Twitter Targets 100 Top UK Advertisers

Twitter has launched a campaign to boost its advertising revenue by targeting up to 100 of Britain's biggest companies.

The micro-blogging site is looking for a London-based campaign strategist to "align" advertisers' media plans to incorporate spending on Twitter.

"We need a strategic analyst to help scale the Twitter advertising business in the UK," the job advert says.

"The focus will be 50-100 of the UK's largest advertising clients."

Twitter is trying to build advertising revenue ahead of its planned flotation in the US either in late 2013 or next year.

"This is a very interesting role to integrate itself in the bigger conversation with the major advertisers in Europe," branding expert Mark Borkowski told Sky News.

"It is an interesting time for this role but the bottom line is advertising is challenged at the moment and there is a changing face of how to spend budgets."

Twitter's UK subsidiary's currently earns income by selling services to its immediate parent based in Dublin, which is ultimately controlled by the San Francisco-based firm.

It also recently advertised for a tax manager for its Irish base, which is responsible for operations across the whole of Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

The tax manager role was to "implement and monitor transfer pricing strategy".

Twitter advertised for a tax manager in July for its European operations

Transfer pricing is used by corporations to minimise potential tax burdens, by effectively registering the sale of goods or services abroad.

Twitter's US parent revealed in flotation documents recently lodged with the Security and Exchange Commission that it gained 87% of its revenue in 2012 - $317m (£200m) - through advertising.

But the company said that it lost $69.3m in the first six months of 2013, compared with a loss of $49.1m for the same period last year.

Twitter had more than 215 million active users as of the end of June, up 44% from the previous year - compared to Facebook's nearly 1.2 billion and LinkedIn's 240 million.

Mr Borkowski added: "Twitter's problem is scale. Only 1% of people tweet and it is not a mass-market medium, so it doesn't have scale and there are privacy concerns of how it uses data.

"Twitter does have influence but big advertising budgets are about getting to millions of people's attention and old fashioned advertising still works."

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Firefighters To Stage New Pensions Strike

Firefighters in England and Wales are to stage a fresh strike in their row with the Government over pensions.

Members of the Fire Brigades Union will walk out for five hours from 6.30pm on Saturday October 19 following a stoppage in September.

Union general secretary Matt Wrack said: "We had hoped our first strike was enough to show Government that firefighters could not be more serious about protecting public safety and ensuring fair pensions.

"No firefighter wants to strike, and it's desperately disappointing that governments in Westminster and Cardiff continue to deny reality over pensions costs and the need for a pension scheme that reflects the job firefighters do.

"Firefighters simply cannot be expected to fight fires and rescue families in their late fifties and into their sixties.

"We hope this second strike will mean both governments will be willing to discuss the full range of concerns that firefighters and the general public have expressed."

He added that more strikes could not be ruled out.

Firefighters in Scotland will not be taking industrial action following an offer on pensions from the Scottish Government which the union said was enough to prevent a strike "at the current time".

The FBU argues that changes to pensions and the retirement age will see thousands of firefighters lose their job "simply for getting older".

The union also maintains that firemen and women pay some of the highest pension contributions in the UK at almost 13% of their salary, with further rises due next year.

Mr Wrack added: "If governments in Westminster and Cardiff are willing to discuss these matters seriously, we would be happy to meet tomorrow or any day early next week and can provide a venue if required."

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Oil Forecast: Instability To Keep Prices High

Instability in the Middle East and North Africa is keeping oil prices up, the International Energy Agency (IAE) has said in a review of the market.

It also said that global oil demand this year was being slightly boosted by the recovery of European economies, while new production was building up fast in a rapidly changing oil market.

The IAE's monthly review raised its forecast for demand for oil around the world this year by 90,000 barrels per day to 91 million barrels per day (mbd).

This would be a rise of 1.1% - or 1mbd - from the level last year, and 1.1mbd in 2014 as the overall economic climate improves.

Oil is currently around $102 a barrel, as speculators await a resolution to the political impasse and debt ceiling debate in Washington.

New production from sources outside the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) is being driven by shale-energy production in the United States.

The agency said that the US had produced 10 mbd of oil in the last two quarters "its highest in decades".

The place taken by the US "in the driver's seat of growth is also a throwback to decades past" it added.

The US is set to be the biggest producer outside Opec grouping by the second quarter of next year.

In July, a billionaire Saudi prince admitted that fracking elsewhere in the world was the biggest threat to his oil-rich nation.

The IEA forecast that the current growth of fracking in the US would make it a bigger producer than Russia, "and that's not even counting biofuels and refinery gains".

