MoneyWeek

The ten-year performance award Elon Musk (pictured) received from the electric-car giant he heads in 2018 lost $9.7bn in value last year. He is in good company, says Inti Pacheco in The Wall Street Journal. Two-thirds of CEOs at big-cap US S&P 500 fi

The Bank of England is “now the rare messenger of good news”, says Mehreen Khan in The Times. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has ditched its forecast of the longest recession since 1945 and now predicts “modest growth over the next three years”,

“Monopolies are generally deemed to be bad for society... they tend to create higher prices for consumers... [But in] the mid-20th century, AT&T had a monopoly in the US consumer telecoms market... It also ran its own research laboratory, called Bell

US markets have come off last year’s highs, but they are still far from cheap, says Justin Lahart in The Wall Street Journal. The benchmark S&P 500 index has fallen back from a forward price/earnings (p/e) multiple of 21.6 at the start of 2022 to 18.

The online retailer Asos has “suffered a fresh setback”, says John Abiona on This is Money. City analysts have warned of another decline in revenue just days after the fast-fashion group reported a first-half loss of £209m. JPMorgan and Credit Suisse

EU regulators have broken from their counterparts in the UK and US by clearing Microsoft’s $75bn acquisition of Activision Blizzard, say Javier Espinoza and Tim Bradshaw in the Financial Times. Competition authorities in Brussels said Microsoft had m

This week the CEO of Rolls-Royce was forced to defend his previous description of Britain’s flagship engineer as a “burning platform”, says Sylvia Pfeifer in the Financial Times. Tufan Erginbilgic said his “bleak assessment” of Rolls-Royce, made afte

“Thai voters have delivered a stunning verdict in favour of an opposition party that is calling for radical reform,” says Jonathan Head on the BBC. Early results from Sunday’s elections show Pita Limjaroenrat’s progressive Move Forward Party has won

In a few days’ time, Greece will go to the polls to decide who will govern the country for the next four years. While both Betfair and Smarkets have markets on the outcome, sadly neither of them are liquid enough to be useful. The good news is that t

The latest talks between US president Joe Biden and Republican leaders have offered “glimmers of hope” about reaching a deal to raise America’s borrowing limit (known as the debt ceiling), say Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Catie Edmondson in The New York Ti

India’s prime minister Narendra Modi (pictured) has experienced “a rare political setback” after his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lost control of the southern state of Karnataka, says John Reed in the Financial Times. The BJP only took 66 of the 224

● The extradition of Autonomy founder Mike Lynch (pictured) to the US “sets a dangerous precedent”, says Maggie Pagano in the Daily Mail. Lynch faces charges that he “duped” HP into overpaying for Autonomy by inflating its accounts prior to an $11bn

In the 1970s, the last time the UK was in this much of an economic mess, a popular analysis described the country as having “too few producers”. There were simply not enough productive workers to pay the taxes needed to support all the people on the

A futures contract is an agreement to buy or sell something at a pre-arranged price on a pre-arranged date (known as the delivery date). Futures were developed for agricultural goods such as grain and later for other commodities such as oil, gas and

It has not been a strong year for commodities. Since peaking in June 2022, the Dow Jones Commodity Index – which tracks a basket of energy, metals and agricultural commodities futures – is down by almost 25%. Shares in many commodity producers have h

Sushil Wadhwani, chief investment officer, PGIM Wadhwani The Bank of England would be “unwise” to lift interest rates as high as 5%, says Sushil Wadhwani, the hedge-fund manager who served on the central bank’s monetary policy committee between 1999

Robert Colvile The Sunday Times If Kemi Badenoch’s defence of the U-turn on retained EU laws has angered Brexiteers, the broader issue is that when it comes to our competitiveness in business and innovation, “Britain is simply not at the races”, say

