BUSINESS LIVE: Unilever spins-off ice cream unit; Diageo hires John Manzoni as chair; AstraZeneca to buy Fusion

SThree saw a significant drop in first-quarter fees amid a subdued macroeconomic backdrop and large-scale layoffs within the technology sector.

The STEM-specialist recruiter revealed net fees declined by 6 per cent year-on-year to £93.7million between the beginning of December and 29 February.

Just before close, the FTSE 100 was 0.17% up at 7,736.04.

Meanwhile, the FTSE 250 was 0.31% lower at 19,426.83.

Motor insurance premiums could fall as the Government plans to rip up rules that let uninsured drivers make claims – with innocent car owners picking up the bill.

(PA) – Majestic Wines is in talks to buy wine bar chain Vagabond from administration.

Vagabond Wines, which has 12 locations, predominantly in London, filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators earlier this month.

The chain, which allows customers to order a variety of wines from self-pouring machines, was founded in 2009 by Stephen Finch.

Sky News reported that the companies could strike a deal “within days”.

A Majestic spokesman said: “Majestic can confirm that it is exploring a deal to purchase all or part of the Vagabond Wines business.

“Majestic cannot comment further on ongoing discussions but we are hopeful of securing a deal.

“Since our acquisition by Fortress Investment Group in 2019, we have invested heavily in our growth plan, opening 16 new shops; hiring many new colleagues; supplying thousands of premium hospitality businesses through our business-to-business division; and training thousands of colleagues as one of the biggest wine educators in Europe.”

HMRC will close its self-assessment helpline from 8 April to 30 September, instead directing people to seek assistance via its online chatbots.

The taxman also said that helplines will reopen between October and March, but only to deal with ‘priority queries’, with all others to be directed to its online services.

DFS shares fell sharply on Tuesday as the furniture retailer cut its sales and profits forecasts for the year.

The Doncaster-based firm told investors on Tuesday that demand had ‘weakened significantly’ over the past two months, after revenues sank by 7.2 per cent to £505.1million in the six months to 24 December.

Fashion retailer Ted Baker has called in the administrators, putting 86 stores and hundreds of jobs at risk.

The firm No Ordinary Designer Label, which is owned by the Authentic Brands Group (ABG) and trades as Ted Baker filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators Teneo Financial Advisory today.

(PA) – Telecoms regulator Ofcom has launched an investigation into an outage that stopped businesses being able to make 999 calls last year.

Business customers of Vonage, a subsidiary of Swedish telecoms Ericsson, saw their emergency call services disrupted in October and November 2023, the watchdog said.

“Ofcom has today launched an investigation into cloud communications provider, Vonage,” Ofcom said.

“This follows an incident resulting in disruption for its business customers to emergency call services during October and November 2023.

“Our rules require providers to take all necessary measures to ensure uninterrupted access to emergency organisations as part of any call services offered.

“Providers must also take appropriate and proportionate measures to identify and reduce the risks of the availability, performance or functionality of their network or service being compromised.”

The regulator added that providers need to take “appropriate and proportionate measures” to ensure there are not any “adverse effects” from such a compromise.

Major retailers are all vulnerable to IT outages after McDonald’s, Sainsbury’s and Tesco lost millions of pounds amid technical issues, retail experts have warned.

Tesco and Sainsbury’s were both hit with unrelated problems on Saturday which saw them both have to apologise to angry customers who were left without orders.

Close Brothers Group has unveiled measures to save approximately £400million to enhance its capital position amid a regulatory review into the motor finance.

Crest Nicholson shares tumbled on Tuesday after the housebuilder warned it expects to complete fewer homes this year.

The Surrey-based group told investors it now expects to build 1,800 to 2,000 houses in the year to the end of October, down from 2,020 last year.

FTSE 250-listed Crest Nicholson said this reflected a weaker order book and ;the low level of reservations in the first two months of the financial year’.

In a car park somewhere on the rugged Cornish coast, a Ghanaian scammer stands shivering and confused. He has been sent here to collect the payment for 10kg of non-existent gold promised to the victim of one of his scams.

The fraudster is expecting to get £234,000 in cash. It’s a massive sum, by far outweighing the costs of the 6,000 mile round trip from the Ghanian capital, Accra.

The boss of British luxury car firm Bentley has blasted Labour plans to reinstate the controversial 2030 electric vehicle deadline if it gets into power.

Chairman and chief executive Adrian Hallmark warned it would be a ‘mistake’ to bring forward the ban on petrol and diesel cars from 2035 to 2030.

Unilever will spin-out its ice cream unit into a separate and independent business as part of efforts to ‘simplify’ the consumer goods giant and cut costs.

The group, whose stable of brands also includes Marmite, Domestos and Persil, also laid out plans to cut €800million (£684million) in costs over the next three years, potentially impacting 7,500 ‘predominantly office-based roles globally’.

The shake-up follows a ‘disappointing’ year for Unilever, whose chief executive Hein Schumacher has vowed to turn the FTSE 100 firm around after replacing Alan Jope in July.

Debbie Crosbie is a chief executive in a hurry.

The Nationwide boss is fearful that if the mutual lender is prevented from making its bid for Virgin Money within 28 days, the time prescribed by City referee the Takeover Panel, the opportunity of a lifetime for the mutual sector could be lost.

The FTSE 100 has inched higher at the open, propped up by Unilever on its ice cream unit spin-off plans, though gains are capped by caution ahead of UK inflation data and Federal Reserve’s interest rate decision later this week.