Elsewhere, production will also be increased the huge Kashagan oil field, under the Caspian Sea off Kazakhstan, and an agreement between Sudan and South Sudan.

The forecast comes as France's constitutional council rejected a challenge to a law banning fracking for shale gas and oil.

The ruling is a boost for President Francois Hollande, who has opposed the technology alongside ecologist Greens in his ruling coalition - to the dismay of some allies who believe France is sacrificing access to a cheap source of energy.

US-based firm Schuepbach Energy had challenged on four counts a ban introduced in 2011 due to potential risks to the environment, which led to two of its exploration permits being cancelled in southern France.

:: Iraq's prime minister has confirmed that a $6bn (£3.7bn) contract has been signed by his conflict-hit country with Swiss company Satarem to build and run an oil refinery in southern Iraq.

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L&G Joins Battle For Co-Op Insurance Arm

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

Legal & General, the FTSE 100 insurance and pensions giant, is joining the battle to take over a slice of the troubled Co-Operative Group after tabling an offer for the mutual's household insurance operation.

Sky News understands that L&G, which has been on an acquisition spree under its new chief executive, has submitted a bid for the household insurance book that the Co-Op has earmarked for disposal as it seeks a £1.5bn rescue package for its banking operation.

L&G is only understood to be interested in the Co-Op's home insurance business and not its motor insurance book, an approach which is forcing the mutual's advisers to examine different ways of carving up the insurance business.

The household insurance book is thought to be worth several hundred million pounds, although analysts have a broad range of views about the price-tag that the Co-Op will be able to command for the business.

L&G has made a number of acquisitions since Nigel Wilson, its former finance director, took over as chief executive last year. It owns a stake in Cala, the Scottish housebuilder, and bought Cofunds, an online investment platform, in March.

Among the other bidders for the Co-Op general insurance operation are Catalina Holdings, a consolidator of general insurance firms, and Anacap, a specialist financial services investor which last week lost out with an attempt to acquire 314 branches from Royal Bank of Scotland.

Separately, Advent International has been working with the former chief executive of RSA Insurance, Andy Haste, on a possible offer for the Co-op arm.

The mutual's proposals to fill a £1.5bn black hole in the balance sheet of the Co-operative Bank, which were approved by the industry regulator in June, have angered bondholders who will be forced to take a significant hit on the value of their investments.

The Co-op's new chief executive, Euan Sutherland, has insisted that he will not sell any of the mutual's other assets, including the Funeralcare arm, which has also attracted interest from buyout firms.

His ability to resist such offers may, however, depend to a degree on the price he is able to command for the general insurance unit, with analysts' estimates varying over its value from £250m to as much as £600m.

Deutsche Bank is handling the sale on behalf of the Co-op, whose life insurance operation has already been sold to Royal London for nearly £220m.

The Co-Op and L&G both declined to comment.

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Toyota Unveils Car With Autopilot System

Toyota has unveiled the next generation of cars featuring an autopilot system that will swerve to avoid collisions without drivers touching the wheel.

The Automated Highway Driving Assist (AHDA) system lets vehicles communicate wirelessly to avoid running into each other while keeping the car in the middle of the road, regardless of how many twists and turns lie ahead.

Although rivals Nissan and Google have been designing self-driving cars for a while, Toyota's AHDA technology could be available to consumers in a few years.

The technology allows cars to communicate wirelessly to avoid collisions

Toyota managing director Moritaka Yoshida said: "These advanced driving-support technologies prevent human errors, reduce driving stress and help drivers avert accidents, which has a big potential to reduce the number of traffic deaths."

While drivers will need to remain alert and in general control of their vehicle, the new technology lets them leave most of the work to the autopilot.

The latest collision-avoidance system has doubled the detection time of oncoming objects to four seconds from a previous two seconds, according to Toyota.

Although the autopilot takes control drivers must remain alert at all times

The Japanese giant has already introduced the pre-collision braking assist system in its Lexus luxury sedan and plans to install it in other models by 2015, with the other technologies to follow.

"Cars with these technologies recognise the accelerating or slowing speed of those ahead, which also helps avoid traffic jams," said project manager Mitsuhisa Shida.

"They can wirelessly exchange data once every 0.1 seconds."

Toyota said the innovation will be especially helpful for older people.

Japan's over-65s already make up around a quarter of the country's population of 128 million people.

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The Sky News Business Round-Up And Look Ahead

Sky's Naomi Kerbel offers a round-up of what's coming up in the week's business news.

