Hello and welcome to our daily digest of business, financial and economic news from around Scotland.1. More funding is needed to help grow the scale of businesses in Scotland’s life sciences sector, according to one of the first minister’s advisers.Dr Poonam Malik, who chairs Humza Yousaf’s new deal for business group alongside Màiri McAllan, the wellbeing economy secretary, told a meeting in Aberdeen that there was a need to win a bigger share of the UK financing pot.Malik, who is also head of investments at the University of Strathclyde and chairwoman of Microplate Dx, a medical technology company, praised the work of Scottish Enterprise to fund start-up and early-stage companies. However, she highlighted a need to provide further help in getting firms

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Glasgow revamp to breathe life back into city centre

The Bank of England has kept interest rates on hold for the fifth meeting in a row, but signalled that the economy is “moving in the right direction” to allow for cuts to borrowing costs.Members of the nine-strong monetary policy committee (MPC), the group tasked with setting interest rates in the UK, voted 8-1 in favour of keeping the base rate at 5.25 per cent, a 16-year high.However, two members of the MPC who had consistently voted for a rise in interest rates favoured a hold at this meeting, suggesting that the group is near to agreeing that a reduction in borrowing costs is appropriate.Catherine Mann and Jonathan Haskel, both external members of the MPC, voted to leave the base rate unchanged,

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Bank of England holds interest rates again —  when will they be cut?

The British Business Bank has selected the nine fund managers that will invest a £660 million “Northern Powerhouse” fund into growth companies across the north of England.They include Praetura Ventures in the northwest, which will invest up to £5 million in equity per deal, Mercia in Yorkshire and the Humber, which can provide debt of up to £2 million and equity investment of up to £5 million, and Maven Capital Partners, managing equity deals of up to £5 million in the northeast.The initiative is designed to plug a gap in funding for growth companies in these regions, with private money crowded into deals backed by taxpayers and the deal flow supporting the expansion of the professional advisory community outside London. The British Business

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Managers chosen to invest £660m fund in north of England

The Office for National Statistics has spent £24.1 million on overhauling how it measures trends in the UK jobs market, figures have revealed.The UK statistics agency has spent an average of £8 million a year on this since 2021-22, according to a response to a freedom of information request.A sharp fall in response rates to its long-standing monthly labour force survey — down to a low of 12.7 per cent in the third quarter of last year from nearly 50 per cent a decade ago — forced the statistics agency to suspend its publication. Since 2021-22, it has allocated about 1 per cent of its gross spending on revamping its labour market data. It had used a mixture of alternative data sources, such

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ONS spent £24 million on overhaul of jobs market data-gathering

Inflation slid faster than expected to its lowest level in two and a half years last month, strengthening hopes that the Bank of England will cut interest rates in the coming months, official figures showed.The rate of price growth in the UK economy fell to 3.4 per cent in February from 4 per cent in the previous month, according to the Office for National Statistics. Inflation is now running at its slowest pace since September 2021.City analysts and the Bank of England had anticipated the rate to decline to 3.5 per cent. Inflation peaked at 11.1 per cent in October 2022, lifted by higher energy prices after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, said that the larger-than-forecasted fall showed that

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UK inflation falls to 3.4% as Bank of England mulls interest rate cut

Fund managers are feeling the most optimistic about the outlook for the global economy than they have in two years, and most believe that central banks will bring inflation back to target without triggering a recession.The Bank of America’s latest survey of fund managers around the world found that 62 per cent of respondents expected a “soft landing”, with the global economy avoiding recession and a sharp rise in unemployment as inflation falls back to the banks’ common 2 per cent target.Concerns about growth slowing down or the economy contracting as a result of tight financial conditions, a scenario known as a “hard landing”, receded, with 11 per cent of fund managers expecting one, compared with 30 per cent in October.

