Author: Blake Anderson

The UK government wants UK investors to put more money into the UK economy. That ambition may prompt rhetoric and even concrete reforms in next week’s Budget.This will leave me feeling shifty. Yes, friends, I confess it: I am suffering from unpatriotic portfolio shame. My investments are those of a cheese-eating declinist. A posse will come for me soon.Chancellor Rachel Reeves has already launched a “landmark” review of UK pensions savings, which aims to encourage UK investment. The Labour party had even promised to create a “Brit Isa”, before post-election cold feet set in.Meanwhile, we would-be citizens of nowhere have…

Labour’s dream of building 1.5mn homes has a problem: it relies on Britain’s commercial housebuilders to deliver them.While the industry has welcomed the goal of building more homes than at any point in two generations as “bold” and “vital”, regulators and industry experts say their dominant interest is to control supply and keep up prices.“Housebuilders do not want lower prices,” housing experts Toby Lloyd, Neal Hudson and Rose Grayston — now an adviser to housing minister Matthew Pennycook — wrote in a report for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation this year. “Maintaining headline sales prices is . . . important for housebuilders seeking to keep…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.One of the problems with being a fund manager is taxi drivers giving you fund tips and friends asking for them.I have been asked a couple of times recently for shares that will deliver a reliable 5 per cent annual return. I know why. The Bank of England base rate has started edging down; the Fed is now following suit. Rates on cash accounts, currently delivering a “risk-free” real return, are going in the same direction. Is it time to buy some…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Ministers plan to end a scheme that allows private train companies in England to make extra profits, as the government prepares to fully nationalise the railway network.The Department for Transport has told operators it will not renew an incentive scheme that enables groups to take a share of the profits if they grow passenger revenue above an agreed benchmark, according to three industry executives. The arrangement, known as the “revenue out-turn mechanism”, was introduced last year by the previous Conservative administration and is…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Water regulator Ofwat could be overhauled or even replaced under the most far-reaching review of the industry since it was privatised 35 years ago. A new commission will carry out a “root and branch” assessment that will consider all options for the regulation of the industry, environment secretary Steve Reed said, while also declaring that the “whole water sector has failed”. “If we had better regulation I don’t think the water sector would be in the state that it is in today,” he…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The UK Treasury is preparing to slash spending on overseas aid in the Budget after refusing to match Tory-era top ups to compensate for development cash spent on asylum seekers in the country, said people familiar with the matter.The decision comes despite warnings that without an emergency cash injection, UK international aid could slump to its lowest level in 17 years — at just 0.36 per cent of gross national income — and undermine the government’s ambitions on the global stage.The Financial…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Regulator Ofwat has signalled that it will allow water companies to lift bills further than initially proposed after the industry argued that it needed more money to invest in Britain’s ailing infrastructure.Ofwat said on Tuesday the industry had made a fresh push to increase prices beyond the regulator’s draft decision in July to fund an additional £7bn of investment, which would take the total to £108bn.“This increased expenditure request will, if approved, increase customer bills compared to our draft determinations,” it said.Water…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Unions in Britain could win the right to bargain with employers over pay and conditions when as few as 2 per cent of the workers are members, under new proposals that also make it easier to strike. Currently, unions can seek formal recognition from an employer once 10 per cent of workers concerned have joined. But ministers will consult in the future on lowering this threshold to as little as 2 per cent, the government has said. Combined with a separate provision scrapping…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.UK economic growth will accelerate this year and next as falling inflation and interest rates strengthen domestic demand, the IMF has said, in a boost to chancellor Rachel Reeves ahead of her first Budget next week.The economy will grow by 1.1 per cent this year — a 0.4 percentage point upgrade on its previous projections — the fund said on Tuesday.In 2025, growth will pick up further to 1.5 per cent, the third-strongest forecast among the G7 group of advanced economies, the…

This article is an on-site version of our Chris Giles on Central Banks newsletter. Premium subscribers can sign up here to get the newsletter delivered every Tuesday. Standard subscribers can upgrade to Premium here, or explore all FT newslettersTwo years after the UK financial crisis that followed Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng’s “mini” Budget is a good time to learn lessons. The episode is in the past. Two prime ministers and two chancellors later, the UK is just about to have another Budget that will again raise borrowing plans. And markets are a little nervous. But first, a recap.Potted historyLiz…