:: Monday October 14

On Monday, the Eurogroup is gathering ahead of Tuesday's Economic and Financial Affairs Council meeting. Eurogroup is composed of the Eurogroup President, EU Commissioner for economic and monetary affairs, European Central Bank President and finance ministers from the member states whose currency is the euro.

:: Tuesday October 15

The chief executive of the Royal Mail will ring the London Stock Exchange bell on Tuesday as the company's shares list for the first time.The value of the Royal Mail jumped more than £1.2bn as conditional trading begins on the London Stock Exchange.

Also, the ONS will release UK monthly inflation figures. Consumer Price Index was 2.7% in August, down from 2.8% in July and within one percentage point of the government's 2% target rate.

:: Wednesday October 16

Wednesday brings UK unemployment figures for September. In the three months to July unemployment fell by 24,000 to 2.49 million, while the unemployment rate was 7.7%.

:: Thursday October 17

Thursday is the deadline for the United States debt limit, known as the debt ceiling to be extended. Republicans will not agree to lift it unless long term spending is addressed as well as delaying funding for President Obama's healthcare reforms. Parts of the US government have been shut down since October 1 due to an ongoing battle over the budget.

:: Friday October 18

Chinese quarterly GDP figure will be out at 03:00 BST on Friday morning. Figures published in July revealed  the rate of economic growth was 7.5% in the second quarter of 2013 compared to 7.7% in the first quarter.

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Govt Takes Interest On Investors' Mail Funds

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

The Government has earned hundreds of thousands of pounds in interest from private investors who saw their applications to buy Royal Mail shares snubbed by ministers.

Sky News understands that hundreds of thousands of members of the public who applied for more than £750 in the postal operator's shares, and who transferred their money ahead of a deadline earlier this week, will not see the interest on those funds returned to them.

More than £3.8bn of orders for Royal Mail stock were received from so-called retail investors, with that part of the privatisation seven times oversubscribed.

Some of those orders were placed through intermediaries and did not require money to be transferred in advance, but many thousands of people are understood to have paid via debit cards on a dedicated website.

The Government is due to return the excess funds to would-be investors by October 21, meaning that it could have held the money in an interest-earning account for as long as three weeks.

One analyst calculated that the Government was likely to have earned hundreds of thousands of pounds in interest from these investors' funds.

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) declined to comment on what proportion of the £3.8bn in orders from private investors had been paid up-front.

Its retention of the interest from unused funds is likely to stoke anger from investors who failed to receive their desired allocation. Individuals who applied for more than £10,000-worth of shares were excluded from the sale altogether.

A BIS spokesman said:

"Details of how refunds to retail investors would be made and by when and when they will be issued were clearly set out in the terms and conditions contained in the prospectus - the document all investors should have based their investment decision on."

"Funds from retail investors have been held in a low interest bank account on Government's behalf. Any interest gained on this money will be returned to Government."

Courtenay Humphries, a private investor who applied for £10,000 of shares and received an allocation of £750, said: "In this day of Internet banking I would have thought it unnecessary to take more than the required amount from my debit card in the first place.

"As for low interest accounts I would be happier if they stated the actual interest they are getting for it and what they intend to do with their ill-gotten gain."

More than £30bn in orders were also received from institutional investors, hundreds of whom missed out altogether because of the level of demand.

Others saw their allocations scaled back, although the Government did sell millions of pounds-worth of shares to sovereign wealth funds in Kuwait and Singapore.

The institutions did not pay in advance, in accordance with conventional practice on share offerings.

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Royal Mail Shares Soar In First Trades

By Mark Kleinman, City Editor

Nearly 150,000 Royal Mail staff were sitting on shareholdings worth more than £3,000 after a first day of trading that left the Government exposed to accusations that it had vastly undervalued the company.

The postal operator's shares ended conditional trading on Friday up 38% on their sale price of £3.30, capping a session in which institutional investors engaged in a stampede aimed at bulking up their holdings.

The frenzied trading followed the vastly oversubscribed demand for shares which saw more than £40bn in orders received by advisers to the Government.

The closing price of 455p gave Royal Mail a market value of £4.55bn, meaning it would be guaranteed entry to the FTSE-100 index when its next quarterly review takes place before the end of the year.

Royal Mail employees now hold shares worth £455m after being handed 10% of the company by ministers keen to smooth the path to privatisation. However, they are unable to sell the stock without incurring a tax liability for five years.

At the closing price, each employee's shares were worth just over £3,033.

Royal Mail's eleven board directors also benefited from the surge in the share price. The collective owners of 33,557 shares, the directors were sitting on stock worth £152,685, a profit of more than £40,000 on the day.

