Several of my clients are interested in the insurance industry. The Association of British Insurers provides an excellent overview of the (2007) UK market: • Largest in Europe and now second largest in the world – 11% of total worldwide premium income • Employs 309,000 people – a third of Read More
City of London Police reported that the number of reported frauds rose by 64% last year. They advocate changing its name from the gentlemanly "white collar crime" to "organised crime". They highlight mortgage fraud in the property market caused by deliberate over valuing of new developments requiring conspiracies of lawyers, Read More
There were several media reports on Ernst & Young's annual survey that London remains Europe's top choice for foreign investment. London attracted 262 foreign investment projects last year making it top City in Europe for 11th year in a row. However, this was 14% down on 2007. The UK was Read More
Taking a random sample of recent press reports it seems that there is still no consensus about what is happening in the market: Savills, usually the darling of property performers, posted annual losses of £7.7m and cut its dividend. It reports a "very cautious" outlook for 2009. Sir John Ritblat Read More
Graham Norwood, with whom I co-wrote the book “Media relations in property” (EG Books) a couple of years ago has just had his latest book published. In the book, he sets out the signals that were appearing from 2005 and asks questions about why so few people spoke out as Read More