And finally…Man sells trading firm he set up with £4k for £200m

An entrepreneur who launched his currencies trading business with £4,250 of start-up capital has just sold it for more than £200 million to the private equity firm that is buying RBS spin-off bank Williams & Glyn.

According to The Times newspaper, Mayank Patel, 47, founded Currencies Direct, which specialises in helping small firms and wealthy individuals buy and sell currency, in 1996.

He owned 63 per cent of the company before selling to Williams & Glyn buyer Corsair Capital and its partner Palamon Capital.

London-based Currencies Direct has 150,000 clients and processes $4.5 billion of transactions every year and has operations on in Europe, Australia, South Africa and America.

Mr Patel, who was born in Zambia and is of Indian descent, was made an OBE last year.

He will retain a small stake and will be honorary president.

Lord Davies of Abersoch, the chairman of Corsair, said he was very excited about the company’s global prospects.