News

Magazine archive
Lloyds to return £3.1bn to investors as profits surge past forecasts

Lloyds Banking Group is handing more than £3.1 billion back to shareholders after delivering stronger-than-expected annual profits, underlining the financial firepower of Britain’s biggest domestic lender. The FTSE 100 bank reported full-year pre-tax profits of £6.66 billion, up 12 per cent on 2024 and comfortably ahead of the £6.38 billion forecast by City analysts. The performance was supported by lower-than-expected bad loan provisions and growing income from non-lending activities. Lloyds announced a final dividend of...

New wave of ‘zombie’ companies faces collapse as financial distress surges

Tens of thousands of so-called “zombie” businesses could collapse this year as mounting cost pressures and weak demand push companies to breaking point, insolvency specialists have warned. New research from Begbies Traynor shows a sharp rise in businesses experiencing severe financial strain, with a 44 per cent increase in companies classed as being in “critical financial distress” in the final three months of last year compared with the same period in 2024. In total, 67,369...

Trump warns UK it’s ‘very dangerous’ to do business with China after Starmer’s Beijing meeting

President Donald Trump warned the U.K. Thursday against strengthening ties with China, hours after Prime Minister Keir Starmer met President Xi Jinping in Beijing to reset relations after a long period of strain. Trump’s remarks came as Starmer and Xi had called for a renewed ‘strategic partnership,’ highlighting the pressures facing them amid global instability. Speaking to Fox News while traveling to Florida for the premiere of first lady Melania Trump’s documentary, Trump was asked...

Trump declares national emergency over Cuba, threatens tariffs on nations that supply oil to communist regime

President Donald Trump on Thursday declared a national emergency via an executive order over Cuba, accusing the communist regime of aligning with hostile foreign powers and terrorist groups while moving to punish countries that supply the island nation with oil. Thursday’s executive order states that the policies and actions of the Cuban government constitute ‘an unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national...

Trump administration eases sanctions on Venezuelan oil industry after Maduro’s capture

The Trump administration announced Thursday it was easing sanctions on the Venezuelan oil industry, as the U.S. aims to ramp up production in the South American country following the capture of dictator Nicolás Maduro earlier this month. The U.S. Treasury said it is authorizing transactions involving the government of Venezuela and state-owned oil company PdVSA that are ‘ordinarily incident and necessary to the lifting, exportation, reexportation, sale, resale, supply, storage, marketing, purchase, delivery, or transportation...

Rubio revokes Iranian officials’ US travel privileges over deadly protest crackdown killing thousands

Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently revoked Iranian senior officials and their family members’ privilege to travel to the U.S., citing ongoing oppression by the regime. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s regime is accused of killing more than 6,200 protesters since Dec. 28, with nearly 17,100 additional arrests as internet communications remain halted, according to the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA). ‘As the people of Iran continue to fight for their basic rights,...

House conservatives skeptical as Senate deal sacrificing DHS spending reached: ‘Non-starter’

House conservatives are expressing skepticism after Senate Democrats and the White House announced a deal had been reached to fund the government without a long-term Department of Homeland Security funding bill. One House member warned that Republicans should not give in to demands to ‘handcuff ICE.’   With any deal reached in the Senate needing approval in the House of Representatives, Rep. Mark Harris, R-N.C., told Fox News Digital, ‘[Senate Minority Leader Chuck] Schumer’s current demands,...

Trump files $10B lawsuit against IRS over alleged tax return leaks to major news outlets

President Donald Trump has filed a $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS, accusing the agency of unlawfully leaking his confidential tax returns in a politically motivated violation of federal privacy laws. A spokesman for Trump’s legal team told Fox News ‘a rogue, politically motivated’ IRS employee disclosed private and confidential tax information involving Trump, his family and the Trump Organization to outlets, including The New York Times and ProPublica. The suit claims the disclosures were...

UK bans Coinbase adverts that suggested crypto could ease cost-of-living pressures

The UK’s advertising watchdog has banned a series of adverts by Coinbase, ruling that they implied cryptocurrency could help ease cost-of-living pressures and downplayed the risks associated with crypto investing. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) upheld complaints from members of the public after the adverts ran in August, depicting Britain in various states of decline alongside a satirical slogan and the Coinbase logo. The campaign included three poster adverts and a video which portrayed families,...

Driverless taxis could hit UK roads as early as September, Waymo says

Driverless taxis could begin operating in the UK as soon as September, according to Waymo, the US self-driving car firm owned by Alphabet. Waymo said it plans to launch a pilot robotaxi service in London in April, with the ambition of carrying paying passengers later in the year once regulations allow. The UK government has said it intends to introduce new rules in the second half of 2026 to permit fully autonomous taxi services, though...