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LONDON, Jan 15 (Reuters) - British house prices rose at their slowest annual pace since May 2013 at the end of last year, as tighter lending rules and a looming national election weighed on buyer demand, an industry body said on Thursday. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) said its monthly house price balance sank to +11 in December from +13 a month before. The index measures surveyors' assessment of whether house prices have risen or fallen on an annual basis over the previous three months. Britain's housing market has been slowing since mid-2014, when regulators required banks to make closer checks on whether borrowers would still be able to afford mortgage repayments if interest rates rise sharply. Mortgage lender Halifax said last week that house prices in the fourth quarter of 2014 were up 7.8 percent on the year, down from a peak of 10.2 percent in July. RICS said that as well as tighter lending rules, the national election due on May 7 was also causing both buyers and sellers to pause for thought. "With new instructions still flat at a headline level as has been the case for most of the last year it seems implausible that the dip in demand will result in very much of a decline in house prices," said RICS chief economist Simon Rubinsohn. RICS said its members continued to expect that a cut in property transaction tax for homes costing under 937,000 pounds announced by finance minister George Osborne in December would boost prices and sales by 2-5 percent in 2015 as a whole. But prices and volumes were expected to fall in London, as expensive homes would be subject to higher taxation, RICS said. RICS reported in November that house prices in London fell at their fastest rate since October 2010, and the pace of decline eased only slightly in December. (Reporting by David Milliken; Editing by Catherine Evans)

Bank of England governor Mark Carney has warned that the UK is in danger of fallng into deflation after figures showed that consumer prices rose at their lowest annual rate in over 14 years in December, writes The Telegraph. In interviews with the BBC and ITV, Carney said inflation is expected to "continue to drift down in the coming months" and deflation was now "possible

Following updates from several housebuilders since the start of the year, Barratt Developments followed suit and reported a strong performance in the six months to the end of December, saying it was on track for another "significant improvement" in its financial performance for the full year. The FTSE 250 housebuilder, which said the 90 new sites it was poised to open would give it the highest average number of developments for six years, stepped up the total number of completions 12.5% to 6,971 and its total average selling price rose 8.4% to £229,000 per house

Set-top maker signals growth: TV set-top maker Pace announced that it boosted profit projections for 2014, in a sign that it was continuing to shore up its position in the video and digital entertainment world.

London market cools after 2014 housing boom: London’s house prices led last year’s nation-wide boom, figures released by the Office for National Statistics revealed.

Goldman sees oil at $40 to cap U.S. shale: Oil hit its lowest price for nearly six years as Goldman Sachs warned it would have to slide towards $40 a barrel to tackle the global supply glut

The People's Operator is overvalued: The People’s Operator (TPO) is not the catchiest name for a mobile phone company, and that isn’t a great sign for a business that is trying to expand through social media by word of mouth alone. The company has eschewed the usual practice of heavy advertising on TV and radio, and instead it places adverts on the websites of charities and hopes people will spread the word, or three words in this case. The business has received high profile backing by Jimmy Wales, the Founder of Wikipedia, and recently raised £20 million of new money on Aim last month. The listing valued the company at £100 million and Mr Wales told Questor he has ambitious plans to grow into a global giant. That forecast is dependent on a successful expansion into the United States which is planned for the spring. An agreement has already been signed with American telecom giant Sprint. TPO is a mobile virtual network operator (mvno) that sells sim cards on its website and piggybacks on EE’s mobile infrastructure. The company said it had about 14,000 subscribers at the end of last year, more than double the 5,800 it had six months earlier. By comparison the mvno business of Phones 4U that had about 85,000 subscribers was recently bought by EE for around £5 million. This was admittedly a distressed sale out of administration and the Phones 4U business wasn’t growing as quickly, but on Questor’s rough estimates using subscriber numbers then TPO is worth less than £1 million, or 1.3p per share. House broker finnCap disagrees and given the rapid growth profile has placed a 250p target price on the shares as it expects revenue of £98 million and pretax profits of £17.1 million by the end of 2016. Questor is not convinced. The People’s Operator at 137.75p unch Questor Says ‘Avoid’.

