BUDGET

Chancellor George Osborne has announced a clampdown on venture capital trusts (VCTs) and enterprise investment schemes (EIS') purely set up to access tax reliefs.

Shrewd punters who had a flutter on George Osborne sporting a blue tie in today's Budget would not have been disappointed, after the favourite came in at 3/1.

Skandia Investment Group (SIG) has replaced Goldman Sachs as manager of its offshore $158m European Equity fund, installing General Electric Asset Management to run the fund.

UK equity income stalwart Neil Woodford has argued further quantitative easing measures in the UK may be stifled by a sharp rise in the oil price.

Jim O'Neill, the chairman of Goldman Sachs Asset Management, said markets are displaying signs of a return to normality, boosted by an improving US economy.

Technology giant Apple has announced it will return cash to shareholders for the first time since 1995, deploying some of its $98bn cash mountain, while also committing to a share buyback programme.

European indices have opened trading in the red, reversing some of last week's gains, as investors take profits ahead of a crucial week for of UK data.

Andrew Bell's £1.1bn Witan investment trust has conceded it was too highly leveraged last year, after reporting a sharp drop in its NAV for 2011.

F&C Asset Management was one of the biggest losers in the FTSE 250 today after the group revealed a spike in outflows in 2011 and a dip in profits.