News

As inflation soars, it appears that central banks will make an abrupt change of course by tightening monetary policy hard and fast. Remember that monetary policy is anchored around the neutral rate of interest - the price of money needed to balance the global appetite...

The second UK interest rate rise in three months - from 0.25% to 0.5% - has rammed home  worries about inflation that have defined Q1 2022 so far for many businesses. It’s hard to know how long term the present inflationary pressure is likely to be. Academic...

Inflation reached 5.4% last month with 2022 set to be a difficult year for small businesses to fund working capital requirements. In comparison, US inflation hit a staggering 6.8% in November 2021. To combat inflation, The Bank of England took the decision to raise...

Starting back at work seems slower this new year. Perhaps not surprising, given the huge numbers now working from home for a large part of the week, as well as a continued reluctance to meet in groups during this  latest phase of the Covid pandemic. Nonetheless, for...

Just like the ‘old days’ pre-Covid, leadership books by well-known business and sporting personalities are being rushed out before Christmas. Among these lazy stocking fillers, for the spouse who has everything, is a relatively instructive tome by England rugby coach...

It’s easy to forget, with everything that’s happened since March 2020, that troubled retail energy suppliers have actually faced existential challenges for quite some time. Almost three years have passed since Economy Energy collapsed, affecting 235,000 domestic...

The lockdown periods of the Covid-19 pandemic took a significant toll on commercial property owners (landlords), having faced rent defaults and voids as business occupants were unable to operate and many have had to close their doors for good. Equally, businesses able...

UK manufacturing is by no means dead – it’s just different these days. Before Brexit, Covid and driver shortages, the sector faced fierce competition from emerging economies in Asia, primarily China and India, which are clearly able to produce goods more cheaply....

During a Buchler Phillips recent breakfast event in London, British politician, former member of Parliament for Cities of London and Westminster and Buchler Phillips Consultant, The RT Hon Mark Field, gave us his View from the...

A well-known City figure wrote, in autumn 2019, about his annual get-back-to-work routine. Only six months before the first lockdown, he reminisced about having always started the school year in September with a new pair of black shoes, and how he’d continued the...

As towns and cities reopen in earnest and get busier this autumn, it’s great to see the curtain lifted on live entertainment again. Our love of opera at Buchler Phillips is well known, but as media disclaimers might say, other performance art forms are available!...

My first memory of Jimmy Greaves was when he played for Chelsea in the late 1950s. Even to a youngster like me, it was obvious that he was supremely gifted and able to play football at a different level to most others. When he left Chelsea in 1961 to join AC Milan, it...