Hold Mondi as defensive shares defy downturn: Mondi was one of the leading shares in the U.K.’s blue chip index, with investors buying into the positive outlook for the packaging group as prices for its products rise and energy costs fall. The FTSE 100-listed, Africa-based packaging giant saw its shares gain 2.3% after strong demand and steady prices across the sector were identified in a Credit Suisse research note. The company will also enjoy the benefit from falling energy costs at its factories across Europe. The packaging sector is one that is often overlooked by investors but it supplies some of the most stable companies in the world, such as Procter & Gamble, Nestle and Unilever. These companies need packaging for consumer goods such as washing powder, toothpaste and tinned goods on supermarket shelves. In the past four years Mondi has increased profits and more than tripled the dividend. Analysts from Credit Suisse are expecting pretax profit to increase to €695 million, giving earnings per share of 95 cents and a dividend of 30 cents in next week’s results. What’s more, they expect underlying operating profits, earnings and dividend to increase to €700 million, 113 cents and 45 cents respectively in the year ahead. Over the past 10 years, Mondi has spent €3 billion upgrading and modernising its paper mills, hence the group now has a portfolio of well-invested low-cost mills in emerging economies. More than half of Mondi’s sales come from emerging economies such as Russia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Poland and South Africa, where Mondi is benefiting from higher growth in demand for paper, compared to depressed Western European markets. The company is enjoying strong pricing for its products and falling costs. But with shares once again moving toward record highs of £11.23, we downgrade to a hold. Mondi at £10.67+18p Questor Says ‘Hold’.

House price rises for Britain’s forgotten regions: Areas of Britain, such as Northern Ireland and the North East, that were left behind in the recent London-led housing market recovery, enjoyed a resurgence in house price rises in November.

Fears of bubble rise as property investment volumes hit record: An annual survey of European investors’ intentions found that for the first time since the financial crisis property investors were becoming concerned that a bubble might be developing

China’s oil imports climb above 7 million barrels a day for first time: China’s crude oil imports rose above 7 million barrels per day for the first time in December, reaching record levels as plunging international prices allowed the world’s largest importer to fill strategic and commercial reserves.

Sainsbury’s axes 500 back-office jobs: Up to 500 jobs are to be cut by J Sainsbury, despite figures showing that the supermarket chain has leapfrogged Asda to become Britain’s second-largest food retailer for the first time in 11 years.

Oil price ‘to fall to $20’ as Gulf states battle shale drillers in U.S.: Oil traders are betting that crude prices will hit a 20-year low of $20 a barrel as prices fell again and as Gulf producers stood firm on their plan to turn the screws on shale drillers in the United States.

UK house price index registered a rise in November On an annual basis, the house price index registered a rise of 10.00% in the UK, in November. The house price index had climbed 10.40% in the previous month.

At 0430GMT today, Brent crude oil one month futures contract is trading 0.79% or $0.37 lower at $46.22 per barrel ahead of the Energy Information Administration weekly oil stockpiles data to be released later today. Yesterday, the contract declined 1.77% or $0.84, to settle at $46.59 per barrel, after UAE’s Energy Minister stated that OPEC would continue to expand output, irrespective of current oil prices. Moreover, the American Petroleum Institute announced that crude oil inventories rose 3.9 million barrels during the last week, pressurising the commodity further.

While the collapse in crude should lower energy costs and stimulate economies, it also risks creating damaging deflationary pressures that prompt consumers and businesses to shelve spending decisions and weaken growth. Borrowing costs had already tumbled for governments as the prospect of exceptionally low inflation, driven by low oil prices, loomed over world economies. (FT)

Copper prices hit a five-year low and oil prices continued to slide today, highlighting the debate over the benefits of low oil prices just one day after the World Bank cut its forecast for world growth. (FT)

Reliable dividend stock I guess

According to The Times, private-equity firm Apax has appointed Deutsche Bank and Bank of America Merrill Lynch to advise a potential float of Auto Trader, the UK's largest website for second-hand car sales.

Google rents more office space at King’s Cross after campus delay: Google has signed a deal to let more space in a building at King’s Cross after deciding to redraw plans for new £650 million headquarters at the central London site.