News

A variety of asset classes and investment strategies feature in the list of funds with the largest outflows in the first half of the year.

Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and RBS have agreed settlements with the FSA after the regulator found "serious failings" in their sales of interest rate hedging products.

Fixed income strategies continue to be the most desired asset class in the first six months of the year, with M&G topping the inflow charts.

The UK is increasingly likely to lose its AAA credit rating - but this may not spell disaster for the domestic bond market, according to M&G's Jim Leaviss.

Investors continued to exercise caution in their asset allocation in May, with bond and money market funds the most popular and equity funds seeing their first net outflow in 2012.

Threadneedle's Simon Brazier is to take over management of the £25m UK Select trust as the group lays out its plans for expansion into the investment trust space.

Chancellor George Osborne has pledged to use fines imposed by the Financial Services Authority to compensate taxpayers in the wake of the LIBOR scandal.

Chancellor George Osborne has called the manipulation of LIBOR rates by Barclays traders "a shocking indictment" of the greed of the financial sector, while confirming RBS and HSBC are also under investigation.

The Foreign & Colonial investment trust is to move to quarterly dividend payments and raise its total dividend for 2012 by 20%, as part of an overhaul of its distribution policy.

Barclays' share price plummeted 18% early this afternoon amid calls for boss Bob Diamond to quit in the wake of the LIBOR scandal, and following a speech from George Osborne attacking its traders 'systematic greed'.