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Beyonce teams up with Topshop for athletic streetwear label: Beyonce has formed a business partnership with Topshop Owner Sir Philip Green to develop a range of athletic streetwear, which will launch next autumn.

Brent crude oil price drops below $86 in face of rising global supply: Goldman Sachs has forecast that brent crude could drop in price to $80 a barrel next year as it slashed its oil price estimates due to a global supply glut.

Barbecued beast: Salamanders can supposedly play with fire without getting burnt. That has not applied to oil explorer Salamander Energy, whose shares are two-thirds below their post-crisis peak at 93.5p, valuing the group at £242 million. Even that modest worth has external support – rival bid approaches from Ophir, another London-listed explorer, and a consortium led by Cepsa of Spain. A scarcity of new reserves and a low oil price has left the sector out of favour. The episode suggested cash may succeed when persuasion fails. That should be particularly true when your target is in talks to sell a 40% stake in its main asset – an oilfield in the Gulf of Thailand – to a Malaysian investor for $280 million. Slow progress with the disposal has fuelled rumours it could be in trouble. If Malaysia’s Sona Energy withdraws, Ophir or Cepsa may be able to buy the whole of Salamander for a price lower than the stake sale implies. Macquarie analysts suggest an offer could come at 103p per share, which would attribute no value for exploration upside.

Standard Chartered reported a drop in profits for the three months to September 30 and warned the pattern would remain throughout the second half, continuing a disappointing year for the bank and likely to raise the pressure on its chief executive. StanChart reported pre-tax profit of $1.53bn in the three months to September 30, versus $1.83bn the year before. Operating income rose 1 per cent year-on-year to $4.5bn. (FastFT)

Unilever hit by emerging market slowdown: Consumer goods giant Unilever is a bellwether for the global economy because, from toothpaste to washing up powder, it gives us a view into household spending from Boston to Beijing. The group’s sales figures gave a worrying insight into the state of the world economy, and sounded a warning for all investors. Sales growth across Unilever’s Asian, African, Middle Eastern and East European emerging markets was dragged down to 3.1%, less than half the 6.5% that Andrew Wood (from broker Bernstein) forecast. Revenue for the group as a whole fell by 2% to €12.2 billion (£9.63 billion) during the quarter. It wasn’t just Asia that disappointed. European sales looked awful. The company reported a 4.3% decline in sales, far worse than market consensus for a 1% decline. In particular, poor weather in July and August hit Ben and Jerry ice cream sales. But more worryingly the group reported deflationary pressure on prices across Europe. Sales volumes declined 1.7%, bur price deflation was 2.7% during the third quarter. The Americas was the only ray of hope with sales growth accelerating to 6.8% during the third quarter. Latin America was the main driver of growth in volume and prices. Unilever shares have struggled during the past 12 months as they have fallen by almost 9%, compared with the wider FTSE 100 that is up more than 4%. The fears over a sharp reversal in emerging market fortunes look overdone for now. However the shares are still richly priced for a company where growth is slowing. They trade on a price-earnings ratio of 20 times, falling to 18 times next year, and that looks at odds with a company that reported declining revenue and cash flow in the most recent annual results. Unilever is a quality company but not at these prices. Questor downgrades the shares to a hold. Unilever at £24.40-94p Questor Says ‘Hold’.

Sell Bloomsbury as profits halve: Harry Potter publisher Bloomsbury struggled to repeat the success of last year’s bestsellers with first half profits down by more than half. Sales of titles from the Adult division, including And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini and cookery books such as Tom Kerridge’s Best Ever Dishes, were down 17% to £19.3 million in the first six months ended August, from £23.2 million, on the same period last year. Children’s and educational books performed better, with sales up 8% to £11.2 million and academic publishing edged up 1% to £14 million in the first half. Bloomsbury has greatly reduced its exposure to the fickle consumer market and now generates more than half of the group’s annual sales, and 62% of the gross profit, from outside adult book publishing. Bloomsbury spent £9 million in cash beefing up the academic publishing arm in the first half of the year. This reduced net cash to £2.8 million at the end of August, down from £10 million at the end of February this year. The festive season is by far the most important trading period for Bloomsbury. The publisher has lined up some big titles including spin-off TV cookery book Paul Hollywood’s British Baking. But the indications from first half trading are not encouraging as group revenue fell to £46.6 million, from £49.2 million in the same period last year. Market Consensus is for pretax profits to increase 28% to £12.2 million for the year ended February, giving 13.2p in earnings per share. Given the soft consumer environment, that looks challenging. After recommending buying shares in May of last year at 118p, it looks prudent to take profits, given the gloomy economic outlook. Bloomsbury Publishing at 154.25p-6p Questor Says ‘Sell’.

