Tuesday newspaper round-up: FCA, Greensill Capital, Klarna
City firms revealed in the final months of 2020 that they planned to shift nearly £100bn in assets to the EU, taking the total value of assets lost to the bloc since the Brexit vote to £1.3 trillion, according to a new survey. The data from consulting group EY pointed to a last-minute push by firms before 31 December after the UK-EU trade deal did not offer concessions for the UK’s dominant financial services sector. It forced companies to move staff and assets to the continent in order to continue serving EU customers. - Guardian
The City watchdog is scrapping performance-related pay and bonuses for senior executives, and also plans to impose salary cuts, as it faces criticism over its handling of the London Capital & Finance (LC&F) investment scandal. After an outcry about the Financial Conduct Authority’s failure to properly police the collapsed firm, the regulator’s chair, Charles Randell, told MPs that there would be a crackdown on remuneration. He said: “We decided that the consequences that flow from this should be collective. It was clearly the case that the FCA wasn’t sufficiently joined up across its various activities.” - Guardian
Hedge fund billionaire Sir Chris Hohn has landed one of the biggest annual paydays ever recorded in Britain after handing himself $479m (£344m) following soaring profits at his firm. The sum paid to 54-year-old Sir Chris by The Children's Investment Fund (TCI) exceeds previous bonanzas such as the £320m handed to Bet365 boss Denise Coates in 2018, which catapulted her ahead of celebrities such as Taylor Swift and cemented her position as the world's best-paid woman. - Telegraph
Greensill Capital was under pressure last night after Credit Suisse suspended funds investing in the controversial lender’s products and as it emerged that SoftBank had substantially written down its $1.5 billion investment in it. The British company, which is advised by David Cameron, the former prime minister, is believed to have appointed administrators and could file for insolvency within days. - The Times
Klarna, the “buy now pay later” finance company, has tripled in value to $31 billion in six months based on the terms of a new capital raising. The Swedish financial technology group said it had raised $1 billion from new and existing shareholders in a fundraising that was oversubscribed by four times. It declared itself the most valuable unlisted fintech in Europe and the second most valuable in the world. - The Times