Salmon leaps up Spreadex ladder

Ping! A press release arrives from spread betting house Spreadex. It has just appointed a new manager of its "Financial Trading Room" (caps obligatory) and I'll let the company take it from here:
"Tom Salmon has taken up the role at the age of just 25 after impressing during his four years with the firm.
Spreadex Managing Director Jonathan Hufford said: 'We like to think of ourselves as a forward thinking company and are keen to promote people to positions of responsibility when they have proved their worth, no
matter what their age.' Tom is originally from Blackpool and studied maths at Manchester University, where he specialised in applied maths."
Young maths geek in charge? There are literally no recorded examples of this ever going wrong.

Budget is taxing the spreadies

I see that there's much speculation in financial freesheet, City AM, that previously tax-free spread betting gains are going to be clobbered with capital gains tax in the emergency budget.

That would be a monumentally stupid move, as one of the unspoken facts about the spread betting industry is that most punters don't actually win, so the government would be introducing a new rule where most of them could simply write their routine losses off against tax.

Michael Fallon, the Tory MP tipped to chair the Treasury Select Committee, is well aware of all this, but the stories are still causing much consternation among the spreadies, as such a move would cancel one of the industry's big draws.

To illustrate how dear they hold their tax-free selling point, one provider has just shelled out on a massive ad campaign which is ready to go straight after the budget. It plans to inform punters that they can counter any CGT rises by using tax-free spread betting. Let's hope City AM has got its facts wrong.

Relocation, relocation, relocation...

Does spread betting giant, IG Group, suddenly feel confident enough to become proper part of the City?
I hear that the FTSE 250 company has just signed a deal on new office space in the heart of the Square Mile - just behind Cannon Street station.
The relocation comes after years slumming it at its Blackfriars Road office - an unimpressive building that was (even worse) located south of the river.