UK
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Retail sales rose due to good weather and higher incomes. Despite this, the struggling retail sector looks to the festive season for a boost, as sales fell by 0.1% from May to August. Consumer confidence remains cautious.
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Reeves faces £18bn shortfall if public sector gains fail. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned that the government’s budget strategy rests on historically ambitious assumptions for productivity growth, with potential consequences for spending, taxation, and public services if efficiencies do not materialise.
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MPs and the Government respond after cross-party committee labels system “broken”. The Government has pledged to review all parental leave and pay entitlements, confirming scope across the board and promising day-one rights from 2026. Campaigners say that urgent action is still needed to extend and raise paternity leave.
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UK consumer confidence fell again in September amid tax fears. The GfK index dropped to -19, down from August’s -17, as all five survey measures weakened and expectations for the economy deteriorated sharply compared with mid-2024 levels.
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One in four organisations faced AI data poisoning this year. IO’s latest State of Information Security Report reveals how rushed adoption and shadow AI are exposing companies to sabotage, fraud, and compliance risks across the UK and US.
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Apax Global Alpha taken private in €916.5m deal. The London-listed trust has been acquired by Janus Bidco Limited, backed by Apax Partners and Ares Management, with shareholders to receive €1.90 per share in cash as the company delists from the London Stock Exchange.
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The Bank of England is set to slow quantitative tightening. Policymakers are expected to cut gilt sales from £100 billion to £67.5 billion a year, leaving rates unchanged at 4 per cent as they balance inflation control with concerns over bond market volatility.
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Lloyds Banking Group has signed a new multi-year deal with Broadcom. The agreement expands its use of VMware Cloud Foundation and mainframe software to modernise private cloud and strengthen digital banking services for millions of customers.
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Britain sees 84 new companies launched every hour in 2025. More than 363,000 businesses were registered from January to June 2025, despite a 21% decline from the previous year. Reforms and low SME confidence contributed to the decrease.
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Nvidia has revealed a major investment of up to £11 billion into the UK’s AI ecosystem. This project aims to create the largest GPU cluster in Europe by 2026, utilising 120,000 of Nvidia’s most recent Blackwell Ultra chips in new data centres.