BUSINESS LIVE: CMA warns on Three-Vodafone merger; Spoon’s costs ease; Retail sales stagnate

Just before close, the FTSE 100 was 0.66% up at 7,934.36.

Meanwhile, the FTSE 250 was 0.2% lower at 19,701.63.

Apple’s stock price is falling – as regulators in the US and Europe crackdown on the technology giant.

Dual investigations both sides of the Atlantic are unnerving investors – with fears of fines and forced changes to how it operates.

Shares of the company slid 4.1 percent Thursday – their worst day since August 2023 -reducing its market value by $113billion in market value.

It took the losses this year to 11 per cent – at a time the rest of themarket is making record highs.

Today shares opened about the same price they closed at Thursday – $172 – but then slid downwards again.

The US Department of Justice and 15 states allege it used the powerful demand for its iPhone and other products to drive up prices and hurt smaller rivals in the first major antitrust effort against Apple.

(PA) – JD Sports is expected to reveal sales growth as investors will be keeping an eye out for an improved outlook after signs of cooler demand from shoppers.

The company is also expected to confirm that profits have dipped slightly over the year to early February, in an update to shareholders on Thursday March 28.

Shares in the company are down by around a third over the past year, with the retailer among firms being impacted by a challenging economic backdrop.

Investors will be looking for a more positive outlook after JD Sports cut its profit targets in its previous stock market update in January.

It told the market it was on track to deliver a pre-tax profit of between £915million to £935million in the year to early February.

This compared with previous guidance of a of £1.04billion profit.

The latest projection also pointed towards a drop in profits, after the firm posted a profit before tax and adjusted items of £991million for the previous financial year.

How well a household will be able to cope with higher mortgage payments depends to some extent on how much they have in savings.

The amount of savings held by households fell every month last year, according to the trade association for the banking and financial services sector, UK Finance.

(PA) – Nationwide Building Society has apologised to customers after all payments in and out of accounts were delayed on Friday morning.

The building society said there was an issue impacting its Faster Payments system to and from other banks and building societies.

“The issue has now been fixed and queued payments are being processed,” a spokesman for Nationwide said.

“It may take a few hours before impacted payments are processed, so customers should not try to send the payment again.”

Some customers were complaining on X, formerly Twitter, that they were unable to pay their bills or they had not received their wages because of the issue in the morning.

Others said they had no access to finances while their transfers were delayed.

Direct debits and standing orders were working normally throughout the issues and customers could continue to use their cards online and in shops, withdraw money at cash machines and move money between Nationwide accounts.

Looking for you nearest public charger for your electric car? It could be just down the road at your local Sainsbury’s, Tesco or Aldi, as supermarkets continue to expand their public charging offerings.

Last year the total number of supermarkets offering electric vehicle (EV) charge points rose 59 per cent – with motorists now able to charge at more one-in-10 stores, analysis from Zapmap and the RAC shows.

Bentley Motors’ boss has left the luxury carmaker to take over as chief executive of its struggling rival, Aston Martin Lagonda.

Bentley confirmed on Friday that Adrian Hallmark had departed with immediate effect, having overseen a significant turnaround of the carmaker since becoming its chairman and chief executive in February 2018.

Phoenix Group shares led the FTSE 100 on Friday as the insurance group lifted profit and cash generation targets, and outlined plans to pay down its debts.

The FTSE 100 firm told investors it now expects to post profits of £900million and operating cash generation – the cash generated by its underlying entities – to hit £1.4billion by 2026.

A pleasing set of preliminary results sent ‘geospatial’ software provider IQGeo Group shares on an upward trajectory this week. In fact, they hit an all-time high of 414p.

IQGeo booked a record order intake of £57.2million, with underlying earnings more than tripling to £6.6million for the 12 months ending 31 December, up from £1.9million in the previous year.

(PA) – Insurance giant LV= said it had managed to get back into the black as it kept costs steady last year.

The former friendly society said it had seen pre-tax profit hit £107million in the year to the end of December. The same figure had shown a pre-tax loss of £145million the year before.

It helped the business return £30million in bonuses to its members.

“Since 2011, we have shared member bonuses of £385million, reflecting our commitment to driving the success of LV= so that it can be shared with our members,” said chief executive David Hynam.

He said that the company’s outlook “remains positive” and that it has “strong” foundations.

