The XPeng G6 undercuts BMW’s iX3, Audi’s Q6 e-tron and the electric Mercedes GLC by around £20,000, and charges faster than all of them. So what does the German badge actually buy you? For years, buying a premium SUV meant picking between three German badges. BMW, Audi and Mercedes still own that conversation, but the [...]

The Ford Puma isn’t new and it isn’t flashy, yet it keeps finishing at or near the top of the UK sales charts. Here’s what it gets right, and whether it’s still worth buying. The Ford Puma has been around since 2019, and while it has never been the car anyone raves about down the [...]

Volkswagen is retiring the ID.4 and putting its best-selling SUV name on the replacement. Early prototype drives suggest it’s quieter and comfier, but the charging hasn’t moved on as much as it should have. Volkswagen’s ID naming never quite stuck with buyers, and the company seems to have admitted as much. The ID.2 became the [...]

Retail footfall took a dive in September as shoppers stayed away from shopping centres, prompting calls for the Chancellor to slash taxes for high street firms. In September, the UK’s total retail footfall fell by 2.9 per cent, far worse than the 1.7 per cent decline recorded in the month prior, according to the British [...]

Airtel Money will begin trading today on the London Stock Exchange in what is expected to be the largest initial public offering in the City for five years. The mobile payments firm has priced its shares at £1.96 apiece, which is expected to hand it a price tag of around £5.3bn. Existing shareholders, which include [...]

Welcome back to the City AM liveblog. Donald Trump has said the US has engaged in “productive discussions” with Iran and would refrain from attacking the country before the midterm elections, bringing relief to the oil market. It’s taken the price of Brent crude back slightly, though it has remained around $103 per barrel after [...]

Watching Harlequins at the moment is either absolutely soul-crushing or completely baffling, depending on whether you support the London club or not. Soul-crushing because the club is supposed to represent the very best of attacking rugby in a fusion of England internationals and overseas superstars. Baffling because it should never have got this bad, losing [...]

With Asos just the latest to be the victim of a cyber hack, it's time for the UK to start incentivising businesses to up their security.

Duncan Jones returns to form with a brisk, earnest Rogue Trooper, powered by strong voice work and pulp sci-fi zeal—see why it wins over.

Businesses could face a “raft” of “trivial” data protection claims if the Supreme Court rules compensation can be won for emotional distress or anxiety caused by data breaches without needing to prove any harm actually occurred, in a hearing set to conclude on Thursday. The case was originally brought by 432 current and former police [...]

Big Four giant EY’s global revenue has hit $57bn (£43bn), up nearly 5 per cent on the previous financial year. EY-Parthenon’s strategy arm led the firm’s overall growth across all services lines, with a 7 per cent increase. Tax grew by 6 per cent, consulting by over 4 per cent, and assurance by 3 per [...]

The UK’s financial watchdog has proposed changes to retail investment fund rules in a bid to reduce the risk of rushed asset sales during market volatility. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) floated a minimum 90-day notice period for investors withdrawing from long-term investment funds holding illiquid assets such as infrastructure and private equity, in its [...]

Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey has said that governments should look to help keep prices stable and win over markets with disinflationary tax and spending measures. In an intervention on the relationship between monetary and fiscal policy, Bailey urged governments to consider the impacts of government spending and borrowing on inflation. The Bank of [...]

The Midday Market report is a new newsletter from City AM, giving you fresh analysis on the biggest stories in the City straight into your inbox every lunchtime. Today, Ali Lyon chews over Kemi Badenoch’s Tory conference inheritance tax overhaul, and what it might mean for the UK’s irrational tax system. Sign up to the [...]

The founder of collapsed shadow bank MFS has accused administrators of “internecine warfare” and harassment as the firm’s creditors fight to unlock billions of pounds in frozen funds, City AM can reveal. Paresh Raja, the chief executive of Market Financial Solutions who has denied claims he siphoned “vast sums” from the mortgage firm, has asked [...]

The NBA wants its European basketball competition to replicate the dynamic between football’s Champions League and Europa League. Much of the rest of the detail surrounding a property slated for launch next year remains under wraps. A cloud may have fallen over talks between the NBA and EuroLeague but there is at least some welcome [...]

Top housebuilders have begun to pull out of London citing a “nightmare” of planning objections that have made developments unviable. Listed housebuilders Taylor Wimpey and Berkeley Group both said that the costs of navigating the huge complexities of red tape and planning processes in the capital are making them less willing to continue investing. This [...]

