LONDON: British bank Lloyds TSB Group Plc. is selling its Goldfish credit card business to U.S. financial firm Morgan Stanley Bank International Limited for 1 billion pounds in cash.

Morgan Stanley said it hoped the acquisition will help it to expand its existing credit card business — increasing the number of cards by as much as 47 per cent — to 2.3 million accounts and securing 800 million pounds worth of business through balance transfer to its existing 1.5 billion pounds. The price the U.S. bank is paying constitutes a premium of 175 million pounds to the business unit’s net balances.

Lloyds TSB, Britain’s fifth-largest bank in assets terms, will make a profit before tax of 70 million pounds from the deal. The bank’s head of retail Terri Dial said the bank would want to have a Lloyds TSB-branded credit card.

The bank had acquired Goldfish by buying the 70 per cent stake in did not own from utility major Centrica in 2003 for a premium of 112.5 million pounds to the unit’s net balances. The deal with Morgan Stanley includes transfer of the brand and loyalty program. Dial said a vast majority of Goldfish’s Glasgow-based staff will move to Morgan Stanley.

Morgan Stanley International’s chairman David Walker said the acquisition is consistent with the bank’s strategy of growing its international business by taking opportunities for bolt-on acquisitions. It is also in consonance with its decision to commit resources in the U.K. and Europe.

LONDON – Mozilla’s Firefox browser is now ahead of the Internet Explorer in terms of usage on European computers. A study by technology company AdTech says that the popularity of the open-source browser has grown by 40 percent over the last six months.

Plus Firefox has managed to increase its market share from 8.96 percent to 12.41 percent in the same six-month period between March and October this year. The main reason for users shunning Microsoft’s Internet Explorer is the dodgy security in the latter. That is not to say that Firefox is not vulnerable to being attacked.

But the fact remains that IE supports the ActiveX controls, which remains the main channel for the entry of malicious codes as well as spyware. Firefox does not support these controls, but it has still made massive improvements in the 1.5 version. The tabbed browsing feature has always been its main attraction to many users and this feature continues to deliver in leaps and bounds in the new version as well.

The main feature that has rendered Firefox relatively safe against hackers has been its open-source origins, which means that programmers have been regularly updating this version as keeping it out of the reach of malware makers. The new version boasts of a better pop-up blocking feature, but initial feelings are that it remains pretty much similar to earlier versions. The “Clear Private Data” command is pretty useful in wiping out all your traces including that of saved passwords and usernames. Firefox scores heavily over Internet Explorer in this category.

The new version also presents two new web-design categories called Canvas and SVG and this makes surfing more interesting. A big plus is the RSS button, which is now displayed on top of the page rather than at the bottom. All said and done, Firefox is at the moment ahead of Internet Explorer in the stakes and this should serve as a wake-up call to the Redmond honchos. A IE 7.0 is in the works and it is a sure thing that all the popular features of Firefox will be taken into consideration before releasing it. Till then happy “tabbed” browsing!

LONDON: European drug distributor Alliance UniChem Plc., which is in the process of merging with Boots Group Plc. in a 7 billion-pound deal, said it expects to meet financial goals in the current fiscal although it had encountered difficulties in some markets.

The company said it could not achieve expected growth in Spain and Britain during the second half of the year. However, this was compensated by a strong performance by its retail division. It, however, expected the British market to return to the growth phase in 2006 after the impact of the government-imposed price cuts in January last wanes.

Under the Pharmaceutical Price Regulation Scheme, drug companies have agreed to cut prices on products that are sold to the NHS by 7 per cent.

Alliance UniChem said it continued with its tight cost controls and a strict financial regimen, which it hoped should yield results in 2006.

The company added 101 pharmacies in the 11 months to 30 November, reaching a total of 1,283. Nearly 120 of the stores are operated by associates.

