Fancy that...

No mention in the Daily Mail this morning that Viscount Rothermere, chairman of Daily Mail and General Trust, has joined the likes of Michael Spencer at ICAP, Tim Martin at JD Wetherspoon and Brian Souter at Stagecoach, in pledging shares as security for a loan.
So we best go back to Ben Laurence's Mail column of January 10, to find out what the newspaper really thinks about this practice.
Then Laurence wrote: "The upshot is that directors who have used shares as collateral to obtain a loan without disclosing the fact will escape any penalty whatsoever. Frankly, this looks like a shambles. Too often, the regulatory regime covering the City and financial services looks rickety. The fact that people who have patently broken the directors' code and violated the spirit of the disclosure requirements are now going to escape censure or punishment is lamentable."
Oh well.

Surveillance...

JD Wetherspoon boss Tim Martin outside the Royal Courts of Justice at lunchtime today. Unusually for the casual-dressing, mullet-loving Tim, pictured, he was wearing a suit. Was he in the dock for crimes against hairstyles? Amazingly not. JDW is actually suing its former property adviser Van de Berg for fraud and breach of contract.