The Big Picture | Business Post

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: The fact that banks fail is the lesson we never seem to learn

It is clear that, 15 years after the last round of major bank failures, there is no consensus on how to deal with the next failure, especially a very big one

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Demise of Libor is another symptom of Britain’s malaise

The death of the international financial benchmark in use for 40 years is symbolic of a small, stagnant Britain systematically destroyed by Tory rule

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: City of London up in Arms over SoftBank asset’s Nasdaq move

The rebuff is bad news for the British government and exposes the City’s many weaknesses in the post-globalisation era, where financial centres must compete on intrinsic strengths rather than global appeal

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Can the new Rolls-Royce boss pilot its return to the top flight?

There may be turbulence ahead for Tufan Erginbilgic, recently appointed chief executive of the British aircraft engine manufacturer, but there are reasons to be hopeful

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: One year on, Russia shambles into insanity as Ukraine’s tragedy advances

Some brave Russians stand up to Putin’s blatant lies about the war in Ukraine, but it was striking to see so many of the country’s elite cowed and compliant as the Russian leader rambled on with his terrifying vision for the future

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: The Adidas-Ye fiasco is a cautionary tale for brands signing starry mega-deals

As Adidas is discovering to its cost after falling out with Kanye West, a badly judged corporate-celebrity relationship can be damaging to the bottom line as well as to reputation

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Despite massive windfalls Big Oil may soon be left twisting in the wind

As investors reap the benefits of massive profits, fortunes for the oil industry 2023 are tied to Ukraine, China and the health of the global economy, while demand for petrol is actually slowing

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Asia’s richest man must prove that he is not sitting on a massive financial scam

A probe into the Adani Group led by Indian multibillionaire Gautam Adani and what is alleged by Hindenburg Research to be ‘the largest con in corporate history’ must be taken if that country is to save its reputation in the corporate world

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Tech’s accelerating slide is about value, culture and credibility

Big tech is facing a reckoning with diminishing advertising, overvalued stocks, stagnant innovation and encroaching regulation just some of the factors the shrinking sector is struggling to deal with

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Our global economy can’t function without this Taiwanese microchip plant — for now

TSMC’s microchips are vital, but with Taiwan under threat from China, there are moves by governments to become less reliant on the tech giant

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Goldman Sachs is first of many forced to rein in lavish cost base

The titan of Wall Street leads investment banks’ move to cut spending as outlook for global financial industry worsens

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Markets reset expectations to coincide with global slowdown

Looming global recession, economic disruption in China and war in Ukraine make 2023 a year of great uncertainty and risk for companies and investors

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Each life lost to war is a person with a name and a story

The terrible conflict grinds on in Ukraine, with estimates of 200,000 soldiers from both sides killed and wounded up to November, along with 40,000 Ukrainian civilian deaths, and each number is an abomination

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Modest but significant protests pierce Xi Jinping’s aura of invincibility

As protests continue to break out across China in a population thoroughly sick of the president’s crushing zero-Covid policy, he may be turning a potential victory over the virus into a far greater defeat

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: It proved to be a short spell at the top for Disney’s king of the castle

Picking a successor is not easy and Bob Chapek’s dismissal as Disney boss is an admission of failure by the entertainment giant’s directors — as well as a textbook example of poor corporate governance

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Reading between the lines, the US-China ‘new cold war’ is very real

At the first ever presidential face-to-face meeting between Joe Biden and Xi Jinping at the G20 in Bali, it was clear that the gulf which divides them is far wider than the Taiwan Strait

The Big Picture

From hero to zero: is fall of FTX crypto’s own Lehman moment?

Sam Bankman-Fried, the brilliant young founder of FTX, was supposed to be the person who made crypto currencies respectable – but as the firm’s value plummeted from $32 billion to virtually nothing, investors were left wondering what went wrong

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Brazil needs more than Lula to bring it back from the brink

The new left-wing president leads a deeply divided country, with a stagnant economy and severely damaged self-esteem

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Rarefied air of the metaverse proving too thin for investors

A year after Mark Zuckerberg changed Facebook’s name to Meta, his $30 billion long-term bet on an unknown future has failed to convince even his most stalwart backers

The Big Picture

Vincent Boland: Is Goldman Sachs facing its own bonfire of the vanities?

The travails of the old titan of Wall Street suggest that investment banking has peaked and that it, and the bank, may soon face a reckoning