The proposed merger with Boots is expected to create one of Europe’s largest drug and healthcare firms with sales reaching 13 billion pounds and 2,600 stores across the U.K. The Office of Fair Trading is debating whether the deal should be referred to the Competition Commission. It anyway requires the approval of both companies’ shareholders.

Alliance UniChem brings out its financial results on 28 February. The company’s shares were down 1 penny at 789, valuing the business at 2.9 billion pounds.

LONDON: Power company British Energy Group Plc. reported operating profit of 135 million pounds for the first half ended 2 October. It did not provide any comparative year-earlier figure, but it had reported a loss of 262 million pounds for the first half of 2004.

The company, whose nuclear reactors can produce a fifth of the country’s electricity, benefited from the increased wholesale prices of power, which have more than doubled over the past 12 months. However, unplanned production halts in its Hartlepool and Heysham units have affected the company’s projections for the year — lowered output by 15 per cent annually, compared with about 3 per cent downtime for the world’s most efficient nuclear generators.

Chief executive Bill Coley said the impact will be minimised as a result of continuing improvements in operating metrics as a result of a performance improvement programme.

The company’s total production rose to 33.1 terawatt hours in the first half, up from 31.7 terrawatt hours over the same period last year. It expects to produce 61 terrawatt hours during the fiscal ending March 2006 against a projected 63 terrawatt hours. This will be an improvement on the 59 terrawatt hours it produced in 2004-2005.

The company, on the brink of a collapse due to its debt three years ago, said it had sold half of its output for 2006-2007 at 35 pounds per megawatt hour. It had achieved a price of 25 pounds per megawatt hour during the first half of the current fiscal, up from 24 pounds per megawatt hour in the first quarter. It has also sold 95 per cent of its planned output for the current financial year at an average of 32.5 pounds per megawatt hour.

It is estimated that a price of 20 pounds per megawatt hour is required for the company to break even.

Coley said the company will spend more than 250 million pounds as capital expenditure on its nuclear reactors this year, while a further 250 million pounds will be spent in the following year.

The company has a mandate to extend the asset life of its Dungeness power station in Kent by 10 years. A decision on whether its Hinkley Point B and Hunterston reactors will have their lives extended will be taken in 2008, three years before their planned closure. Its three reactors — at Hartlepool 1, Dungeness and Heysham 2 — are out of action, but at least two of them will be recommissioned before March 2006.

Coley said he believes the company can help bridge the gap between old and new plants by extending the life of some, if not all, of its eight facilities.

The company’s share price has doubled since relisting in January, closing Tuesday at 505.25 pence a share.

LONDON: Property website Rightmove who seem to always look on the positive side of the property market predicts that house prices in England and Wales may touch the 200,000-pound mark in the New Year, well sometime in 2006 at least. This also presumably means that they may not reach the 200k figure of course.

Price growth of just 2 per cent is enough to reach this ‘magical’ figure, Rightmove said, adding in fact the prices are set to grow at 4 per cent during the year. It’s not so magical if your a first time buyer of course who is struggling to afford the deposit or repayments.

This possible growth will be despite the fact that house prices fell 0.8 per cent during the four weeks ended 3 December to 196,181 pounds, as the market is poised for a recovery, Rightmove said. The number of unsold properties with estate agents has fallen from an average of 69 to 65, it said.

Prices have fallen in six out of 10 regions in England and Wales during the four weeks with East Anglia seeing the highest rise of 2.1 per cent while the North of England witnessing the highest fall — of 5 per cent.

Rightmove said affordability norms will affect the price growth and will be limited to the same levels as increases in average earnings during 2006 and beyond. Economic stability, low mortgage costs and high levels of employment will help avoid any price falls.

Through 2006, the housing market would be more positive without peaks and troughs affecting it as in the past two years, the group predicted.

Rightmove’s commercial director Miles Shipside said demand has been outstripping supply in the sector and this has been a substantial factor in pushing average asking prices towards an all-time high.

