Archive for January, 2009
British student dies on ski holiday
A British student froze to death after apparently slipping on ice and falling into a river while on holiday in the French Alps, police said today.
Rachel Ward, 20, a second year natural sciences student at Durham University, was found dead in Val d’Isère early yesterday.
Ward, from Halifax, West Yorkshire, had been out with friends on Monday night but left early to return to her apartment alone. At around 1.15am she sent a text message to a friend saying that she was lost.
French police believe that soon after she slipped on ice and tumbled into the Isère river, where she died of hypothermia.
“There’s no trace of bruising and we are investigating it as a probable accident,” said an official from the gendarmerie in Val d’Isère.
Her body was found the next morning by a man on his way to work.
Durham University paid tribute to Ward, who attended Collingwood College, saying she was both academically gifted and active in extra-curricular activities.
“Everyone in Collingwood is shocked by Rachel’s tragic death. She was a bright, popular student, who was academically talented and enjoyed participating in sport and other college activities,” said Professor Ed Corrigan, principal of the college. “She will be missed by all of us. We extend our deeply felt sympathy to her family and to her many friends.”
Ward’s team-mates from Durham University hockey club also paid tribute to the student.
“Rachel was an active member of our hockey club as club treasurer and regular player in the women’s 3rd team,” said the club’s captain, Phil Mutlow. “Rachel was one of the best – she always had a smile on her face and was lovely to be around.”
Ward’s parents have travelled to Val d’Isère where they are being assisted by British consular officials.
The student’s death came days after two young British friends, Rob Gauntlett and James Atkinson, both 21, died in a climbing accident in nearby Chamonix.
Ward was on a student-organised ski and snowboarding holiday with travel operator On the Piste.
The company, based in Withington, Manchester, said in a statement: “The police have confirmed that the incident was an accidental death and they are not looking for anyone else in connection with the incident.
“Our staff are doing everything possible to assist the family and local authorities. Senior managers are in the resort to accompany the family, in addition to supporting local staff and customers who may have been affected.”
Mortgage rates: First-time buyers are missing out on low-cost deals
Nationalised bank Northern Rock announced today it was only passing on half of last week’s interest rate cut to its variable rate mortgage customers.
The lender is reducing its standard variable rate (SVR) by 0.25% to 5.09% with effect from 1 February; at the same time tracker mortgage customers will see their rates fall by the full 0.5%.
Northern Rock said that in deciding how much of the base rate reduction to pass on it had “given careful consideration to all of its customers”. Savings rates at the bank are currently being reviewed.
Last week, RBS and the UK’s largest lender, Halifax, also opted to reduce its SVR by just 0.25% rather than passing on the full cut.
Few other lenders have announced a rate change, although borrowers on SVR-linked deals with Nationwide and Skipton building societies, C&G and HSBC have been told their rates will go down in line with last week’s cut. Bradford & Bingley, which was also nationalised last year, is yet to announce its plans.
A flurry of new low-cost home loans have been launched in the wake of last week’s base rate cut, but first-time buyers and those with small deposits have been left out in the cold.
Despite the Bank of England’s half-point cut, which reduced the base rate to 1.5%, millions of borrowers will not benefit from the lower mortgage rates. These include first-time buyers and existing homeowners who no longer qualify for cheap deals but have seen a huge rise in the ratio of the size of their mortgage to the value of their home as a result of falling property prices.
Today, HSBC launched what it said was its lowest ever mortgage rate – a discounted variable deal at 2.99% which will be available from 6 February. However, to qualify borrowers must have a deposit of at least 40% and either earn £75,000 or more or have at least £50,000 saved with the bank.
Barclays has cut its fixed-rate mortgages to 3.79% for borrowers with 60% equity in their homes, while Abbey has also cut rates to below 4%, but borrowers with less than 25% of a property’s asking price still face rates of more than 7%.
Abbey’s new range of cheaper home loans includes a two-year fixed-rate deal with a rate of 3.99%, available up to 60% loan-to-value (LTV), but there is nothing for anyone with less than 25% to put down. Borrowers with only 5% of a property’s purchase price must pay 7.09% for the bank’s five-year fixed-rate deal.
For any borrower with a 10% deposit- a sum once accepted by all lenders as a ready key to a decent mortgage – the best two-year fix on offer from HSBC is 6.79%. At Barclays there is no home loan available for anyone with less than a 15% deposit; its best rate for borrowers with an LTV of 85% is 6.79%.