The chief executive said fixed term annuities – which pay a regular income in retirement for a specific time – have seen “greater demand” as interest rates remain high. That is “giving members the certainty they want in retirement”, he said.

He said: “Thanks to our robust business model and focused strategy, LV= has been profitable despite 2023’s many external headwinds including high inflation, rising interest rates and low growth.

“At the same time, we have shown strong cost disciplines and kept operating costs largely flat despite an external environment of significant inflation.”

JD Wetherspoon chair Sir Tim Martin expects a ‘reasonable outcome’ for the financial year’ after the pub group’s profits soared in the first half.

The FTSE 250 pub giant’s pre-tax profits jumped to £36million in the 26 weeks ending 28 January, marking a near-eightfold increase on the equivalent period the previous year.

The revival in retail sales stalled last month as hard-pressed Brits cut back on fuel and miserable weather dampened footfall in high streets.

Volumes were flat in in February after a spike of 3.6 per cent the previous month that had clawed back ground from a lacklustre Christmas.

From Nectar to Clubcard and Sparks to MyWaitrose, most supermarkets now give shoppers the option to sign up for a loyalty scheme.

You will usually get a physical or digital card which you can use to collect points or get discounts every time you shop – though many schemes have changed how they work in recent years, and in some cases have become less generous.

The power struggle at Disney intensified last night after Nelson Peltz won influential backing in his battle with the board.

Ahead of a crunch vote next month, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) recommended investors elect the activist investor as a director to hold executives to account.

Phoenix Group shares have soared in early trading after the FTSE 100 insurer said it expected to increase profits by nearly a half and generate higher operating cash by 2026, as it looks to optimise costs and pay down debt aided by new business growth.

Phoenix – whose business model is to acquire old portfolios of life insurance policies, and then look to optimise the cost and capital requirements for running these portfolios – has benefited from the booming bulk annuities market, where insurance giants buy pension obligations from companies.

The UK bulk annuity market hit a record high above £50billion last year and is expected to top that this year.

Higher interest rates have made it cheaper for pensions schemes to buy the insurance, which removes pensions risks from company balance sheets.

Britain’s defence sector received a major boost after two industrial giants were chosen to build Australia’s next-generation nuclear powered submarines.

BAE Systems and Rolls-Royce have been picked by the Australian government alongside domestic defence company ASC Pty and will deliver the SSN-AUKUS submarines in the early 2040s.

Global stock markets soared yesterday amid hopes that the move towards interest rate cuts is gathering pace on both sides of the Atlantic.

The FTSE 100 rose nearly 2 per cent to an 11-month high of 7882.55 after Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey said ‘things are moving in the right direction’ for a cut as inflation falls.

Daniel Mahoney, UK economist, Handelsbanken:

‘Retail sales figures for February are fairly unremarkable although they are notably better than market expectations. Sales volumes were estimated to be 0% m-o-m (market expectations: -0.4%), following an increase of 3.6% in January.

‘December saw a large fall in sales, which was subsequently corrected in January. At the time, there were some concerns that December’s print could indicate a worrying trend, but January and February’s prints suggest that it was merely a seasonal blip.

‘Retail sales volumes gradually declined from the middle of 2021 for around two years but have effectively plateaued from that point onwards.’

J D Wetherspoon profits soared in the first half of its financial year, supported by a gradual easing of costs and an increase in customers coming to grab drinks and food.

The group, which owns and operates pubs across the UK and Ireland, reported a profit before tax of £36million, compared with £4.6million a year ago.

UK retail sales unexpectedly held steady last month after rising by a revised 3.6 per cent January, figures from the Office for National Statistics showed on Friday.

Flat performance for February compare to forecasts that sales would shrink by 0.3 per cent for the month.

‘There was growth in clothing, which rebounded after recent falls as people invested in the new season’s collections, as well as department stores,” ONS senior statistician Heather Bovill, said.

‘However, these were offset by falls in fuel sales, possibly affected by rising prices, and a reduction in food sales.’

Compared with a year ago, sales volumes were 0.4 per cent lower.

Mobile customers could pay higher prices if the merger between Three and Vodafone is allowed to go ahead, the competition watchdog has warned.

But the Competition and Markets Authority is concerned that a shrinking market of providers could push up prices for all mobile phone customers – not just those of Vodafone and Three.