The group’s assessment comes in line with the study made by mortgage lender Nationwide Building Society, which said house prices would at worst stagnate and at best rise by 3 per cent in 2006.

With residential property out of the SIPPs equation and the economy in trouble, except for the Christmas shopping rush it is difficult to see how any increase in house prices is possible, even with the introduction of REITs.

The main issue remains that property is overvalued by owners and that first time buyers on the whole cannot afford it; they can’t afford the deposit and if they do get a mortgage will struggle with repayments. Without first time buyer movement back into the property market, it remains difficult to see anything other than stagnation as these first timers are required to kick start the chain.

LONDON – A fuel depot in north London was rocked by massive explosions that spewed ash and fire into the sky and shattered windows in nearby houses. The Buncefield oil depot, which is jointly operated by oil giants Total and Texaco, was rocked by these explosions, which appear to be accidental at the moment.

43 people were reportedly injured by the flying debris, smoke or escaping the scene. Among these, four are apparently injured seriously. The explosions took place early morning on Sunday and residents were rudely awakened by a big boom. The oil depot is located near the Luton airport.

And although, it was reported that a plane was flying low before the explosions, the police are treating the fire as accidental. “All indications are, at this stage, that this was an accident. However, clearly we will keep an open mind … until we can confirm that for certain,” Hertfordshire Chief Constable Frank Whiteley said.

He added that it was too early to conclusively say what caused the blasts. Britain is still on the edge after the deadly terrorist attacks, which hit the transport system in July. And al-Qaeda ahs already intimated that fuel depots are its next target. But by and large these explosions are being categorized as accidental.

Meanwhile, people have rushed out to fuel depots to fill up fearing that these explosions could lead to fuel shortages. But BP spokeswoman Sheila Williams has assured that there will be no shortages. “There is certainly no shortage of fuel in and around the area and we are working hard to bring fuel supplies in from other terminals to petrol sites in those areas affected,” she told Sky News.

“Companies like BP can bring supplies via tankers from other areas. People shouldn’t be concerned,” Even the police are advising against panic buying and are saying that doing so might lead to shortages. The Luton Airport also said that flights would not be affected because of these blasts.

HOUSTON, Texas – The US Labor Department has indicated that BP Plc could face a criminal enquiry into the explosion at its Texas refinery in March. That explosion was responsible for 15 deaths and injured 170 people.

“A verbal referral has been made to the Department of Justice. It is now up to the Department of Justice to decide whether or not to pursue it,” confirmed Alan Belsky, a Labor Department spokesman, adding ”When you have a case where there are willful violations found and those violations are tied directly to fatalities, the Department of Labor has the option to refer the case to the Justice Department.”

However, a Justice spokesman declined to comment on the referral. Earlier on Friday, BP had issued a final report of its own investigation into the accident and accepted the responsibility for the blast on March 23. BP was already fined $21.3 million in September when the Occupational Safety and Health Administration had found more than 300 lapses in health and safety measures.

The 192-page report of BP’s internal investigation into the incident acknowledged that the management failed to make safety a priority and that some procedures were willfully bypassed. It also “accepted responsibility for the March 23rd explosion and for the management system failures and employee mistakes which contributed to or caused the explosion.”

The United Steelworkers union, of which most of the BP workers are a part, said that the report vindicated their stand that the explosion was not caused by the negligence of a few workers, but by the management failure over many years.

The Texas City complex is BP’s biggest refinery in North America and pumps out 460,000 barrels-per-day. Ross Pillari, president of BP said that they accepted the findings of the report and would spend close to $1 billion to make sure that the plant is rendered safe.

“We are working to make Texas City a complex that attains the highest levels of safety, reliability and environmental performance,” Pillari said. In the backdrop of this news, London-based BP’s shares fell 1.9 percent to $67.15 by mid-day on the New York exchange.