Fall in oil prices is temporary, says Saudi petrochemicals chief arguing that while the decline may continue for a year or so, population growth will spur higher consumption and support prices in the longer term. The comments by Mohammed al-Mady, chief executive of the state-controlled petrochemicals producer Sabic, reported by Reuters, come as oil-dependent states in the Gulf grapple with demands to curtail public spending and speed up reform programmes. The price of oil has fallen by a quarter since the summer. Brent crude closed at $86.05 on Friday. (Financial Times)

BP's links with controversial Russian oil giant Rosneft likely to drag profits down nearly 20% to £1.8 billion: BP’s links with controversial Russian oil giant Rosneft are likely to have dragged its profits down nearly 20% to $2.9 billion (£1.8 billion) in the third quarter.

Sell TSB as mortgage market softens: TSB is winning plenty of new customers and profits are rising sharply, but the shares should be given a wide berth by long-term investors. The bank, which demerged from Lloyds and floated in June, has seen its shares steadily slide since then, down almost 10% from the first day’s trading. There were signs of hope in the most recent update for the three months ended September, as pretax profits increased to £33.1 million, up 28.8% on the same period last year. The bank also secured almost 10% of new current accounts opened during the period, increasing deposits by £500 million to £24.2 billion. TSB plans to sell more mortgages at local branches from January next year. The introduction of tighter affordability checks as part of the Mortgage Market Review in April slowed the pace of applications. The U.K. mortgage and personal loan market remains low growth. New mortgages are still half their 2007 peak and the U.K. housing market is showing signs of slowing down into the end of the year. That means the core market for TSB has little or no growth. There are other reasons the shares are looking exposed. Lloyds still owns 65% of TSB, and all those shares have to be sold into a falling stock market by the end of next year under EU rules. The profits are expected to fall sharply next year to £45.4 million for the year ended December 2015, giving 7.1p in earnings per share. That leaves the shares looking overpriced, trading on 37 times forecast 2015 earnings. A return to meaningful dividends is also a long way off with no dividend expected for the next three years. Investors are being asked to buy shares in a company with volatile profits, low growth, no dividend and exposed to house price falls and any new banking fines. TSB Banking Group at 230.3p. Questor says “Sell”.

Ophir to launch £275 million bid for rival oil explorer: A bidding war is set to break out over Salamander Energy, a London-listed oil explorer with operations in Asia.

Battersea fires up: Battersea Power Station Development Company kicks off a global sales push this week just as London’s estate agents are reporting a sales slowdown.

Banks give firepower for shot at Spirit Pub Company: A consortium including Bank of Ireland, Barclays and HSBC has provided debt funding to C&C Group to pursue a possible £1.4 billion takeover of Spirit Pub Company.

TSB SIGNS UP ONE IN 10 CUSTOMERS The UK retail bank spun out of Lloyds just over a year ago says it continues to beat its own expectations. The bank signed up one in 10 new current account customers in the last quarter. The bank's profits in the third quarter increased by 28.8pc to £33.1m

Thirty-one banks are set to participate in the Fed's 2015 stress tests, which will see how they can withstand pressures such as a spike in oil prices, a rise in the U.S. unemployment rate or an increase in risky corporate loans. The capital plans are due in January. Among the bank's that failed last year's tests are Citigroup (NYSE:C), HSBC (NYSE:HSBC), Santander (NYSE:SAN) and RBS (NYSE:RBS). Deutsche Bank (NYSE:DB) will participate for the first time, and has already felt pressure from the NY Fed, which has told it in a private letter that its regulatory reports were "low quality, inaccurate and unreliable". This Sunday, the ECB will release results for stress tests of 130 eurozone banks amid a deteriorating economic outlook for the region.

