Good morning. There’s a blood moon tonight, just so you know…
Departing Bank of England governor Mark Carney has warned that interest rates could still go lower(£), despite being at just 0.75%. Unless the economic picture improves all of a sudden, rates could be cut to practically zero(£).
The Law Commission’s proposed changes to leaseholds could cost landlords £16bn(£). But still campaigners claim it is just “tinkering”.
Galliard, meanwhile, is betting big on a London bounce, as it ponders the sale of its Old Kent Road scheme for £75m.
Trinova Real Estate wants to raise £200m for its maiden discretionary real estate fund, with returns expected in excess of 13%…
… While ICG-Longbow has reached a £500m first close for its latest senior debt vehicle with a £25m loan to Urban Splash’s Royal William Yard redevelopment in Plymouth.
Linkedin is inked in for the remaining 430,000 sq ft at IPUT’s €750m Wilton Park scheme in Dublin.
And SDL’s build-to-rent arm, Wise Living, has been given a £100m funding boost from Triple Point.
The Times (£) and the Guardian have the Ikea story that the FT covered yesterday…
… And roofing materials supplier SIG has issued another profit warning(£), as it becomes the embodiment of the decline in construction activity.
Meanwhile, the UK’s major supermarkets have been letting everyone know what they got for Christmas.
Tesco is crowing about a fifth consecutive year of growth(£), but at 0.1% that just shows how bad things have become…
M&S had a terrible Christmas for clothes(£), especially when it came to skinny jeans, but a pretty good helping of Christmas food(£). Actually, that sounds like my Christmas…
Waitrose did ok, with like-for-like sales up by 0.4%(£), but was dragged down by the poor performance of its sibling, John Lewis (who’s head has duly rolled(£)). Again, sounds like a pretty normal Christmas…
Fortnum & Mason, meanwhile, have had a splendid Christmas, darlings! Sales up 15%, thanks to yummy hampers and lashings of scrummy champagne(£). (We will have to wait to find out how it’s less refined cousins at Primark did.)
But no-one is sending Christmas cards, it seems, as Card Factory has issued a profit warning(£) after woeful Christmas trading. The condolences card is in the post.
And here is a handy roundup of how other retailers have fared.
But if the people weren’t shopping, they were still escaping to the pub over Christmas. Mitchells & Butlers report a record 6.5% lift in sales on the five key drinking days of Christmas, as people fled their families to seek solace in All Bar One. (Again, might’ve helped there.)
And good news for the Stonegate Pub Company, which has been told it can buy Ei for £3bn(£). If it sells 42 pubs.
Meanwhile Oxford plans to charge polluting cars(£) to come into the pretty city centre…
And there is more on just how much Harry and Meghan might lose if they leave the family firm (which is essentially a collection of property companies, when you think about it).
And finally, there is some good news for the retail sector. The number of new independent bookshops is on the rise, showing remarkable resilience and even growth when everything else on the high street looks awful. Still, at only two dozen openings last year it might not make that much difference…
