire’ stats on economy
By Steve Hawkes, Business Editor
One of Britain’s biggest builders merchants claims official statistics that show the economy is nosediving “cannot be trusted”.
Travis Perkins boss Geoff Cooper said the true picture was nowhere near as bad as the one painted....“The industry has been pressing the Government for some time to try to get the figures in better shape. Government officials are now contacting the trade association to check what’s really going on.”
THE GUARDIAN
Markets rally on ECB chief's pledge to preserve euro
By Larry Elliott, Helena Smith in Athens and Louise Ashwell
European Central Bank president Mario Draghi prompted a strong rally in Europe's financial markets when he pledged to do "whatever it takes" to safeguard the future of the single currency. Shares, bonds and the euro all rose sharply after the ECB president dropped the strongest of hints that the bank was preparing to intervene to bring down the crippling borrowing costs affecting the Spanish and Italian governments.
DAILY MAIL
Nationwide hit by account meltdown: 700,000 customers have payments taken twice
By Ruth Lythe and Dan Hyde
Britain's biggest building society left more than 700,000 customers out of pocket yesterday after a basic computer error took payments from their accounts twice...Every debit card payment was deducted as normal on Tuesday – but then taken again on Wednesday. In another blow to the UK’s beleaguered banks and building societies, NatWest’s online service froze yesterday, leaving up to 11.5million customers locked out and unable to access their cash.
THE TELEGRAPH
Facebook shares fall 10pc in after-hours trading on maiden results
By Richard Blackden, and Andrew Trotman
The Californian company had been under intense pressure to deliver strong results given the almost 30pc drop in its share price since the $104bn (£66bn) flotation in May...
As had been forecast, the cost of share-based pay plan for employees saw Facebook report an overall loss of $157m for the quarter. But as founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg made an appearance on the company's conference call with Wall Street analysts on Thursday night, the focus was squarely on how quickly the social network site will be able to drive revenues.
THE TIMES
No recovery in sight as Lloyds takes another mis-selling hit
By Patrick Hosking, Financial Editor
A thousand employees are tied up rejecting bogus compensation claims for mis-sold insurance, Lloyds Banking Group said yesterday as it admitted that it had been wrongfooted about the size of the final bill.
The bailed-out bank set aside another £700 million to meet the cost of claims and associated administration for mis-sold payment protection insurance (PPI), saying that its best estimate of the total cost has mushroomed to £4.275 billion.
bbc.co.uk
Amazon reports 96% fall in Q2 profit on robot deal
The online retailer Amazon has reported a 96% fall in profits to $7m (£4.5m) for the three months ending in June, down from $191m a year earlier.
The company blamed the fall on a $65m loss from its purchase of robot-maker Kiva systems earlier this year.
Sales rose 29% to $12.8bn, slightly lower than analyst predictions.
DAILY EXPRESS
New pension tax rip-off
By Sarah O’Grady
Pensioners are handing over a staggering £42billion a year to the Government in taxes, new figures out today show. As the cost of living soars, the average pensioner is now losing nearly a third of their income in indirect taxes such as VAT, fuel duty and road tax as well as income tax and council tax.
The poorest are hit even harder, ¬losing almost half their money. Critics say these punitive rates, after a lifetime of paying tax on their earnings, are grossly unfair. And they warn that ¬pensioners face paying still more in tax.
THE SCOTSMAN
Two years to go before Scotland is recession-free
By Scott MacNab
Scotland will not get back to the prosperity levels it enjoyed before the financial crash until 2014, the country’s chief economist has warned.
But traditional Scottish prudence could see Scotland bounce back before the rest of the UK as households north of the Border have higher savings, according to Dr Gary Gillespie in his State of the Economy report yesterday.
