Why can’t Britain hang on to its best new companies?
Costa, in my opinion, sells a decent cup of coffee. It employs polite youngsters who seem happy in their work.…
The record bull run must end soon. So is it time for a return to gold?
All good things must come to an end, including summer holidays and bull markets. The bull run in US shares…
Decent broadband is a public right. Get on and kick BT, minister
As I set to compiling your email responses into our ‘broadband dossier’ to send to BT chairman Jan du Plessis,…
Give Mike Ashley a peerage if he can revive House of Fraser
This column has consistently stood up for Mike Ashley, even when the lonesome billionaire’s notions of corporate governance at Sports…
It’s time to accept that companies such as Amazon are beyond shame
‘There has to be a level playing field so that… Amazon cannot undercut domestic booksellers by using the tax advantage…
What’s bad for slick estate agents like Foxtons is good for working Londoners
Those twice-weekly sales emails from Foxtons that the recent GDPR clean-up has failed to stop have lately been spattered with…
Full-fibre broadband by 2033? I wish I could believe you, minister
I bought BT’s offer of an upgrade to ‘superfast’ broadband because the standard service seemed to be deteriorating just as…
An amoral money world needs ethical campaigners more than ever
When I first visited Canary Wharf in the early 1990s, I was struck by a set of black-and-white posters in…
Data breaches show we’re only three clicks away from anarchy
An IT glitch afflicting BP petrol stations for three hours last Sunday evening might not sound like headline news. A…
Enjoy your feelgood summer while you can – there may be trouble ahead
I’ve been on a mini-tour, full of echoes and warnings. First, to the Grange Festival in Hampshire, where we might…
Carmakers are an undeniable voice in the Brexit debate
The voice of business has been all but silent in the Brexit debate ever since former Marks & Spencer boss…
The myth and menace of cryptocurrencies
‘So, Professor Shin, tell us what you really think about cryptocurrencies.’ I’m guessing that’s the brief the Bank for International…
For Pester of TSB, like Patterson of BT, the only way is exit
Should he stay or should he go — or will he already have gone by the time you read this?…
Let’s hope for a better, demerged, RBS when it’s back in private hands
At last the government has restarted the process of selling its stake in Royal Bank of Scotland. A first £2…
WH Smith, Britain’s worst high-street retailer, is ripe for disruption
I’m not in the least surprised to learn that WH Smith has been voted Britain’s worst high-street retailer in a…
Why Mark Carney’s successor is likely to be woman
If Ben Broadbent’s Daily Telegraph interview last week was the launch of a bid for the governorship of the Bank…
We might be plunging towards Brexit chaos – but at least everyone has jobs
It’s heartening to see an authentic British entrepreneur heading this year’s Sunday Times Rich List, the industrial-ist Jim Ratcliffe, who…
It was a hot weekend for takeover deals – and cycling
The bank holiday turned out to be a hot one, not least in the takeover arena. First, Shire Pharmaceutical accepted…
TSB’s new owners should have seen this computer catastrophe coming
The systems breakdown at TSB is not (yet) the worst UK bank computer cock-up of all time: that prize is…
Bank AGMs are an opportunity to shout about branch closures
The season of high-street banks’ annual general meetings is with us and I urge you to turn up and make…
I’m an optimist for trade despite the idiocies of politicians
I’m proud to be a member of the 661-year-old Company of Merchant Adventurers of the City of York, having qualified…
The US Treasury shows London how to cold-shoulder Putin’s cronies
A decade ago I commissioned an article about Vladimir Putin’s business cronies. Among other lines of enquiry, it sought to…
Call this US-China tit-for-tat a trade war?
‘Stocks plunge as China hits US goods with tariffs,’ said a headline after the long weekend, and the FTSE100 duly…
Sorry fishermen, but we were never going to win back control of our waters
My decision to vote Remain was driven in part by an exercise in which I tried to identify anyone close…