The Contrarian Investor raises an issue I've been pondering recently: in today's financial climate, are stocks and shares old hat? They're only a market in what companies are willing to let the public invest. If I were a rich entrepreneur who'd been smart enough to get into cash a year or two ago, I'd be looking to take my company back into private ownership, or buy anothe...

John Redwood has all the details: The government has decided to set up a holding company, UK Financial Investments Ltd, to own and manage all the shares in banks and building societies the government is accumulating at enormous expense to the taxpayer. Now, why would you want to do that? Why doesn’t the government just say they will hold the shares direct but leave the management of each bank to...

BP's shares suffered their worst one-day fall for 18 years as investors reacted with dismay to the failure of the company's efforts to stop the company's leaking oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, cutting the company's market value to just two thirds of its level before the accident

As many as five million private shareholders could end up being dragged into capital gains tax net, after figures suggested far more people owned company shares than previously thought.

Who has ever heard of the private company Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation? Shouldn’t all of us be some what familiar with a company that holds $40 trillion in assets and last year handled “more than $1.86 quadrillion” in securities transactions?

Lloyds shares have opened 14% down after the company was given a £260bn bail-out over the weekend.

The 'golden shares' in Portugal Telecom used by Lisbon to block the company's sale of a stake in its Brazilian mobile phone joint venture were ruled unlawful by Europe's top court

Good to see a bit of media recognition today which overtly acknowledges our now consistent out-performing of Labour on private fundraising efforts. The Financial Times reports: Private and company donations to Labour have plummeted to a 10th of their pre-election average in the first six months of Ed Miliband’s leadership, according to research by the

The continued fall in share prices now means that RBS's market capitalisation is only about £11.5bn. And it is failing to off-load new shares onto investors. As such, if it takes full advantage of the government's recapitalisation scheme, then the state would probably own more preference shares than the private sector owns ordinary shares. In such a situation, it might make more sense to national...

So argues Robert Reich on his blog . I am inclined to agree with him. If a private company is very large and so its failure would cause systematic problems, then the company could well be too large for the public good. Legislation, both here and in the US, has been designed to prevent private monopolies developing. If markets are competitive, with a significant number of players, then the failure ...