UNITED KINGDOM

Barclays Capital, the investment banking arm of Britain's Barclays Plc, has named Mark Bamford as head of global syndicate to replace Geert Vinken, who is retiring.

Swiss bank UBS AG is confident the 287 million pound ($560 million) rights issue it is underwriting for British mortgage lender Paragon will be successful, a source close to the bank said on Monday.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said that the decision to nationalise Northern Rock was the right move at the right time for the right reasons. Brown was speaking at a Downing Street briefing, after the news broke on Sunday that the struggling mortgage lender would be nationalized.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown defended his reputation for sound economic management on Monday in the face of mounting criticism over his decision to nationalize ailing bank Northern Rock after lending it 25 billion pounds ($49 billion). Brown helped transform the Labour Party in the 1990s by ditching an attachment to state ownership.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown faced a political and public backlash on Monday after his decision to take ailing bank Northern Rock Plc into public ownership, the first UK nationalization since the 1970s.

The market for KPO or Knowledge Process Outsourcing, which follows the success waves created by ITO (Information and Technology Outsourcing) in the 1980s and the BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) in the 1990s, is expected to touch $10-17 billion by 2010 and India is well poised to grab a major share of the market, a research paper released by the global audit, tax and advisory services group KPMG has revealed.

The U.K. government will nationalize Northern Rock Plc bank after a bid by Virgin Group Ltd. was rejected, Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling said today. The government did not select either of two bids by a Virgin consortium and an in-house proposal.

According to the Ministry of Justice, the number of companies applying to be wound up in England and Wales dropped by three per cent in 2007. Latest figures indicate 11,791 companies folded last year due to insolvency or other problems.

Lactalis McLelland has admitted its role in a diary price fixing scandal in which top supermarket chains and diary producers stand accused of colluding to fix the retail price diary products.

China's securities regulator has approved the creation of at least three new mutual funds to raise more than 20 billion yuan ($2.8 billion), in an apparent effort to support the sagging stock market, sources said on Friday.

Signs of economic slowdown in the US and rupee appreciation notwithstanding, the National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom), the consortium that serves as the apex body of the Indian IT software and BPO industry said that India's IT-BPO industry is poised to achieve the target of $75 billion in overall software and services revenues by 2010.

The Competition Commission has said it may release a long awaited remedies report on the UK grocery market on Friday.

The EU Commissioner for Information Society and Media, Vivane Reding, has said that parts of the UK will be exempt from EU regulations on the telecoms market because of sufficiently high competition.

Manchester United has moved up the league table of the world's richest football clubs, putting it just behind Real Madrid, who have held their top position for the third consecutive year.

Viruses on mobile phones are still rare but nearly three-quarters of mobile phone users in developed countries are worried about security on their handsets, a survey showed on Wednesday.

Two suitors competing to rescue British bank Northern Rock have been told to improve their offers to beat the alternative of nationalization, sources familiar with the matter said. The Virgin consortium, though, has been picked as a front-runner, ahead of a rival in-house proposal led by the mortgage bank's current management team, the sources said.

India's largest IT services, business solutions and outsourcing company, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has launched its second Global Delivery Center (GDC) near Hyderabad even as it announced reorganization of its global operations for better efficiency.

Indian workers in Gulf countries appear to be the most disgruntled employees in the Middle-East among all expatriates, a survey conducted by the Arabian Business website has revealed.

Scottish & Newcastle (S&N) today announced its plan to close its Berkshire Brewery near Reading by early 2010. The brewer said it would immediately begin consultation with employees at the site, who will be affected by the closure.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Tuesday Iran was still seeking to build nuclear weapons and called for a greater international effort to prevent Tehran from succeeding.

In December house prices rose by 0.4 per cent on the previous month, according to the latest figures from the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG).Despite this the figures still point towards a slow down in house price growth. The latest statistics said that the annual rate of house price inflation was 9.1 per cent – down from 9.7 per cent in November.The latest figures add to evidence which suggests that the housing market boom may be coming to an end. Last year top mo...