Financial Times Summary

Wed 29 Oct 2008

Barclays Capital
The Barclays president Bob Diamond's push with BarCap into various corners of the globe has seen the hiring of Lehman Brothers team in Israel that was not part of the Nomura purchase-he is keen to stress that there is no poaching involved. Lehman's Len Rosen and a team of 20 will report to London-based BarCap regional head of investment banking, John Winter. Barcap raided ABN Amro for a five strong M & A team this year, after its failed bid last year, and since the Lehmans collapse, has attempted to pick up top European Lehman staff that it did not acquire with its purchase of some of the US assets.
Standard Chartered
Standard Chartered has moved to ease concerns that a slowdown in Asia could dent its growth and force it to raise billions of pounds in fresh capital. Peter Sands, chief executive of the Asia-focussed bank, accepted the region was slowing but said gross domestic product growth rates in emerging markets were still likely to be faster than those in the US and UK before the credit crunch.
Lloyds
Lloyds TSB could double its existing £1bn estimate of cost savings from its rescue of HBOS as it integrates overlapping banking branches and IT systems, analysts said yesterday. Lloyds which is due next week to publish its prospectus to buy HBOS and for a capital raising, could also benefit from the negative goodwill involved in buying HBOS.
Nomura
Nomura brokerage lost Y72.9bn (£470m) in the second quarter as the slump hits its domestic business and its equity, credit and derivatives traders.
Morgan Stanley & Goldman Sachs
Share prices in Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs climbed steeply on Tuesday afternoon, erasing sharp drops in morning trading and bringing a positive end to a day of wild volatility on Wall Street. The two bank stocks, which have been whipsawed in recent weeks by concerns over the future of their business model, bounced back from a barrage of selling early on Tuesday. Morgan Stanley’s shares fell 26 per cent in less than half an hour on Tuesday morning before perking up in afternoon trading and finishing at $15.20, up 10.7 per cent for the day.
Deutsche Bank
Deutsche Bank's third-quarter results on Thursday may determine whether it maintains a rare record in this financial crisis: not having had to raise fresh capital. As bank after bank in the US and Europe has sought equity from existing and new investors - and after a series of governments has recapitalised the banking sector’s most fragile institutions - Deutsche has steadfastly resisted.
Schroders
Schroders, the fund manager, revealed falling profits and an exodus by retail investors from its asset management business on Tuesday, but watched its share price jump 5 per cent nevertheless. Investors took comfort from Schroders’ strong balance sheet, which holds £638m in cash or cash equivalents, in spite of a warning that revenues from the asset management arm would “inevitably decline further”.
Abbey
Abbey National, which is owned by Spain’s Santander continued to take a substantial chunk of new mortgage lending in the third quarter at the expense of weaker rivals that have withdrawn from the home loans market. Santander, which has taken over Alliance & Leicester and the savings business of Bradford & Bingley, said that attributable profit jumped 20 per cent to £737m ($1.18bn) in the first nine months, against £613m in the same period of 2007.
Gulf Bank
The crisis in Kuwait’s banking sector deepened on Tuesday as the chairman of Gulf Bank resigned over derivatives losses and Moody’s warned it could downgrade the bank, the country’s second biggest lender. Kutayba Al Ghanim replaced his brother Bassam Al Ghanim as chairman of Gulf Bank after depositors on Monday started to withdraw deposits from the stricken bank. It was the first known bank run in the region during the crisis and came despite the Kuwaiti central bank’s pledge to support the bank and guarantee all bank deposits in the country.
Aviva
Aviva insisted it had sufficient capital as it ruled itself out of the race for the "grossly overvalued" assets of American International Group and warned that a £1bn pay-out to policyholders could be scrapped.Andrew Moss, chief executive, said the UK's biggest assurer had had "no discussions with the Treasury around the capitalisation of insurance companies, "despite market movements wiping out £600m of Aviva's spare capital in less than a month,

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