LONDON: Aberdeen, Scotland-based independent oil and gas explorer Dana Petroleum Plc. said it has struck hydrocarbon-bearing sandstone in the Faucon-1 exploration well in Block 1 offshore Mauritania. The drilling is now temporarily suspended pending collection of samples for analysis, the company said.

Dana operates Block 1 and has a 36 per cent holding in the well. The other stakeholders are Gaz de France UK (24 per cent), Tullow Oil (20 per cent), Hardman Petroleum (Mauritania) Pty (18 per cent) and Roc Oil (Mauritania) (2 per cent). Gaz de France became a stake holder after Dana decided to divest part of its holding last month.

The find is a big boost for Dana, which is now saddled with a substantial rise in its tax burden as a result of the new proposal by the British treasury to levy a windfall tax on oil companies.

Dana said in a brief regulatory announcement that it had found hydrocarbon-bearing sandstones, without giving an indication of whether these might contain gas or more valuable oil, or of the potential size and quality of any find. The company intends to do the testing works, which will be completed in about three weeks.

It said drilling has been suspended at 3,536 metres for acquisition of wireline logs, formation pressures and fluid and core samples.

Hydrocarbons have occurred in the Cretaceous zone. Earlier Woodside Petroleum Ltd. had detected hydrocarbons in the Tevet-2 well, north of Faucon-1.

Dana’s shares went up 13 per cent in London to 1,010 pence, the largest increase since 31 December 2001. The surge gave it a market cap of 813 million pounds.

LONDON: Telcoms major BT Group Plc. has tied up with three content providers to propel its BT Television Services. The company, which has announced its plans to get into media in a bid way, said it is signing up BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of BBC, Warner Music and Paramount, the Viacom group’s film studio, for its soon-to-be launched on-demand service.

BT Television Services chief executive Dan Marks promised a number of similar announcements in the coming weeks and months, which will indicate the scale the proposed activities. He also said the company will sign up some of the major Hollywood studios, other broadcasters and “all major record labels” for the service. All the tie-ups will be revenue-sharing arrangements, he said.

He said the service will target millions of British homes that do not subscribe to pay-TV.

“Our view of the market is that everybody will have a digital TV and the question is how many will be using a subscription service. There are 78 million TV sets in the U.K., of which 11 million are connected to a pay-TV service, which leaves a lot of TV sets,” he said.

The service, to be launched next autumn, provides for customers to choose television, music and films to watch at their convenience. It also intends to offer a broadcast television service with 30 channels to be supplied via a Freeview box. Users can either purchase selected items to view or listen or buy a subscription for unlimited use. The company has not disclosed its pricing model.

The customers will also have to buy the set-top box, which will include an 80 Mb hard drive to save programmes and music. Most probably Philips will make the box, which will be attached to a BT telephone line to deliver the content. The box will have a digital terrestrial tuner to access Freeview programmes.

BT Group plans to take on pay television channels NTL and BSkyB in a big way.

The company said it expects BT Retail to continue with the last quarter’s return to profit growth and deliver an increased profit for the full year. It expects to have cost savings of 400-500 million pounds over three years by focusing on more cost effective use of online sales, service and billing as well as improved processes.

The company has decided to offer free calls throughout the festive holiday to any landline in 30 different countries. It is also reducing the rate of Broadband Talk, which allows customers to use a normal phone, rather than the PC, by up to 50 per cent to 2 pounds a month for evening and weekend calls or 7 pounds a month for anytime calls. Its evening and weekend call packages are completely free.

BT said it is evolving a concept of a broadband BT hub in homes which will enable wireless networking for all the family’s computer systems, next generation TV, voice calls over the internet and five different voice channels that can be used simultaneously. The hub will also enable monitoring services, such as security for the home as well as greater protection for data.

The company is also establishing a network of 8,000 Wi-Fi hotspots in the country to offer opportunities to work and play. The recent tie-up with Nintendo to allow gamers to interact and play using a Wi-Fi link is an example.