“[My] first job was for Mossad when I was 13 years old... [an agent] would disappear for a few weeks to an Arabic country and send me letters. I had to jump on my bike, cycle down to the Israeli consulate in Nicosia and hand over the letters. I was p

unherd.com During the first Covid lockdown, several households on my street acquired chickens to keep us supplied with fresh eggs, said Mary Harrington. Covid “scrambled” many of the food-supply chains we depend on, and some of our neighbours “did a

bbc.com/worklife Following a “passion-based career” – long hours in a tough field you genuinely love – can be exhilarating, says Sophia Epstein. But there are also major downsides. “Passion jobs” can easily become unsustainable, because truly “dedic

taxpolicy.org.uk Leftist campaigners for tax reform often fall into a self-defeating trap, says Dan Neidle. They believe so strongly in the “righteousness” of their ideas “that all of their time and focus is spent on advocacy, and none on analysis”

Elliott Investment Management is once again calling for change at utility NRG Energy, says Bloomberg. In a letter to NRG’s board this week, the hedge fund decried “the single worst deal” in the utility sector: NRG’s acquisition of Vivint Smart Home,

■ The UK’s leading asset managers are working on a proposal to set up a fund to back Britain’s start-ups, says Reuters. A risk-averse attitude among the country’s fund managers has been cited as one of the reasons why companies are fleeing the countr

Nvidia designs chips and related software for various industries. For example, it has excelled in building the high-speed graphics chips powering the extremely complex and realistic video games that users demand nowadays. There is also growing demand

Most retail-rewards schemes are not very useful unless you are a regular customer with sound reasons for being loyal. You typically accumulate tiny numbers of points that can only be used at the company that issues them. If you allow collecting point

Using a loyalty card scheme such as Nectar means that the scheme has some data on your shopping habits – that was one of the reasons why the supermarkets originally launched them. There are other rewards schemes that can pay you a lot of extra points

● There’s a little-known tax break that could let you use a former home to reduce your inheritance tax (IHT) liability even after you’ve sold it, says tax expert Mike Warburton in The Telegraph. Downsizing relief lets you offset the value of a previo

Small businesses locked into expensive fixed-rate energy deals should see if they can “blend and extend” their deals with suppliers. There is growing concern about many firms’ ability to continue paying high energy bills. The Federation of Small Busi

● Risk-averse banks are increasingly reluctant to lend money to small businesses, new research warns, just as demand for loans is increasing. In a survey conducted by the alternative-finance provider Iwoca, 77% of brokers said high-street banks had b

Flotations tend to be highly anticipated events. No wonder: those who buy into initial public offerings (IPOs) during the subscription phase tend to do well, at least initially. One study by Jay Ritter of the University of Florida, covering 9,126 new

With inflation and interest-rate hikes expected to moderate in the UK, many investors now wonder whether Britain is headed for a deep recession after all. However, the more relevant question is whether the new economic regime of elevated inflation an

Over the last month three of my long tips rose while five fell. Builder DR Horton advanced from $98.15 to $110.29, Gamma Communications increased from 1,112p to 1.153p and Computacenter climbed from 2,264p to 2,442p. However, luxury-clothing retailer

Bank of America has its origins in the Bank of Italy, founded in San Francisco in 1904. Originally aimed at Italian immigrants to the US, it rapidly expanded across California and was renamed Bank of America in 1930. In 1998 it merged with NationsBan

2018 Barbaresco, Rabajà, Giuseppe Cortese, Piemonte, Italy £44.68 each, sold by the case of six bottles, Decorum Vintners, 020-8969 6581, wine@decvin.com, Decvin.com It is admittedly rather lazy to state that I have a favourite vineyard in any wine

The bar from the classic 1980s sitcom Cheers! (pictured) is on sale with Texas-based Heritage Auctions on 2-4 June. It was made from luan wood panels and brass panels and can come apart in three sections, so that cameras could shoot scenes from vario

For collectors of spirits, it’s not always just about what lies within. The bottle can also add significant value. Colombia’s Dictador rum is known for its beautifully crafted bottle collections, as Simon Aron showed me with his hand-painted examples

Editor: Andrew Van Sickle Markets editor: Alexander Rankine Comment editor: Stuart Watkins Politics editor: Emily Hohler Wealth editor: Chris Carter Shares editor: Matthew Partridge Senior digital editor: Kalpana Fitzpatrick Deputy digital editor: Ru