WASHINGTON (Alliance News) - US crude oil surged to end sharply higher on Thursday, boosted by reports that Saudi Arabia has cut its crude output to prop up prices, even as some strong earnings and upbeat data raised hopes the global economy would recover sooner than initially anticipated. Oil prices got a boost after reports emerged that Saudi Arabia -- the biggest crude oil exporter in the world, shipped 9.36 million barrels a day in September, down 328,000 barrels a day from August, excluding quantity in storage. The OPEC had earlier indicated the cartel will maintain its output without any cut in production, with some member countries preferring to slash prices in order to gain share of the market. Last week, oil prices had tumbled to the lowest level in nearly four years, amid concerns over excess supply globally, with OPEC member countries reportedly unwilling to cut crude production. After yesterday's sharp setback, oil started off on a sluggish note this morning and very nearly slipped below USD80 before staging a recovery. Light Sweet Crude Oil futures for December delivery, the most actively traded contract, surged USD1.57 or 1.9% to close at USD82.09 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange Thursday. Crude prices for December delivery scaled a high of USD82.37 a barrel intraday and a low of USD80.05. On Wednesday, crude oil futures ended down USD1.97 or 2.4% at USD80.52 a barrel, after official data showed US crude oil inventories to have surged much more than expected last week. Data released by the US Energy Information Administration on Wednesday showed US crude oil inventories to have risen by 7.1 million barrels to 377.7 million barrels in the week ended October 17, three times more than the expected increase of 2.7 million barrels.

Oct 23 (Reuters) - Britain's Spirit Pub Co Plc said it had rejected a takeover proposal from Irish cider maker C&C Group Plc. Spirit Pub, which is engaged in takeover talks with brewer and pub owner Greene King Plc, said C&C, the maker of Magners and Bulmers, had until Nov. 20 to announce a firm offer. Greene King has offered to buy Spirit Pub in a cash-and-stock deal valued at 723 million pounds ($1.16 billion). The details of the C&C proposal were not disclosed, but the Times newspaper reported that C&C was offering 115 pence per share in cash and stock, with at least a third in cash. This would top Greene King's offer of 109.5 pence per share, comprising 8 pence in cash and 0.1322 Greene King shares for every Spirit share. Spirit Pub and C&C representatives were not available for comment. A spokeswoman for Greene King declined to comment. Spirit Pub has a market value of just over 700 million pounds. (1 US dollar = 0.6238 British pound) (Reporting by Abhiram Nandakumar in Bangalore; Editing by Maju Samuel)

Foxtons has warned that profits will fall this year amid a "sharp slowing" in London's previously white-hot property market. The estate agent said sales volumes in the July to September quarter were lower than in the same period last year and that it expected the market to remain "constrained". "Although the longer term outlook for London property markets remains positive, the market is expected to continue to be constrained for some time due to political and economic uncertainty within the UK and Europe, tighter mortgage lending markets and mismatches between the price expectations of buyers and sellers," it said in a statement. It said it expected sales volumes in the second half of 2014 to be "significantly below levels during the same period last year", meaning full year adjusted ebitda (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) would be lower than the £49.6m it made in 2013. Foxtons said the £16.4m it made in property sale commissions in the July to September quarter was 7.8pc lower than in the same period a year ago, as a reduction in sales volumes more than offset price increases.

Foxtons Group Plc (FOXT.L) Announced in its interim management statement, that company’s performance in Q3 2014 was negatively impacted by a sharp and recent slowing of volumes in London property sale markets. The company’s turnover was £39.9 million, while its mortgage revenue grew by 13.8%. Additionally, the company remains debt free and generated £13.9 million of adjusted operating cash during Q3 representing an operating cash conversion rate of 98%.

Standard Life signs deal with Chinese bank giant: Standard Life has underlined its global ambitions by signing a Memorandum of Understanding with Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the world’s biggest bank.

Housebuilding at strongest levels since 2007, despite skills shortage: Housebuilding activity is at its strongest levels since 2007 as the recovery broadens out beyond London to the rest of the U.K., an industry body has reported.