LONDON (Alliance News) - The following is a summary of top news stories Monday.
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COMPANIES
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Royal Dutch Shell said it has plugged and abandoned the Burger J exploration well in the Chukchi Sea in Alaska and said it will stop further exploration activity in the Alaska region for the foreseeable future. The oil and gas major said the well was drilled to a total depth of 6,800 feet over the summer within a basin which had demonstrated a number of the key features of a major petroleum basin and which is substantially under-explored. But Shell said that while it found indications of oil and gas in the Burger J Well, these were not sufficient to pursue further exploration activity at the prospect and, therefore, the well has been plugged and abandoned. Shell said it will now cease further exploration activity in offshore Alaska for the foreseeable future, given the result from the Burger J well, the high costs associated with the project and the "unpredictable federal regulatory environment in offshore Alaska".
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Vodafone Group said its talks with US cable company Liberty Global have terminated. The mobile phone company had confirmed talks with Liberty Global in early June over a potential exchange of some assets between the two. Earlier this month Bloomberg reported that Liberty Global's owner John Malone indicated that a deal between his company and Vodafone looked unlikely, saying that there had not yet been a structure proposed for a deal that he would take to his shareholders.
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Belgian brewer Anheuser-Busch InBev could bid GBP70 billion for SABMiller this week, the Sunday Times reported. Over recent days the world's two biggest brewers have begun "friendly" talks. The discussions continued into Saturday, with AB InBev expected to make a firm opening offer within days - possibly as soon as Monday morning, the newspaper said.
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The Swiss competition regulator confirmed it has opened an investigation into the possible manipulation of precious metals markets by several major banks, Reuters reported. The WEKO watchdog is understood to have opened probes into possible collusion by UBS, Julius Baer Group, Deutsche Bank, HSBC Holdings, Barclays, Morgan Stanley and Mitsui Group.
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Barclays is in preliminary talks with potential buyers of its Brazilian business as part of a wider restructuring, Sky News reported citing people familiar with the matter. The report indicated that Barclays executives have sanctioned a process to explore an exit from parts of its remaining investment banking operations in the stuttering Latin American economy. Barclays has in recent weeks struck a deal to offload retail banking operations in Portugal, and is exploring a similar exit in Italy.
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The Royal Bank of Scotland Group is facing a probe by regulators into whether it falsified customer records, The Times reported. The bank has been accused of editing customer emails, call transcripts, and how it presented its "central file" record of correspondence, which may have resulted in it breaching data protection laws, according to the newspaper.
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Tesco is close to scrapping a deal to sell its Dunnhumby customer data business and is now shifting its attention to the sale of its operations in central and eastern Europe, The Sunday Times reported. Senior City sources told the newspaper that WPP, the advertising and marketing group and the last bidder left in the troubled auction of Dunnhumby, is struggling to agree a price for the business. The Sunday Times, citing other sources, said Tesco has held preliminary talks with private equity houses about the sale of its Polish, Hungarian, Czech and Slovakian business, which could be worth around GBP3 billion.
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Pennon Group said it is on track to hit its targets for the full year and is well-positioned for the future as its recycling and waste management business establishes its new energy recovery business. The utility infrastructure company's waste management business, Viridor, is establishing energy recovery facilities business which aims to transform waste into a resource.
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MARKETS
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UK indices were trading lower, with SABMiller leading the FTSE 100 amid takeover speculation, while Glencore led decliners, setting another new record low.
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FTSE 100: down 1.3% at 6,032.32
FTSE 250: down 0.5% at 16,712.07
AIM ALL-SHARE: down 0.3% at 730.46
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GBP: up at USD1.5218
EUR: down at USD1.1187
GOLD: down at USD1137.65 per ounce
OIL (Brent): down at USD47.92 a barrel
(changes since end of previous GMT day)
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ECONOMICS AND GENERAL
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England/Wales house price growth eased to a 21-month low in August, data from Land Registry showed. House prices advanced 4.2% year-on-year in August, which was the slowest growth since November 2013, when it climbed 3.5%. In July, house prices rose 4.6% and by 4.9% in June. Month-on-month, house prices grew only 0.5% in August, slower than the 1.7% increase seen in July. The average house price in England and Wales totaled GBP184,682.
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China's industrial profits declined in August as product prices continued to decrease, the National Bureau of Statistics reported. Industrial profits fell 8.8% in August from a year ago, following a 2.9% drop in July. Falling product prices as well, as lower return on investment, weighed on industrial profits. During January to August, industrial profits decreased 1.9% from the corresponding period of last year.
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The European Commission said the Russian Federation and Ukraine have agreed on the terms of gas deliveries to Ukraine for the upcoming winter period from October 1 until the end of March 2016. The agreement follows several rounds of trilateral and bilateral negotiations over the past several months.
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US President Barack Obama urged global mobilization to meet a set of UN development goals, saying "cynicism is our enemy," at the ongoing UN summit on development Sunday. Obama and other leaders spoke at the United Nations on the third and final day of the summit discussing a set of global development goals that were officially adopted on Friday and are to be met over the next 15 years. Obama vowed to work towards meeting the goals in the US and abroad during his time in office and beyond.
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US Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner said he will step down to avoid a looming challenge from conservative members of his caucus that could damage his Republican Party and the US Congress. Boehner said that he would resign from Congress on October 30 to prevent "prolonged leadership turmoil." Boehner, who will also vacate his House seat, said he had long been considering retirement and was not quitting out of fear of losing a leadership fight.
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A coalition of separatists who promised independence for the Spanish region of Catalonia emerged as victors in parliamentary elections Sunday. With 99% of the votes counted, the separatist alliance led by Catalan leader Artur Mas captured 72 seats of the 135 seats up for grabs in Catalonia's parliament. But while the alliance won an absolute majority in parliament, it did not win the majority of votes cast, taking 47.8%.
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FIFA president Joseph Blatter and European supremo Michel Platini are under investigation by the ruling body's ethics committee over a payment from 2011 revealed in a Swiss criminal investigation, dpa learnt on Sunday. The committee is looking into a "disloyal payment" of CHF2 million Platini received from FIFA in 2011 for work done between 1999 and 2002. The issue was revealed in a statement from Switzerland's Attorney General on Friday in which the start of a criminal investigation against Blatter was announced. Apart from the payment, the probe involves a contract, likely on TV rights, with the Caribbean football union from 2005.
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By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com; @ArvindBhunjun
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