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[keasy]

Aye that's fair enough that shares are offered at a discount as incentive for them to buy new shares or potential new investors and if they don't sell enough the value of a share is diluted. That's all fine, but you still don't explain why HBOS are claiming 17% of a share.
It's not that the shares are worth less HBOS are taking a cut. Even after the diluted worth of a share they are still taking 17%.
You still aren't getting it/what I am trying to say.

[Wooster]

That 17% would be the money they make from the rights issue for every shareholder who didn't take up their options.
That money goes straight back to the bank when they sell them on your behalf.

The only way the shareholder can recoup some of their losses is to buy the extra shares offered.

Sometimes the rights issue can have a positive effect on the share price (if the bank are trying to raise extra capital to buy out another company for example), but the climate at the time meant that people panicked, saw it as a sign that the bank was in serious difficulty (which it was) and started bailing out.
So by the time the Rights issue was meant to go ahead, the existing shares were worth less than the fixed price of the new shares. (so it would be cheaper to buy shares on the open market)

That's when they decided that it was a waste of time going ahead with it.
This is what the situation was the day before their deadline..
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article4348639.ece

[keasy]

Japan in a slump.

Recession ? Yes but  Feck no, it's depression, it's a slump.

Japan's economy is now in recession and comparable to the economic world value they held in the year ...1982!!!


That's real economic terms not just  relative btw, but to put relative perspective upon it...Japan is (was until their slump) the second largest growing economy in the world.


It's always nice to see someone else fecked isn't it ?!!!   

[Wooster]

That's twice they've been humped in 20 years.
They had their own property crash back in 1990.

There's a lot of UK jobs reliant on the Japanese economy though, that's the rub.

[keasy]

We're a World economy and market now anyway, so we all depend on each other these days more than ever.


Get the tax dodgers and hang any bankers who dare mutter the word' bonus'.

[AlexC]

Osborne fights those ‘mugging taxpayers’ (MPs, bankers, and tax evasion/avoidance by the rich excluded):

“Osborne has announced a crackdown on benefit cheats, comparing them to muggers robbing taxpayers of their hard-earned money (unlike the banks then…).

A new drive to tackle benefit and tax credit fraud will include mobile hit squads of inspectors being sent to areas where the problem is rife, he said.

Repeat offenders could have their benefits suspended for as long as four years.

Osborne has said that bringing down the welfare bill will play a crucial role in easing the impact of state spending cuts as he tries to pay down Britain's structural deficit over the coming four years.

Fraud in the benefit and tax credit system is estimated to cost the taxpayer around £1.5 billion a year.

Osborne told the News of the World: "This is a fight. We are really going to go after the welfare cheats.

"Frankly, a welfare cheat is no different from someone who comes up and robs you in the street. It's your money. This money is paid through our taxes which is meant to be going to the most vulnerable in our society, not into the pockets of criminals."

The new anti-fraud drive will make use of high-tech data-tracking techniques to track the "muddy footprints" of professional cheats, said the Department for Work and Pensions.

Some 200 additional inspectors are to be recruited to a new investigation service, which will detect the patterns of fraudulent activities by looking at shared data from government offices and credit reference agencies.

Welfare reform minister Lord Freud warned that no wrongful claimant will be let off under the new measures.

Minor offenders will be issued with instant fines of £50 or more, while repeat fraudsters face a three-year benefit ban under a "three-strikes-and-you're-out" rule.

Investigators will also aim to seize more of the assets of those found guilty of benefit fraud.

Osborne declined to discuss press reports that he will save billions by cutting thousands of police officers and abolishing Child Benefit for 16-19 year-olds, currently paid to teenagers who stay on in education or training.”

‘Lord’ Ashcroft is currently unavailable for comment... 

[Wooster]

From the LSE

Tax dodgers cost government £42bn


Crime and errors lost the Treasury tens of billions of pounds in tax revenue last year.



17 Sep - 11:44

Treasury coffers missed out on an incredible £42bn of tax revenue in 2009 – 9% of total tax liability - according to a new survey by HM Revenue & Customs.

Figures show the tax gap – the difference between tax collected and the tax that should be collected – grew by around £4bn between 2007/08 and 2008/09, the last period for which data is available.

Individuals returning incorrect self assessment forms are thought to have cost the government almost £6bn of income and corporation tax some £6.9bn, but VAT is the biggest culprit, losing the exchequer £15.2bn last year.

Smuggling is responsible for costing almost half the revenue from hand rolled tobacco – about £0.6bn – while £1.1bn of cigarette duty goes missing each year.

A section of the report was devoted to VAT swindles by organised crime - worth as much as £2bn in attempted fraud and a £1.5bn impact on VAT receipts during 2009/10 - although that’s far less than the figures four years before.

HMRC explained that fraudulent traders buy goods VAT free from EU member states, then charge VAT on their onward sale and go “missing” to avoid paying the VAT charged to the appropriate tax authorities.