Ordinary retail investors who received the basic allocation of £750-worth of shares were sitting on a paper profit of more than £270m, with many expected to try to sell their holdings when full trading gets underway next Tuesday.

Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, told Sky News that allegations that the Government had undervalued Royal Mail were "nonsense", but a continued upturn in the share price in the coming weeks would lead to uncomfortable questions about the advice given to ministers and the fees paid to the investment banks working on the privatisation.

Chuka Umunna, the shadow business secretary, said Royal Mail had been "significantly undervalued with taxpayers being left short changed. Vince Cable has shown how out of touch he is in dismissing the hundreds of millions of pounds which the taxpayer could have lost out as 'froth' at a time when families across Britain are facing a cost of living crisis."

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Osborne To Use Extra Cash To Pay Off Debts

By Ed Conway, Economics Editor, Washington

George Osborne has signalled that he will use any extra money generated by the strengthening economy to help pay back the Government's debts.

Speaking on the fringes of the International Monetary Fund's annual meetings in Washington, the Chancellor announced that the Autumn Statement this year will be held on December 4.

A growing number of economists suspect that with the economy strengthening faster than many anticipated, the extra tax revenues generated will mean the Government will be able to reduce its borrowing projections.

However, the Chancellor indicated that he would not use any extra cash to fund giveaways.

He said: "I still sit down at the table at the G20 with one of the highest budget deficits. Britain still continues to have some very serious public finance challenges that need to be addressed.

"Although we've brought down the deficit by a third, it is still too high. And as we demonstrated with the proceeds of the recent disposal of the Lloyds shares, where we've got the resource available we've got to make sure that we are doing what we can to reduce our deficits and debts."

The Chancellor said he had been cheered at the change in tone from the IMF on the British economy, whose growth forecasts it upgraded by more than any other major economy this week.

"There's a recognition we've stuck to our plan," he said.

Osborne has warned of the 'gravity' of the US shutdown

Responding to widespread criticism of his Help To Buy policy, under which the Government will guarantee mortgages, Mr Osborne said: "We are addressing a very specific problem in the housing market - a lack of availability of high loan-to-value mortgages. We are fixing what has gone wrong in the financial system."

He added that he had given the Bank of England's Financial Policy Committee the powers to regulate the scheme: "I am the chancellor who gave the Bank of England the powers to deal with potential housing bubbles should they arise. Otherwise I wouldn't have involved the FPC."

He urged American politicians to resolve the debt ceiling crisis, saying he had met with US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, as well as Republican Congressmen John Boehner and Paul Ryan.

"I told them of the gravity of the situation," said Mr Osborne. "They are well aware of that."

Commenting on the Royal Mail privatisation, Mr Osborne said he thought it "has been a huge success".

He added: "This is something Labour and Conservative governments have tried to do in the past and failed. It is an achievement for those who work in the Royal Mail, who will now get an investment in the business.

"With all these privatisations, they have been done at a discount. It is sensible, though, not to make a judgement on price the day after, but to wait until things settle down a bit in three or six months' time."

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Beckham Brand Turns Over £100,000 A Day

Power couple David and Victoria Beckham have increased their combined business revenue to almost £100,000 a day, newly released documents have shown.

Papers lodged with Companies House show that Beckham Ventures Ltd, which handles Victoria's fashion range, increased its turnover to £15.4m in 2012.

David Beckham's football-focused business, Footwork Productions, grossed £16.5m on the back of endorsements and sponsorships.

A third company, Brand Beckham, grossed £3.2m, taking their combined turnover to £35.1m - more than £96,100 a day.

The growth of their business ventures shows the success of their ability to move on from being a football player and a pop star.

"They both work incredibly hard to make this work for themselves and their family," a source close to the couple told Sky News.

"Victoria's first love was always fashion, even when she was in the Spice Girls, and so it is great to see the success of her label.

"And David continues to be really busy with his charity work and the main business commitments."

Documents lodged for Beckham Ventures Ltd show that revenue growth for the label increased by 127%, on the previous year.

Clothes in Victoria's fashion line range from under £500 to more than £2,000.

As director of Footwork Productions, David paid himself £14.1m, up £800,000 on the previous year.

During 2012 Footwork Productions paid £98,000 in corporation tax, while Beckham Ventures paid £435,000 and Brand Beckham paid £490,000.

David Beckham retired from football in May after leaving Paris Saint-Germain, but the former England captain continues to earn from endorsements and advertising, as well as performing charity and fundraising work.

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