Last week marked the last prime minister’s questions before the British election in June and seems a good place to examine the reasons Theresa May might be less secure that she seems. While her Conservative Party is 21 points ahead of Labour in the polls — its biggest lead in almost a decade — there are four reasons to doubt it will stay there.
Repsol made net profit of 689 million euros in the first quarter of 2017, up 59% from a year earlier, fuelled by plans implemented to increase the company’s resilience and flexibility against the current backdrop of low prices. Its downstream business was the main driver of its strong first quarter performance.
Despite quantitative easing and 3 years of more synchronised developed economy growth, it is not clear that inflation has really got any traction. Technology, globalisation, unemployment and changes in working practices have all contributed to the lack of inflationary pressures and still do.
On May 2, Fitch confirmed its BBB+ rating with a stable outlook for Abertis, citing as reasons the company’s recent acquisition of 100% of Sanef and the fact it has less debt than its competitors.
Reforms in Spain’s education system are key to guaranteeing future economic growth. But having a better educated population would also help to fight against rising inequality and poverty.
The improving macroeconomic backdrop and continued rise of the middle class as well as high private health spending, make Brazil a potentially “attractive” investment destination. However, AXA IM analyst Manolis Davradakis point that “the emerging market’s poor ranking in terms of ease of doing business and international competitiveness, plenty of risks remain.
Stephen Chan | Bernard Henri Levy, the French intellectual and provocateur, recently said that, in the wake of the US withdrawal into itself, the world stage would feature five empires. These would be Russia, Iran, Turkey, Islamic extremism and the commercial might of China.
It takes a social democrat candidate to the French presidential election to push Banks 2017 P/Book to a 2-year high. As Carax-Alphavalue’s analysts report “whereas the banks hit a glass ceiling at 0.7x in the first half of 2016 (on 2016 figures), they were judged to become expensive at 0.85x and now trade at 0.9x”. The last leg is owed to the confidence surge around the euro, Europe and France since the democrat candidate emerged as a first- round winner.