United States military bases in the UK could stage Nascar races as the American motor sport moves towards international expansion. The North American series – which is being challenged domestically by the increased presence of Formula 1 – has only ever ventured out of the US for point-scoring races in neighbouring Canada and Mexico. But [...]

Retailers have urged John Healey to slash green policy costs from energy bills, warning that their electricity costs are set to soar by £440m this year. The British Retail Consortium (BRC) – which represents top retailers including Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Marks & Spencer – has warned that rising “policy costs” on energy bills will inevitably [...]

Money market funds roared back to popularity last month, as investors continued to shun equities amid ongoing market uncertainty. UK investors allocated capital to money market funds in favour of stocks in a bid to ride out the ongoing economic and geopolitical tensions rocking financial markets. The funds attracted £417m of inflows in September, marking [...]

Virgin Media O2 has pushed back at claims it is paying around £200m to keep its name on the O2, as the heavily indebted telecoms group commits to another decade of one of Britain’s longest-running sponsorship deals. The company and venue owner AEG have not disclosed the value of the agreement, which will keep the [...]

Sensitive corporate data can be stolen through everyday workplace software without setting off traditional cyber defences, Darktrace has warned, after a breach at the Big Four giant exposed information linked to Goldman Sachs and Man Group. Nathaniel Jones, senior vice president of global threat intelligence at Darktrace, told City AM attackers were increasingly able to [...]

Hotel Petra opened its doors last June, timed to coincide with Copenhagen’s 3daysofdesign festival. For three days, this annual showcase transforms the capital into a temporary showroom, making the collaboration with Petra particularly fitting, given it’s a project from Danish design powerhouse &Tradition, which has been trading showrooms for guestrooms as it raises its ambitions [...]

Saudi Arabia remains keen to invest in sport despite scaling back funding for high-profile projects in golf, football and tennis, says the Public Investment Fund. PIF has retreated from bankrolling LIV Golf and extravagant spending on foreign players for the Saudi Pro League as well as giving up hosting the WTA Finals as part of [...]

Royal Mail will cut as many as 2,500 jobs as part of a root-and-branch overhaul that the ailing postal service hopes will reduce its overheads at a time of dwindling usage and scrutiny over its delivery performance. The group, which was bought off the London Stock Exchange by Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky in 2024, unveiled [...]

The chief executive of PwC UK said he expects the hiring of young people across the professional services sector to “push back up”, challenging the notion that AI is replacing junior work and slowing entry-level recruitment. Marco Amitrano, the Big Four giant’s UK chief executive and senior partner of PwC UK and the firm’s Middle [...]

Fast-fashion giant Shein took in more than £2.5bn in UK revenue last year as it tightens its hold on British shoppers despite its IPO woes. The e-commerce firm generated £2.58bn in revenue in 2025, newly published accounts show, as its pre-tax profit widened by 18 per cent to £45m. Proof of Shein’s growing presence in [...]

City AM meets the men who transformed the much-loved Simpsons Tavern into the new Cloth Cornhill How much can you fiddle with the recipe of… a sausage? “We’re now on the ninth iteration,” sighs Ben Butterworth, founder of Cloth Cornhill. “We’ve been fine tuning the details. It’s still a very peppery, well-seasoned sausage, only more [...]

The billionaire Weston family has struck a deal to buy Boots for $8.9bn, scuppering hopes that the high street giant could return to the London Stock Exchange. Wittington Investments, the company representing the Westons’ Canadian operations, said on Wednesday it will buy Boots from its private equity owners, Sycamore Partners. Alex Baldock, chief executive of [...]

Long gone are the days of life-long jobs and thank goodness – job-hopping is a joy, writes Shazam-investor-turned-play-director Ajay Chowdhury.

Andy Burnham’s pricey plans for nationalisation and greater public control of services have thrust Thames Water, housebuilders and the care sector under the microscope. But while public attention has centred primarily on these British heavyweights, the process of bringing the UK’s passenger rail services back into state hands has chugged along quietly, leaving the question [...]

Arsenal’s owners believe they can become “the biggest brand in the world” after being stunned by the global celebrations which greeted their long-awaited Premier League triumph this year. Footage of Gunners fans swarming the streets of East Africa and monuments from New York City to Guangzhou being lit up red flooded social media before 1m [...]

Green bike conglomerate Lime is pumping nearly £1m into hundreds of new e-bike parking bays as it looks to tackle the pavement clutter that has accompanied London’s rental bike boom. The capital’s biggest shared e-bike operator has awarded £886,857 to nine boroughs, including Greenwich, Lambeth and Hackney, to create or expand 586 parking bays this [...]

