Below are the key morning press headlines, featuring the The Times, The Telegraph, The Daily Mail & more - see the full Press section here.
Unresolved issues have prevented the clearance of the £4 billion takeover of Cobham (COB) by an American private equity firm. On the day that parliament was dissolved, Andrea Leadsom, the business secretary, indicated that she had been unable to make up her mind whether to intervene in Advent International’s takeover of Cobham in a deal already agreed by the British company’s shareholders. The minister is sitting on a report from the Competition and Markets Authority into the proposed takeover that was filed a week ago. She has yet to divulge the contents of that report.
The government pressured Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) to foreclose on business customers and acquire their properties, according to the executive who ran the bank’s disgraced restructuring unit. Derek Sach, former head of RBS’s Global Restructuring Group, told the High Court yesterday that a Treasury agency had tried to influence many of the decisions taken by the division. In his first public appearance in five years, Mr Sach, 71, said that the government’s asset protection agency, which insured RBS’s toxic loans after the financial crisis struck, had no interest in customers and would have preferred the bank to have “flogged” businesses to secure the government’s objectives.
Dixons Carphone (DC.) has been rebuked by the competition watchdog after mystery shoppers said that the electrical retailer had misled them on product warranties. Alex Baldock, Dixons Carphone’s chief executive, has made boosting the retailer’s financial division by increasing its customer credit offer a key part of his revival efforts. “Paying by instalment also facilitates the add-on sale of other services. We see higher warranty, insurance, protection and repair product penetration going along with credit customers than we do with cash,” the company said in June. However, Dixons Carphone has been reprimanded by the Competition and Markets Authority, which said that a quarter of staff at Currys could not provide accurate information on its warranties.
The £2.6 billion takeover of Inmarsat (ISAT) has been cast into doubt after a trio of hedge funds staged a late attempt to squeeze more cash from the buyer. Oaktree Capital, a Los Angeles-based fund with 2.8% of the satellite operator, said that the deal should be delayed by a month so that the board could renegotiate. Its demand won the backing of Rubric Capital and Kite Lake, with respective holdings of 2.2% and 3.8%. Inmarsat agreed in March to be bought by a consortium of investors including Warburg Pincus and Apax Partners. The acquisition has been approved by shareholders and regulators and is scheduled to be rubber-stamped in the High Court next week.
At least three Ryanair Boeing 737s have been grounded due to cracks between the wing and fuselage but this was not disclosed to the public, the Guardian can reveal. The budget Irish airline is the latest to be affected by faults in the “pickle fork” structure, which has sparked an urgent grounding of 50 planes globally since 3 October. While other airlines, such as Australia’s Qantas and America’s Southwest, have disclosed the number of their planes affected by the cracks, Ryanair Holdings (RYA) – which operates the largest fleet of 737s in Europe – has previously refused to confirm how many of its planes have been affected.
Strong sales at its store in Brooklyn, New York, have given Associated British Foods (ABF) the confidence to press ahead with an expansion programme for its Primark fashion chain in the United States. Primark’s sales rose by 4.2% to £7.9 billion in the year to September 14, while operating profits increased by 8%. “The positive reception by US consumers to Primark, combined with our profitable store model, gives us confidence for further expansion,” George Weston, 55, ABF’s chief executive, said. He added that rather than claiming to have cracked the notoriously difficult American market, the retailer had “earned the right to keep going in the US.”
Shares in Trainline Plc (TRN) skidded lower after the cost of the travel booking firm’s stock market float pushed it £89million into the red. Stock dipped after it revealed its listing on the London Stock Exchange resulted in a £91.5million bill. This was made up of about £21.1million in ‘transaction costs’, which included adviser fees and staff bonuses, and around £70.4million in one-off expenses. Without the steep bill, Trainline said that it would have booked a £2million profit for the six months to August 31. That was after ticket sales rose to more than £1.8billion, up from £1.5billion during the same period a year ago. Clare Gilmartin, 44, the firm’s chief executive, said the strong growth in ticket sales was partly due to more people buying via their mobiles.
The impact of America’s crackdown on vaping was laid bare yesterday when Imperial Brands (IMB) announced a 26.5% slide in annual US revenues from next-generation products. The decline in the United States in the year to September to £111 million — amid bans by some American states and by Walmart, the giant retailer — was in stark contrast with an increase in sales of vaping products of more than 100% to £131 million in Europe. Worldwide growth in next-generation products slowed to 52.4%, worse than had been expected.