Daily Finance Update

Tue 9 Jun 2009

Brown fights off Labour rebels

Gordon Brown routed an attempted coup to remove him as Britain’s prime minister on Monday night, as party heavyweights rallied behind him after a week of Labour bloodletting, ministerial resignations and poll defeats.
In a tense behind-closed-doors meeting at Westminster, Mr Brown faced down his critics, promising to learn from his mistakes and to produce decisive policies to clean up politics and rebuild the economy.

Citi confirms plan to raise $33bn

Citigroup on Monday confirmed it would launch a long-awaited $33bn capital raising this week in a move aimed at allaying investors’ fears over the offering and concerns over mounting regulatory pressure.
The announcement came as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, one of Citi’s regulators, continued to press the bank to replace Vikram Pandit, Citi’s chief executive, and his closest lieutenants, according to people close to the situation.

BlackRock looks set to seal the acquisition of Barclays Global Investors and become the world’s biggest money manager by Wednesday according to people close to the talks.
The US group plans to pay Barclays $12bn-$13bn (£7.5bn-£8.1bn) for BGI – half in cash and half in shares – to create a group with more than $3,000bn in assets under management, half as much again as nearest rivals, such State Street, Allianz and Fidelity.

Bank group Lloyds axes 985 staff

Lloyds Banking Group is to cut 985 jobs over the next two years, the company has confirmed.
The jobs will go at a business offering car finance, which a review found was "no longer financially viable". The banking group, which is 43% owned by the government, said 200 jobs in Speke, Merseyside, could be affected, along with 340 jobs in Chester.
The union Unite said it was in talks with Lloyds and would oppose any compulsory redundancies. Lloyds said it hopes as many jobs as possible will go by natural turnover.

Setanta 'is on brink of collapse'

Setanta faces administration "within days" unless backers provide more funds to pay £30m it owes to the English Premier League, reports suggest.

The broadcaster has already failed to pay the Scottish Premier League £3m it owes in television rights money.
Setanta, which also shows cricket, golf and rugby union, has about 1.2m subscribers, but is losing up to £100m a year, analysts say.
Deloitte is set to step in to run the firm if it goes into administration

US banks submit funding plans

The 10 banks ordered by regulators to raise extra funds have developed sufficient plans to strengthen their finances, the Federal Reserve says.
The banks were subjected to stress tests in May that found they needed additional capital to cope if the recession worsened.
The Fed said it would ensure the programmes are implemented effectively.
The government is also expected to announce this week which US banks will be able to repay bail-out funds.