Putting it away
Savers, too, are beginning to feel the pressure. Although the vast majority of institutions have yet to act on last week’s interest rate cut, former top-payer Anglo Irish has slashed the rates on its easy access deposit and seven-day notice accounts by 2.1 percentage points to 2.5% and 2.55% respectively.
Leeds building society has repriced its fixed-rate bonds for new customers to take December’s rate cut into account – its one-year fixed-rate savings bond now pays 2.5%, down from 3%, and its three-year fixed-rate bond offers 3%, down from 3.5%.
Indian bank ICICI has cut rates on its HiSave account. The interest paid on the account, which has regularly appeared in the best-buy tables, will fall from 4.5% to 3.55%.
Price comparison site Moneyexpert.com said banks and buildings societies had withdrawn almost a quarter of all savings accounts that were on offer this time last year, and slashed average interest rates.
Over the past 12 months, the number of instant access savings accounts has slumped from 1,478 to 1,136.
Sean Gardner, director of MoneyExpert, said: “Banks need a fresh injection of cash, but they need the security of long-term investments to really improve liquidity. So instant access savings accounts aren’t a priority at the moment, which explains why a quarter have been withdrawn completely.”
While the number has fallen, so has the average rate paid out: on Monday, Bank of England figures showed that weeks before this month’s base rate cut banks and building societies were offering the lowest interest rates since records started in 1995.
Official bank data showed that in December average interest rates on instant access accounts, “notice” accounts and short-term savings bonds had all fallen below 1%.
• Is now the time to look again at fixed-rate mortgages? See the Cash section in this Sunday’s Observer for the latest opinion
Man Group plans to sue Madoff
Man Group is planning to launch legal action to recover its losses from the Madoff scandal.
The hedge fund manager, which reported a significant fall in its assets under management this morning, confirmed that it may turn to the courts to recover any losses from the alleged $50bn fraud. “We are actively reviewing all options to recover assets for our investors,” a Man spokesman said this morning.
Earlier, chief executive Peter Clarke told Reuters that Man “will be suing the people involved,” adding: “We will take action in conjunction with our institutional investors.”
Man’s institutional fund-of-funds operation, RMF, has invested around $360m (£247m) in two funds that had links to Madoff Securities. According to Man, this equates to just 1.5% of RMF’s total funds under management.
Earlier this week, Bernard Madoff again dodged attempts to confine him to prison. He remains at his Manhattan apartment on $10m bail.
Man reported today that its total assets under management has fallen to $53bn by the end of 2008, down from $68bn in September – more than analysts expected. The company said that most of the decline was due to its decision to “deleverage” its investments to reduce risk, in response to falling stockmarkets.
UK airports see dip in passenger numbers
The number of passengers travelling through Britain’s major airports dipped last year, figures out today showed.
The seven UK airports run by the BAA company, which include Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, handled 145.8 million passengers in 2008 – a drop of 2.8% compared with 2007.
At 66.9 million, the number of passengers using Heathrow airport last year was down 1.4%, while Gatwick dipped 2.8% and Stansted fell 6%.
The government is due this month to decide whether to give the go-ahead to expansion at Heathrow in the form of a third runway and a sixth terminal.
Expansion would increase the number of air transport movements (take-off and landings) from around 480,000 a year to 702,000.
Today, BAA announced that air traffic movements at Heathrow had dipped by 0.5% in 2008 to a total of 473,139.
There was a fall in passenger numbers last year at all four of BAA’s other UK airports, with Southampton down 0.8%, Glasgow dipping 6.8%, Edinburgh declining 0.5% and Aberdeen going down 3.5%.
The figures for December alone showed that the seven airports handled 10.18 million passengers – 6.9% down on the December 2007 total.
Heathrow numbers last month were down only 2.3%, but Gatwick passenger numbers fell 13.8%, while Stansted was down 13.0%, Southampton fell 5.4%, Glasgow decreased 10.7%, Edinburgh was down 2,5% and Aberdeen declined 3.2%
In the individual sectors, the biggest passenger fall last year was on European and North African charter routes which were down 7.4% compared with 2007. All other sectors fell , too, with the UK and Channel Islands’ traffic dropping 5.9%.
Taking December alone, the biggest fall was on European and North African charter flights where passenger numbers plunged 21.6%.
Air transport movements for December were down 5.8% compared with December 2007, while movements for the whole of 2008 were down 2.4% compared with 2007.
BAA said today: “We expect, on the evidence of historic economic downturns and the resulting effect on air traffic, that the long-term prospects for growth remain good and that passenger volumes will recover in due course.”
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