Papers

HEDGE FUNDS ARE creating a "major risk" to global financial stability, although there may be little that can be done to tackle the problem, the European Central Bank suggested yesterday.

AVIVA, BRITAIN'S largest insurer, is on the lookout for international joint venture partners as it laid out ambitious plans to increase overseas sales by "at least 10% a year" over the next five years, reports The Times .

AN INDEPENDENT FINANCIAL advice helpline dealing with two million low earners every year could be set up at a cost of £25m-£35m, according to research published today in The Financial Times .

SANDY CROMBIE, the chief executive of Standard Life, poured cold water yesterday on the suggestions London's biggest flotation in five years could be under threat as a result of the global stock market turmoil, reports The Scotsman .

MORE THAN THREE million people will learn they are to lose their rebates from opting out of the state second pension to fund a low-cost national savings scheme when ministers unveil a far-reaching pensions shake-up, reports The Financial Times.

MILLIONS OF MIDDLE-INCOME earners will be hit by a new stealth tax hidden in the Government's pension reforms which will be unveiled tomorrow, says The Daily Telegraph .

BRITAIN WOULD face a pensions crisis unless the government restored the earnings link to the basic state pension by 2012, John Hutton, the work and pensions secretary, warned yesterday, reports The Financial Times .

FORMER DERIVATIVES trader Ashley Tatham is considering claiming £10m in lost earnings from the Financial Services Authority (FSA) on top of the likely £2m-plus bill for costs that the regulator is facing, reports the Telegraph .

SMALL, FAST-GROWING companies should find it easier to raise money on the UK stock market under new guidelines issued on Monday, reports The Financial Times.

ABBEY IS PLANNING to open up to 100 new branches across the UK as part of an ambitious organic expansion programme designed to treble the British operations of Banco Santander Central Hispano, Abbey's Spanish owner, over the next ten years, The Times...