Unilever is up more than 5 per cent after the consumer goods group plans to spin off its ice cream unit into a standalone business and announced a new cost-savings programme that would impact 7,500 jobs.

Investors refrain from placing big bets ahead of key domestic inflation data and the Fed’s rate decision, both due Wednesday, to ascertain the global monetary policy trajectory, before the Bank of England’s rate verdict on Thursday.

The BoE is expected to keep rates at current levels in the upcoming meeting, although the focus will be on the timing of the first rate cut.

The mid cap FTSE 250 was flat at 19,478.30 points, led by a 4.2 per cent fall in Crest Nicholson after the homebuilder said it could build up to 11 per cent fewer homes in fiscal 2024 amid persistent tough conditions in the housing market.

Bitcoin could hit $250,000 next year, according to Standard Chartered.

In a report published yesterday, the bank, one of the world’s biggest, said the digital currency was on course to reach $150,000 by the end of this year.

The terrace at the House of Lords was packed when Lord Austin of Dudley hosted a reception for Israeli energy-tech innovators last week.

Among those present, as coffee and pastries were passed around, were representatives of the London Stock Exchange seeking initial public offering (IPO) opportunities, Shell UK’s top climate transition guru and Britain’s ambassador to Israel Simon Walters making his first trip home to the UK since the atrocities of October 7.

British housebuilder Crest Nicholson could build up to 11 per cent fewer homes in fiscal 2024 amid persistent tough conditions in the housing market.

The British housing market saw signs of stability at the start of 2024 on easing mortgage rates after battling subdued demand for most of last year, but the delay by the Bank of England in lowering interest rates and incessant macro-economic concerns have tempered hopes of a better-paced recovery.

Surrey-based Crest Nicholson said open market year-to-date sales rate per outlet per week was 0.44 based on 46 outlets, and that improved to 0.52 in the last eight weeks to 15 March.

The company added that sales prices are expected to remain stable in the 2024 financial year.

Crest Nicholson, which focuses on suburban areas outside London and in southern England, said it expects to build between 1,800 and 2,000 homes in the year ending 31 October, compared with 2,020 homes a year earlier.

The group also flagged ‘certain build defects’ predominantly on four sites completed prior to 2019 that it told investors would require remediation over the next three years at an estimated cost of up to £15million. 

‘As a result, the Board has decided to appoint third party consultants to provide greater assurance on the adequacy of current provisions around these and other sites completed prior to 2019. A further update will be provided at the Group’s interim results in June,’ Crest said.

Britain’s answer to Bill Gates was the ‘driving force’ behind Silicon Valley’s biggest ever fraud, a court heard last night

Prosecutors accused Mike Lynch of committing a ‘massive fraud’ when he fooled computer giant Hewlett-Packard into buying his software company Autonomy for £8.6billion in 2011.

Share trading app Robinhood has opened its trading platform to all UK investors as it looks to take on established incumbents for the third time.

The US giant will initially offer free trading in over 6,000 US stocks, with no annual charges or fees for dealing or foreign exchange.

Robinhood found itself at the centre of the GameStop frenzy in 2021, when investors flocked to the platform to back so-called ‘meme stocks’.

City grandee Sir Patrick Sergeant celebrated his 100th birthday at the weekend.

He was City Editor of the Daily Mail for 25 years and founder of the hugely successful Euromoney magazine.

AstraZeneca has agreed to buy clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company Fusion Pharmaceuticals for about $2billion in cash, in efforts to boost the drugmaker’s oncology portfolio.

The FTSE 100 firm will pay $21 per Fusion share, a premium of more than 97 per cent to the US-listed company’s closing price on Monday.

AstraZeneca will also pay a non-transferable contingent value right of $3 per share, taking the combined transaction value to about $2.4billion.

Fusion, which is developing ‘next-generation’ radioconjugates (RCs) to treat cancer, will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of AstraZeneca, with operations continuing in Canada and the US.

RCs have emerged as a promising modality in cancer treatment over recent years, AstraZeneca said.

Diageo has named former head of the UK Civil Servive Sir John Manzoni as its next chair, replacing Javier Ferran who is retiring in February 2025.

The world’s top spirits maker reportedly began the search for a new chair earlier this year, while it grappled with the aftermath of a November profit warning that dented its confidence with some investors.

Manzoni joined the Diageo board in 2020, after leading the UK Civil Service as chief executive from 2014.

He is currently chair of energy business SSE plc and previously spent 11 years as a non-executive director of African beer brewer SABMiller, which was taken over by Anheuser-Busch InBev in 2016.

Chemring has been handed nearly £90million to boost defence production in Europe.

The London-listed defence firm yesterday said it has been granted £57million by the European Commission as part of a scheme to make ammunition and missiles for Ukraine.

Chemring has also won a £32million grant from the Norwegian government to increase production in the country.  The EU funding is part of a £427million programme to ramp up ammunition manufacturing capacity to help countries refill their stocks and deliver to Ukraine.

Unilever plans to spin off its ice cream unit into a standalone business, as the consumer goods giant plots a new cost-savings programme set to impact 7,500 jobs.

The spin off of the ice cream business, which is home to popular brands such as Magnum and Ben & Jerry’s, will begin immediately and is expected to complete by the end of 2025, the London-listed company said.

Unilever aims to deliver mid-single digit underlying sales growth and modest margin improvement after the split, it said in a statement, to become a ‘simpler and more focused company’.

The company launched a programme expected to deliver total cost savings of around $869million over the next three years, and the proposed changes would impact around 7,500 roles globally, with total restructuring costs now anticipated to be around 1.2 per cent of its turnover during the period.