The former chief executive of Barclays (BARC) has been cleared of wrongdoing after a judge ruled there was “insufficient evidence” to support the charge of conspiracy to commit fraud. The decision was made after a jury was initially discharged in April, although the case remains subject to strict reporting restrictions. It had been alleged by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) that John Varley concealed £322m of payments to the Qataris from other investors in exchange for multi-billion pound cash injections that saved the bank from a government bailout. When charges were first brought in 2017, Mr Varley was forced to resign from a number of high-profile board positions with immediate effect, including his role as senior independent director at mining giant Rio Tinto and a senior director at investment management behemoth BlackRock.
One of Britain’s best-known hedge fund managers has ramped up his bet against WeBuyAnyCar.com owner BCA Marketplace (BCA), despite a £1.9bn private equity buy-out bid. Crispin Odey said he believes last week’s approach for BCA from private equity firm TDR Capital will fail, and is positioning his fund to profit by building a short position in the car auction company’s shares. The hedge fund chief held a short position on 0.6% of BCA’s stock on Thursday when the company confirmed it was in “advanced discussions” with TDR about a 243p a share bid. News of the approach lifted BCA shares by almost a fifth 239p, with BCA’s board saying it would unanimously back a formal offer from TDR if one was made. However, Mr Odey is convinced a bid will stall and said he had increased his short position in BCA when he learnt of the approach. “BCA is expensive at that level and it’s a business that is likely to return 5%, maybe 11% or 12% at best, and that’s just not enough,” Mr Odey said.
Kier Group (KIE) bosses were awarded significant pay rises even as they oversaw the outsourcer’s descent into a crisis that has drawn comparisons with failed contractors Carillion and Interserve. Aggregate pay for Kier’s board members leapt by more than 70% over three years to 2018, from £3.3m to £5.6m. The figures cover both executive and non-executive directors, and include basic salary, bonus and pension payments, plus employee share scheme benefits and taxable benefits as well as windfalls from the contractor’s long-term incentive plan for its executive directors. Figures from Kier’s publicly available remuneration reports show that total board pay increased by almost a quarter in the year to June 30, renewing questions over whether pay on boards of UK listed companies is sufficiently linked to performance.
Questor: now is not the time to bail out of BT Group (BT.A) as it ends its cat-and-mouse with Ofcom. Questor share tip: improving relations with the regulator may allow the group to make better returns from its latest investment programme
