Source: Sharecast
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Infrastructure group Balfour Beatty has secured a £833.0m contract with Technip Energies that will see it act as the construction partner for Net Zero Teesside Power - an onshore power, capture and compression project. Balfour Beatty said on Thursday that the full value of the contract will go into its order book by the end of Q225, with construction expected to commence this year and be completed in 2028.
Associated British Foods said on Thursday that it would wind down its bioethanol business unless the UK government was able to provide short-term funding for its losses. ABF said in April that its Vivergo unit was being "undermined" by regulations on imported ethanol and that the situation had been made "significantly worse" by the UK's trade deal with the US, which will allow tariff-free US ethanol into the UK. ABF said that talks with the government had started, but given the uncertainty around the outcome, it has stopped wheat purchases and will be forced to shut its plant before the end of its financial year on 13 September.
NEWSPAPER ROUND-UP
The wealth of the world's 3,000 billionaires has surged by $6.5trn in real terms over the past decade, according to Oxfam, equivalent to 14.6% of global output. In total, the richest 1% of the global population has gained at least $33.9trn in real terms, which the charity said was "enough to end annual global poverty 22 times over". – Guardian
China's installations of wind and solar in May are enough to generate as much electricity as Poland, as the world's second-biggest economy breaks further records with its rapid buildup of renewable energy infrastructure. China installed 93 GW of solar capacity last month – almost 100 solar panels every second, according to an analysis by Lauri Myllyvirta, a senior fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute. Wind power installations reached 26 GW, the equivalent of about 5,300 turbines. – Guardian
Rachel Reeves has been warned that tax rises are "paralysing" British businesses, with one in three companies cutting jobs to weather the £25.0bn National Insurance raid. Shevaun Haviland, head of the British Chambers of Commerce, will on Thursday tell the Chancellor not to increase taxes on business in the autumn, warning that doing so would damage growth. – Telegraph
The government has been warned that taxing business further may endanger its growth mission after new research showed firms are cutting staff in the wake of the recent £25.0bn national insurance increase. In a speech at the British Chambers of Commerce's annual conference in London on Thursday, Shevaun Haviland, director general of the business lobby group, will press ministers to ease the cost burden on business. – The Times
Household incomes are on course to grow by only £300 by the end of the decade in a "bleak" outlook dominated by rising taxes, higher energy bills and squeezed state benefits, the Resolution Foundation has warned. The think tank has calculated that the average British household will see incomes grow by only 1% between 2025 and 2030, excluding housing costs, while the poorest families suffer a 1% drop in living standards. The UK's economic disparities are set to widen, with the wealthiest households on course for an equivalent 1% rise in income in the second half of the decade. – The Times
US CLOSE
Major indices delivered a mixed performance on Wednesday as investors digested ongoing newsflow from the Middle East, as well as uncertainty regarding the Federal Reserve's next policy decision.
At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was 0.25% lower at 42,982.43, while the S&P 500 was flat at 6,092.16 and the Nasdaq Composite saw out the session 0.31% firmer at 19,973.55
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com