Suddenly that £1.5Bn doesn't seem quite so large.

In fairness, Danny Alexander announced that they'll be going after the fat cat tax dodgers last month.
Whether that promise ever materialises or turns out to be ConDem whitewash is another story.

[AlexC]

I’ll lay you odds they won’t.

The aim of the ‘cuts’ is to create a large pool of cheap labour for others to exploit.

As for “fraudsters”, we already know that the banks won’t suffer, but is there any valid reason for differentiating between those deemed to have received benefits to which they weren’t entitled and MPs who defraud/defrauded the Expenses system?

How about:

First offence – one year’s salary and banned from Parliament for a year.

Repeat offenders – seizure of assets, forced to relinquish seat and any pension due for being an MP, a large fine and possible imprisonment.

Never going to happen.

In the interests of ‘fairness’, the benefits due to claimants, which they – for whatever reason – did not get but were entitled, will now be awarded them?

Never going to happen.

And the Chinless Wonder is just, like his boss, a mouthpiece for their Tory masters.

 

A cheat is no different from someone who comes up and robs you in the street. It's your money paid through your taxes, and not intended to line the pockets of those (allegedly) representing you.

[Wooster]

They were slated for the three strikes and you're out rule when they first unveiled the plans a few months ago.
When it was looked into, it was discovered that no-one had ever tried (or been caught for) it three times.

Dunno about the cheap labour idea either, but you might be on the right track
Over the last decade there were plenty of jobs to go around, but they were jobs that most turned their noses up at...fuelling the rise in immigration everyone was getting so biscuit arsed about.
They probably hope the new measures (including trying to get everyone off  incapacity benefits) might force people into taking these jobs and reducing immigration levels as a bonus.

[keasy]

Immigration policy is just too stupid.
Only applying to non EU immigrants it means we no longer get the skills we need from outside the EU but we still get the eastern Europeans that comeo ver here to sell the big issue.  Pointless pandering to populist politics is all it is.

They should scrap it and allow non EU back and place a time limit on the EU immigrants that haven't found work within a year.

[gi joe]

How is cutting the military a good idea when we're at war.  Idiots.  One of the big army blokes have also said it's not a good idea getting rid of the jets and carrier.  Because what if Argentina decide they want the Falkland islands again.  They could use that cut of equipment as a sign we're now weaker and they could successfully attack.

[Wooster]

Did anyone see Dispatches the other night about the tax dodging Tories? (including Osborne himself)

Anyhoo, because of the Banks (not Labour by themselves) we are left with a crippled military, crippled social welfare, crippled policing, crippled education and by all accounts up to 500,000 extra people on the dole (not including the knock on effects to other employers...and lets not forget their dependants) due to cutbacks in the public sector as a whole.
If you think it's bad now, you ain't seen nothing yet.

How the hell are all those people flung onto the dole expected to pay their mortgages?
And what will that do to the value of your property?

[gi joe]

500k on the dole and VAT going up to 20% so no ones gonna want to buy anything.  Welcome to the double dip.  Money they save from putting them on the dole gets lost with them claiming dole.  Haven't heard about any cuts to the government.  Cutting down on their expenses etc.

Also, the bus and train fares going up?  WTF!  So they keep putting up petrol prices to get us out our cars to use public transport, yet put the public transport prices up so high no one wants to use them.

Cutting prison sentances?  Clever, more scum on the streets. Cutting police, more chav scum getting away with shit.

PMs?  Will be just sitting back, sipping on wine and laughing and staying rich.  Like the Yuppies did back in the 80s.

Put I do agree, there is a lot of waste in the public sector that needed sorting out.

[Wooster]

No doubt.

If you are close to those in Westminster, no doubt there will be money making opportunities aplenty, since they'll have the heads up on the services that are likely to move into the private sector.
Chances are the plans are already well under way among the favoured few.

[Splinter]

How is cutting the military a good idea when we're at war.  Idiots.  One of the big army blokes have also said it's not a good idea getting rid of the jets and carrier.  Because what if Argentina decide they want the Falkland islands again.  They could use that cut of equipment as a sign we're now weaker and they could successfully attack.

Joe, the Argentine military has had it's balls cut off and teeth blunted, following the last military government in 1983.
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner may sound off from time to time about her beloved 'Sisters' ie the Malvinas, but neither the people, the politicians nor the military have the will to enter into such a suicidal venture.
It would be utter madness, not to mention the fact that even now, they are still licking their wounds. I speak to many Argentines about the war and most consider it to have been a tragedy, the turning point of which was the sinking of the cruiser Belgrano.
The military thinking at that time ie General and President, Galtieri, was that the British would never send a force 7000 miles to fight for a couple of wind swept islands.
Believe me, if it ever occurs again, which i doubt, it would be even nastier than in 1982.