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Fund managers at their most bullish for years over global growth

The chancellor has hinted at an autumn election as he suggested that it would give the government time to cut taxes before a vote.In the latest sign that Rishi Sunak will delay going to the polls until the autumn, Jeremy Hunt volunteered October as a possible date and said he planned on a spending review soon afterwards.Hunt warned of “social unrest” stemming from high levels of immigration, suggesting that it was not clear that importing large numbers of workers improved living standards for ordinary families.He indicated that he wanted to increase defence spending but said reforms to welfare were needed to stop the benefits system “parking people outside the world of work”.Last week Sunak ruled out holding a general election on

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Jeremy Hunt hints that general election will take place in October

Awards for the worst ever corporate deal typically go to AOL/Time Warner, the dotcom blow-up once priced at $164 billion. Or, if not that, Bank of America’s $4 billion purchase of mortgage lender Countrywide that left it with a $40 billion bill once the roof came off in the financial crisis. Or, maybe, Hewlett Packard’s $11 billion purchase of Autonomy, now seeing its ex-boss Mike Lynch fight to stay out of a US clink. Yet shouldn’t there also be a place in this illustrious gallery for Rakesh Kapoor’s baby milk buy — February 2017’s $16.6 billion acquisition of America’s Mead Johnson Nutrition? The swansong deal of the former Reckitt boss has proved an absolute howler. His successor Laxman Narasimhan wrote it down by £8.5 billion,

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Reckitt baby milk saga is still turning sour

China’s economy is gradually building momentum, according to official figures which suggest that consumer spending and factory output rose over the last month.Retail sales rose by 5.5 per cent over the year to February, in line with expectations, albeit a slowdown from over 7 per cent in the previous month. However, industrial production increased by 7 per cent over the same period, well above analyst forecasts and the steepest increase in two years.Consumption was focused on electronic goods, such as mobile phones, while demand for discretionary products such as clothing and jewellery was weak. The eight-day Lunar New Year holiday in February also boosted spending.The latest figures, from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), suggest that growth is gathering pace in the

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Jump in China’s industrial production buoys recovery hopes

This month some of Britain’s biggest banks were placed on alert over 800 apparently rogue filings with Companies House that were causing chaos at a number of the country’s leading institutions, including Sainsbury’s and the Bank of England.UK Finance, the banking trade association, sent out an urgent notice to its members saying that Companies House documents appeared to show that financial liabilities relating to 190 different companies had been wrongly discharged.Speculation quickly mounted as to who was behind the rogue filings and their aim. Industry executives and experts speculated that they may have been the product of a cyberattack or part of a sophisticated fraud. However, it was the work of one individual, who in the space of one day was able to

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How one ‘Dudeist priest’ caused chaos with 800 rogue Companies House filings

As rate-setters at the Bank of England prepare to make their latest interest rate decision this Thursday, a statistical cloud is hanging over their ability to accurately measure what is going on in the economy.Andrew Bailey, governor of the Bank, voiced his concerns last week that the monetary policy committee was flying partially blind due to measurement errors that have beset the UK’s official labour market survey over the past six months. “I wish we knew more exactly what our unemployment number was in the UK,” Bailey told an audience of fellow central bankers in Rome on Wednesday. A lack of clarity over just how much the jobs market has weakened in response to the Bank raising interest rates to a 16-year high of

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Unreliable jobs data leaves Bank flying blind on rate cuts

Michael Gove The Govemeister here, boss. Boyz night! Are we still on for dinner chez vous? It’s asparagus season!Rishi Sunak Probably not. I’m still stuck on the M25Gove But Chequers is 40 miles away. I thought the Rishinator would be going by helicopterSunak You told me not to! And please don’t try to do cool nicknamesGove Why would I, your loyal servant, tell you, our great leader, to travel that far by land? Sunak Well Hunt told me not to, then. He said we might need to hand back the £10 million we took from Frank bloody Hester when we didn’t know he was racist, and we’ll definitely need to hand back the extra £5 million we’ve taken from Frank bloody

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The cabinet discusses what to do with Frank Hester’s money*