The operator of Pizza’s Hut restaurants in the UK is looking to raise more than £10m to help it cope with increased costs after tax rises on business were announced in last month’s Budget. The money could come from a sale of part of the business, or new investment from existing shareholders. It comes amid growing backlash from business owners who warn rises in employers’ national insurance contributions and the
Getty Images iCloud is the online storage service from Apple Apple is facing a legal claim accusing it of effectively locking 40 million British customers into its iCloud service and charging them “rip off prices”. Consumer group Which? says the legal action – which it has launched – could result in a £3bn payout if it is successful, with the average customer getting around £70. Apple has rejected the suggestion
NexGen NexGen’s operation in Canada’s remote Athabasca Basin Uranium is making a comeback thanks to a renewed focus on nuclear energy as a climate crisis solution. Canada, rich with high-grade deposits, could become a nuclear “superpower”. But can its potential be realised? Leigh Curyer had been working in uranium mining for nearly two decades when he noticed a striking shift. In 2011, the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster in Japan badly
Getty Images The Chancellor announced an end to inheritance tax exemption for farms in October. A bid by the department for rural affairs to soften changes to inheritance tax for farms – possibly by exempting some older farmers – has been rejected by the Treasury. The Treasury said there would be no change or mitigations to the policy, which will see an end to inheritance tax exemption for some farms.
Reuters Chancellor Rachel Reeves says she wants pension schemes to “fire up the economy” Plans for a major shake-up of pension funds have been announced by the chancellor, Rachel Reeves. She wants to create pension “megafunds” by merging the UK’s 86 council schemes, using the set-up in Canada and Australia as a model. Other proposals suggest pension schemes need to reach a certain size or pool together. Larger funds could
Amazon has launched a new outlet called Haul which caps the price of products on sale at $20 (£15.79), in an effort to take on low-cost retailers Temu and Shein. The online shopping giant unveiled Haul as a mobile-only experience available in its Shopping app for US customers on Wednesday. It says shoppers can expect “crazy low prices” on Haul products that are “worth the wait” of up to two
Liberty Media announced Wednesday that it’s spinning off most assets besides Formula One auto racing into a separate publicly traded company, called Liberty Live, and that CEO Greg Maffei is stepping down at year-end. Chairman John Malone will become interim CEO of Liberty Media. Liberty Media’s investor day is set to take place on Thursday in Manhattan. While the 83-year-old Malone will once again take the reigns as CEO, the
PA Media Protesters from Greenpeace and Uplift gathered outside the Court of Session in Edinburgh at the start of the case How much oil – and how much profit – remain beneath the waters that buffet the British Isles? Going by the number of lawyers packed into the Court of Session in Edinburgh this week, it must be a decent amount. Seven advocates squeezed into the front row of courtroom
Exceptionally strong housing demand in the U.S. has large homebuilders in the driver’s seat and smaller builders ripe for takeover. The buyers are both domestic and Japanese. M&A activity in the single-family homebuilder space is having a record year in terms of dollar volume, and close to a record in the number of deals, according to Margaret Whelan, founder of Whelan Advisory and one of the biggest investment bankers in
Meta has been fined €798m (£664m) for breaking competition law by embedding Facebook Marketplace within its social network. The European Commission said this meant alternative classified ads services had faced “unfair trading conditions”, making it harder for them to compete. In addition to the fine, it has ordered Meta to stop imposing these conditions on other services. Meta said it rejected the Commission’s findings and would appeal. EU antitrust head
