A laptop containing details of 196,000 retirement customers has been stolen from Fidelity Investments in Boston. Information on stakeholders in US computer giant Hewlett Packard’s pension plan has been the main loss.
“Although this happened in the States it’s very worrying indeed,” said financial adviser Martin Cunningham. “I wouldn’t have thought such sensitive information would be […]

British Airways is planning to raise the retirement age of some of its staff to help plug a £1bn ‘black hole’ in its pension scheme.
The proposals include raising the compulsory retirement age for cabin crew from 55 to 60, although this could well go up again to 65 within five years. The planned moves will […]

Supermarket Morrisons has reported its first ever trading loss, due to the £375m cost of integrating Safeway into its corporate structure.
The Bradford-based group posted a loss of £312.9m for the year to 29 January on a turnover of £12.1bn, although excluding the exceptional Safeway costs it recorded pre-tax profits of £61.5m.
Chairman Sir Ken Morrison said: […]

Chancellor Gordon Brown is to sell nuclear power group British Energy (BE) and the Tote bookmakers in a bid to raise billions of pounds from State-owned assets.
It is estimated that the Government’s stake in BE is worth up to £10bn and the sale of the Tote by the end of next year could raise a […]

Taxes are up on highly polluting cars, while householders are encouraged to think more about energy efficiency in a green budget from Chancellor Gordon Brown. Andrew Partridge reports.

HSBC has announced it plans to enter the equity release market, offering products that allow older borrowers to release some of the money tied up in their properties.
The trade body for equity release, Safe Home Income Plans (SHIP), welcomed the news that a big bank was launching into this market.
Jon King, Chairman of SHIP commented: […]

The Inheritance tax threshold was raised by Gordon Brown in his budget, from £275000 to £325,000 over four years. However, the mortgage industry was disappointed by the move, which sees the threshold rise in year one by just £10,000 to £285,000.
Halifax calculated that the 2006/07 IHT threshold of £285,000 would now be £425,000 if it […]

Chancellor Gordon Brown raised the nil rate Stamp Duty threshold nominally in his budget from £120,000 to £125,000, but many in the mortgage industry argued that this was not enough to help first-time buyers on to the ladder.
This means that buyers purchasing properties over £125,000 will have to pay 1% of the purchase price as […]