News

Edinburgh-based Lloyds Banking Group has reported a 38 per cent rise in half year pre-tax profits while at the same time setting aside a further £1.4 billion to compensate customers to whom it mis-sold payment protection insurance (PPI). The bank said profits for the six months to the end of June w

Construction workloads in Scotland have risen by a third thanks to a rise in private house building and office development activity, according to a survey. The latest RICS UK Construction Market Survey found 33 per cent more respondents reporting higher activity levels in the second quarter of this

David Milroy The Scottish Loan Fund has announced that it has sunk £3.5m of funding into Paywizard, the Kirkcaldy headquartered specialist in subscriber management for pay-TV.

Graeme Allan Aberdeen-based independent accountancy firm Anderson Anderson & Brown LLP is now ranked among the top 30 accountancy firms in the UK following annual growth of 30 per cent, according to a new poll.

Andrew Hannay (left) and chief executive Russell Crichton. Glasgow-based stockbrokers and investment management firm Speirs & Jeffrey has announced the appointment of Andrew Hannay as an associate director.

Malcolm Hurlston The number of business debt judgments recorded in Scotland rose sharply in the first half of 2015, according to new Registry Trust figures.

Mark McCluskey Accountants BDO have announced the promotion of Mark McCluskey to partner in the audit department at the firm’s Glasgow office.

Still 80 per cent Government-owned Royal Bank of Scotland has reported a half-year loss of £153 million. The Edinburgh-based lender cited continuing legal impairments and customer compensation payouts as well as the cost of a drastic restructuring strategy for the figures to the end of June.

Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh. The Scottish Government has insisted that infrastructure projects will be delivered on time and on budget following questions over how much private finance is being used to fund them.

SSE takes £565m stake in North Sea gas field Perth-based energy giant SSE has announced that it is to buy a minority stake in French oil and gas giant Total's West of Shetland operations.

Royal Bank of Scotland has announced that it is selling up to 75 million shares in its former US subsidiary Citizens Financial Group, the parent company of Citizens Bank. If all the shares are sold, it would represent 16 per cent of Citizens and reduce the Edinburgh-based lender’s stake to 132.7 m

A “trusted” member of staff who embezzled almost £80,000 from the Fife credit union where she worked is has been jailed. Margaret Bond had pled guilty on indictment at Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court to a charge of embezzlement after setting up 42 loans totalling £79,120 on the non-profit Kingdom Cred

A quarter of young adults in the UK are still using the bank account chosen for them by their parents when they were a child, according to new research. UK-based price comparison service uSwitch said that when it asked those surveyed why they had chosen a particular current account to be their main

New research carried out by insurance giant Aviva has revealed that nearly two-thirds of people aged over 45 who are not yet retired admit to paying little or no attention to their pensions. The figures suggest more than ten million pots are currently being left largely unmonitored across the UK.

Eric Curran Eric Curran is managing partner of DM Hall Chartered Surveyors, based in the firm's Glasgow North office