Barclays Share News (BARC)

The Sunday Telegraph understands Sir Stelios, who with his family owns 36 per cent of easyJet´s shares, is to vote against the re-election of Sir Mike Rake, the Chairman, as well as against the board's remuneration report. In addition, he will abstain against all 18 other resolutions on matters such as the appointment of auditors and payment of the dividend at the company's annual general meeting (AGM) on February 21st. The Greek-Cypriot entrepreneur is concerned that the company will place a large order for a fleet of more fuel-efficient aircraft, which he claims will be to the detriment of shareholders. Last month, Sir Stelios and his family sold more than 5m pounds worth of shares in a warning that they will sell the rest of their holding if easyJet places such an order.The owner of Britain's biggest private hospital chain is racing to secure a financial lifeline as the company faces an autumn deadline to repay billions of pounds of loans. General Healthcare Group (GHG), which trades as BMI Hospitals, is in crisis talks with its lenders over 2bn pounds of debt that falls due in October. GHG runs 72 hospitals nationwide, treating more than 1m patients a year in partnership with the NHS and private healthcare providers such as Bupa. The scale of the company's indebtedness recalls the crisis that hit Southern Cross, once Britain's biggest care homes operator with 31,000 elderly residents, writes The Sunday Times.Man Group, the troubled hedge fund that started life supplying rum to the Royal Navy in the 1780s, has asked KPMG to sort out its governance after a shareholder revolt last year. The Big Four accountant has recently been appointed as Man's internal auditor, which means that it assesses, monitors and measures risks to a business beyond financial numbers, such as reputational issues. Man suffered a protest vote of 15 per cent over executive pay last May, while nearly a third of investors said no to the re-election of non-executive Alison Carnwath, who is expected to leave later this year to acknowledge shareholder concerns that she has stayed on the board too long to be considered independent, according to The Independent on Sunday. German energy giant RWE has warned it will significantly scale back its investment in Britain unless the Government provides "desperately needed" certainty over energy policy. The company, which owns supplier npower, pumped more than 3bn pounds into UK energy infrastructure over the past three years - some 60% of its European investment and "more than any other energy company". In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Paul Massara, npower chief executive and RWE's UK representative, said: "I doubt that we will be investing the kind of money we have been investing unless there are propositions which attract not only us but also enable other capital lenders to come into the market place," The Sunday Telegraph explains.The chairman of Bumi has filed a complaint with the City of London Police over the "malicious and targeted" hacking of his email, marking another dramatic turn in the battle for control of the miner. Nat Rothschild, 41, founded Bumi two years ago when he merged a London-listed cash shell with coalmines controlled by Indonesia's powerful Bakrie family. The shares have since lost 60% of their value after a bitter falling out between the venture's partners and allegations that up to $1bn (£630m) has gone missing. Rothschild resigned last year but has called a February 21st shareholder meeting to sack 12 of 14 directors and reinstate himself to the board. The company, led by Samin Tan, Bumi's billionaire chairman, has urged investors to vote down the coup, The Sunday Times says.In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph GlaxoSmithKline's Chief Executive, Sir Andrew Witty, says that the company´s future is about sales in emerging markets and explains why the company's Ribena and Lucozade brands may be sold. Witty also highlights how the firm has come through its patent cliff without an acquisition and been able to come out the other side essentially still a very big company with a very healthy economic profile. "We're a much more balanced business now. Emerging markets and Japan, the consumer business and vaccines have really grown in importance," he claims. Worth pointing out, the company´s boss indicates how he wants to bring together strong pharmacy distribution and brand value in emerging markets with products such as Horlicks, pain reliever Panadol and toothpaste brand Sensodyne. He also speaks in detail regarding how the entire R&D process at the firm has been revamped. Lastly, he sets out the reasons why he believes that the outlook for Europe is poor, with Europe's governments expected to rein in spending on drugs.The Sunday Telegraph reveals that Antony Jenkins, who will deliver the outcome of Barclays´s strategic review on Tuesday, will say the bank will shut its structured capital markets (SCM) business. In the mid-2000s the unit made profits of as much as £1bn in a single year and became synonymous with Barclays's aggressive investment banking culture under the stewardship of Bob Diamond, Mr Jenkins' predecessor as Chief Executive. The unit, previously run by Barclays's highest-paid banker, Roger Jenkins, who was paid as much as £40m a year as a result of SCM's success, gave advice to large companies on how to avoid tax. SCM was responsible for building a network of almost 300 offshore tax-haven subsidiaries which meant Barclays itself paid only £113m of UK corporation tax in 2009, despite profits of £4.6bn.One of Britain's biggest multinationals, whose brands include Silver Spoon sugar, Twinings Tea and Kingsmill bread, is avoiding paying millions of pounds of tax in an African state blighted by malnutrition, a year-long investigation revealed on Sunday. The Zambian sugar-producing subsidiary of Associated British Foods, a FTSE100 company, contributed virtually no corporation tax to the state's exchequer between 2007 and 2012, and none at all for two of those years. The firm, Zambia Sugar, has recently posted record pre-tax profits and its huge plantation is increasing its capacity to produce more sugar for markets in Europe and Africa. Yet it paid less than 0.5% of its $123m pre-tax profits in corporation tax between 2007 and 2012, The Observer on Sunday reports. Jaguar Land Rover will invest a total of almost £5bn this year and next in technology and product development as it reports a rise in sales and further international expansion for the third quarter. The British luxury car maker will reveal a solid performance for the three months to the end of December on Thursday, with retail sales of 88,658 vehicles and wholesale sales of 94,828 vehicles, both up from the same period a year earlier. JLR said last month that profit margins over the quarter were likely to be "slightly lower" than recent periods, partly because its relatively cheaper Evoque model accounted for a greater proportion of the sales mix and because of exchange rate changes, The Sunday Telegraph writes.Ab