News

The mortgage market remained steady in the last month of 2018, despite uncertainty around the impact of Brexit on potential homebuyers.

Latest money and credit figures released by the Bank of England reported that £4.1 billion was secured against property in December last year.

In 2018 online retailers experienced their worst December sales growth in nearly twenty years, as shoppers reined in buying over Christmas, capping off a turbulent year.

According to the IMRG, low consumer confidence was the reason spending had been low over the holiday period. Their report shows that sales rose by only 3.6% in December, compared to a growth of 12% for 2018.

The UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) is taking legal action against Ryanair after the airline refused to compensate UK customers who were affected by flight disruptions over the summer.

This summer Ryanair was hit by its worse strikes ever, with pilots and cabin crew walking out over pay and conditions. As a result, they were forced to cancel flights, many of those included major holiday destinations such as Italy, Portugal and Spain.

Chairman of Mitsubishi Motors, Carlos Ghosn has been fired by the company after news of his arrest in Japan, following claims of misconduct.

According to reports, Mr Ghosn who headed an alliance of Mitsubishi, Nissan and Renault, had falsely understated his salary and had used company money for personal gains.

Electric car company Tesla has announced that their board member Robyn Denholm will be replacing Elon Musk as the company’s chair. This is almost a month after Mr Musk had to step down from his position of chairman, as part of a settlement with U.S. regulators.

In the deal with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Tesla had until 13 November to name an independent board chairman, however, they agreed that Elon Musk could retain his position as CEO.

It has been reported that supermarket giant, Tesco, is embarking on a round of aggressive cost-cutting in its UK business, resulting in the termination of thousands of jobs and in-store deli counters.

According to the Mail on Sunday, up to 15,000 jobs may be as risk as Tesco plans to close their meat, fish and delicatessen counters, reduce the number of in-store bakeries and replace staff in their canteens with vending machines.

The economy in 2018 in China grew at its weakest annual pace in nearly three decades amidst a protracted trade war with the US. This has resulted in added pressure on Beijing to reach a deal with Washington and to increase stimulus measures in efforts to avoid a sharper slowdown.

GDP growth for China for all of 2018 was recorded at 6.6%, the slowest since 1990.

British manufacturers are stockpiling goods as they head towards their slowest year of growth since 2015, as Brexit uncertainty hits demand. Businesses are preparing for the potential shortage of raw materials and likely growth in queues at ports across the UK.

In recent months, production across the manufacturing sector has remained strong, with fears of Brexit resulting in a shortage of stock in case of a no-deal Brexit or prices going up if there was a deal.

EE and Virgin Media have been fined £13.3 million by telecoms regulator, after an investigation into the two companies revealed that they were overcharging customers who wanted to leave their broadband and phone contracts early.

Ofcom, the regulator, said nearly 500,000 customers had been overcharged, leaving them “out of pocket”.