UK Business News

Starbucks UK chief resigns

Phil Broad has quit less than a week after assuring The Times that difficulties in the US had not spread to Europe

Repossessions soar by 48% since January

Forecast of 45,000 seizures this year at a rate similar to late 1990s as risky borrowers suffer most, say experts

• Repossession Case study: garden designer, 63

• House prices back to 2006 and still falling

Sir Tom says sorry for record RBS loss

UK's second largest bank chalks up one of the biggest losses in corporate history amid calls for its chairman's head Watch video

• Are they just making up the numbers?

• Is Tom McKillop to resign from RBS?

Global Radio can own five London stations

OFT minded to approve combination of Capital and Heart thus allowing Global to control half London's radio ad market

World Business News

BAT share listing shake-up dashes bid hopes

Cigarette maker's takeover hopes end as South African shareholders Richemont and Remgro say they will spin off holding

AIG dives 18% on refusal to rule out share issue

The biggest US insurer writes down almost $12bn in the second quarter and refuses to rule out the issue of new shares

Smith & Nephew threatens to sue Plus bosses

Medical devices group says it discovered 'unacceptable sales practices' after paying £457 million for orthopaedics firm

• Alzheimer drug puts TauRx on biotech map

• Carl Icahn says bid for Imclone too low

Axa rises on pledge to match record profit

French insurance group defies sector's performance and will be helped by fewer natural disasters to new record

• Credit crunch tears into Europe's top insurers

• Insurance shares fall as Munich Re gives warning

Analysis

Is Tom McKillop to resign from RBS?

The bank's loss will be as much as £1.7 billion and you can already write the script of excuses by those running the show

• Nobel laureates consider state of the world

• Property market's winners and losers

Foundations of bricks and mortar shift

A residential property slump that is likely to prove about as severe as the crash in the early Nineties has taken hold

Tempus: Friends ... Smith & Nephew ... Cobham

Friends Provident takes a slide with wrong priorities ... S&N recovers some of its poise ... Cobham demonstrates economic resilience

Money 

Banks use scare tactics in ID theft cover

Many high street banks push expensive and often unnecessary protection policies

• Careless Facebook users ‘open to identity theft’

• Do you need to change your PIN or your attitude?

Energy giants are told to pay back billions

Utility firms could be taken to court for breaching EU rules on payment methods

• Millions face fuel bills at £100 a month

• Gas and electricity bills go up £200

Meet the men who beat the credit crunch

BlackRock's star fund managers are among the few to have made money since the crisis began a year ago

Law 

Track owners cleared of cartel claim

Bookmakers have failed in a multimillion-pound lawsuit over the rights to broadcast from tracks such as Ascot and Epsom

• Bookmaker admits to sending 'inappropriate' e-mail

Taylor Wessing sues rival for 'poaching'

The City firm has accused US firm Nixon Peabody of taking several Paris-based partners after merger talks broke down

BAA sues Ryanair over unpaid landing fees

Row over fees escalates after budget airline refuses to pay higher costs to land its planes at Stansted airport

business travel 

Profile: Simon Ainslie, Nokia UK

Phone boss talks about mobiles on planes, big hotel beds and clients stripping down to their boxers

• Profile: Dominic Lowe of Green & Black's

The end of laptop rage at security

America's security bosses have said travellers can now leave their laptops inside their bags for scannning, as long as the design is right

Review: Asus Eee PC 900

Asus has captured the world's imagination with its ultra-small laptop but is it any good for business travellers?

• Review: NDrive G800

• Review: O2 XDA Orbit 2