The Court of Appeal has overturned the fraud convictions of five former City traders previously convicted of Libor and Euribor-related offences. The five traders, who previously worked at Barclays, had their convictions quashed on Wednesday after the Supreme Court overturned the convictions of Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo last year, two former City traders who became the [...]

Rathbones has secured a financial licence allowing it to begin operating in Ireland and the EU, as the wealth manager looks to extend its reach across Europe. The firm was granted a Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) licence from the Central Bank of Ireland, which enables it to serve new and existing clients in [...]

Frasers Group, the retail empire founded by Mike Ashley, has taken a stake in athleisure giant Under Armour and built up its holding in fashion house Burberry. The London-listed conglomerate, which owns Sports Direct and Flannels, has pushed up its position in the FTSE 100 fashion brand from 4.2 to 6.3 per cent of the [...]

Kemi Badenoch has announced that the Tories will scrap inheritance taxes on family homes if the party is elected. In her main address to party members at the Conservatives’ conference, she said the Conservatives would restore “common sense” as political leaders enter a “battle for the soul of this nation”. The new pledge on inheritance [...]

With just a year to go before the final T+1 deadline, Andrew Douglas lays out what UK firms must accomplish to smoothly transition.

HSBC is putting a raft of roles in its UK wealth division on the chopping block following a push to slash costs with artificial intelligence. Europe’s biggest lender is consulting on changes to its wealth management operations that would lead to a shake-up for hundreds of relationship managers and financial advisers across the UK. The [...]

Land surrounding West Ham United’s London Stadium could be developed after architects were appointed to lead a consultation over the future use of the site in Stratford. “Potential development and leisure opportunities” will be scoped out by Populous, the global firm behind the likes of the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and Fulham’s Riverside Stand. It comes [...]

A leading investment platform is urging chancellor John Healey to not “penalise investors” at the upcoming Budget, as Brits brace for potential tax hikes. Anna Macdonald, investment strategy director at Hargreaves Lansdown, said fresh upheaval to the tax system could discourage investment in the UK at a time when economic growth is needed. In particular, [...]

India has laid out its vision for hosting the 2036 Olympics in Ahmedabad, promising the first Games on the subcontinent would “inspire millions” to play sport and transform “every part of our society”. Ahmedabad is among the favourites to stage the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 10 years’ time but faces competition from Doha, Munich, [...]

Hollywood Bowl called on its dynamic pricing system to endure falling ten-pin demand during the summer’s record heatwaves, prompting a share price boost. Britain’s biggest ten-pin bowling operator said the summer’s “exceptionally prolonged, dry weather” had “heavily impacted” its trading, as like-for-like sales in the UK fell 2.6 per cent in the second half of [...]

The UK will be uninvestable in the eyes of most energy companies if the government blocks the Jackdaw and Rosebank oilfields in the North Sea, the boss of Norway’s state-run oil and gas firm has warned. Equinor chief Anders Opedal said his firm could pull out of future projects in the UK if the two [...]

Former senior managers at Whitbread have led a deal to buy back nearly 60 restaurants from the group, after it wound up its Beefeater and Brewers Fayre chains last month. Common Table Group, a British hospitality firm, has agreed to buy 57 restaurant sites and one Premier Inn hotel from the FTSE 100 hotels giant. [...]

Jaguar finally showed the production Type 01 in New York last night, nearly two years after a rebrand that made it a national punchline. We think the car is a stunner, and the business case behind it is stronger than the critics allow. There are car launches, and then there are launches where an entire [...]

The finance arm of Volkswagen has taken a mammoth hit from the motor finance scandal plunging it to a loss for the year. Volkswagen Financial Services UK (VWFS) set aside £725m for expected expenses under the City watchdog’s industry-wide car finance redress scheme, according to new account filings. The provision swung the firm to a [...]

Shell is poised to reap major gains from its refining operations after the global surge in fuel prices dramatically ramped up the group’s profit margins. The blue-chip energy giant said on Wednesday it expects its indicative refining margin – the difference between the cost of crude oil and the market value of finished fuels like [...]

House prices in London fell at a faster rate last month, as homeowners in the capital continue to bear the brunt of the property market slowdown caused by the Iran war. The average house price in London fell by 2.2 per cent to £531,548 in the year to September, according to the Lloyds house price [...]

A senior City Football Group official who attended the Labour party conference days after Manchester City were found guilty of over 100 Premier League charges has told City AM he was there in a personal capacity. Chris Anderson, head of regulatory affairs at Manchester City parent company City Football Group, was among the delegates in [...]