Breaking Up BP Would Risk Its Profitable Trading Edge
A peek behind the curtain – 'just a little one' – of BP Plc's strongest and most opaque business reveals why the British energy giant is hesitant to sell some parts of the company, no matter what Elliott Investment Management or any other shareholder wants.
BP trades more than 10 times the amount of oil it produces and manages more than eight times the refined products for which it has capacity, Executive Vice President Carol Howle said during a strategic reset presentation Wednesday. Those trades supply power for data centers and feedstocks for petrochemicals makers, she said.
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CNBC
4 hours ago
- CNBC
'Loud luxury' is back as high-end brands look to rebound
"Loud luxury" is poised for a comeback as ailing fashion houses attempt to inject a sense of newness and novelty into their designs to win over weary shoppers. A flurry of new creative directors at brands including Gucci, Chanel and Versace, and the arrival of new Kering CEO Luca de Meo, are seen phasing out "quiet luxury" subtlety in favor of statement styles, in what analysts say could be a turning point for the industry. "We are seeing a shift to a bit more visible luxury at the moment," Carole Madjo, head of European luxury goods research at Barclays, told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" last month. "Luxury fashion is a cycle. Now, with quiet luxury being a few years old, you want something else. Back to my novelty, newness thesis: I think this is now the focus." The sartorial shake-up comes as the luxury sector struggles to overcome a series of headwinds, from trade tariffs to soft consumer sentiment, following its Covid-era boom. Ultra-luxe brands Brunello Cucinelli, Hermes and LVMH's Loro Piano have navigated that downturn largely unscathed, as their super-rich clientele continued to spend big on understated couture cashmere and high-end handbags. But for many brands, quiet luxury's discrete opulence, which glided to the fore in 2022 alongside the popularity of shows like HBO's "Succession," no longer cut it. That could herald a new era of large logos, bold branding and distinctive designs dominating catwalks to high streets. "There is no longer the same level of desire for many products across the market, pushing all major brands to change creative direction in search of relevance," Yanmei Tang, analyst at Third Bridge, said via email. One brand owning that shift is Burberry. Under the leadership of CEO Josh Schulman, the company is once again embracing its British heritage image after years of management changes, declining sales and knock-off dupes sullying associations with its eponymous check print and signature trench. Chief Financial Officer Kate Ferry said during a second-quarter earnings call that the company's statement heritage collection, which includes full checkered two-pieces, was "reigniting brand desire" and positioning Burberry among a wide consumer base as "a luxury brand with broad universal appeal." Gucci is seen targeting the same refit under its new artistic director Demna Gvasalia, whose boundary-pushing designs courted controversy at parent company Kering's smaller Balenciaga label. Kering's deputy CEO and brand development lead, Francesca Bellettini, said last week that a "first hint of [Demna's] vision for Gucci" would come in September, with a full rollout of the collection due in early 2026. Fashionistas and investors have long awaited a catalyst to turn around Gucci's fortunes, as sales have suffered, particularly from weaker demand in China. The arrival next month of former Renault chief Luca de Meo as Kering CEO is also set to inject an outsider perspective and branding expertise. "The key thing is to bring back some brand desirability," Madjo said. "Bringing newness — something fresh which has not been seen before — is, I think, what could make Gucci great again." New creative and artistic leads are also seen shaking things up at Chanel, Bottega Venetta and the famously out-there Versace. Moncler, meanwhile, has opted to experiment with rotating designers via its Genius collection, and Prada recently cited image adaptability among the brand's virtues. "What's beautiful about Prada is that it can be sporty, it can be glamorous. This is one of the few brands that can allow us to play three or four games at the same time," group CEO Andrea Guerra said on an earnings call last month. Fashion houses will be hoping that the image overhauls can help inspire waning interest from consumers who became disillusioned with brands after significant pandemic-era price hikes failed to reflect product innovation. According to UBS's Evidence Lab, the price of luxury goods rose by a record 8% on average in 2022, well above the pre-Covid rate of 1% and the 3% recorded this year to May. Only top-end brands Hermes, Rolex and Richemont-owned Cartier have been able to sustain significant price rises in 2025 — though many more have warned that tariffs may force their hand. Gucci, Burberry and Prada, meanwhile, have raised prices, but to a smaller extent. That's likely to propel a further divide between quiet ultra-luxe brands and relatively more affordable labels. Marcus Morris, portfolio manager for European and global growth equities at Alliance Bernstein, told CNBC last week that higher prices could now only be justified by the "right brands, the right brand management and the right marketing of those brands." Nevertheless, more modest pricing strategies may be what's needed for troubled brands seeking to regain market share and compel a broader consumer base. "High-end soft luxury brands have increased their prices a lot," Luca Solca, sector head for global luxury goods at Bernstein, told CNBC. "Brands with a more moderate pricing approach [are] doing well ... potentially going to benefit from this middle ground." Indeed, in a loud luxury era, it could play in their favor. "It could be less of an issue to show off this product, because it is still a bit more affordable, let's say, compared to some other brands," Madjo said.
NBC News
19 hours ago
- NBC News
One of England's oldest soccer clubs is in crisis — fans are worried it could disappear
LONDON — One of the world's oldest soccer teams is in big trouble. When Sheffield Wednesday FC kicks off the new season on Sunday — away at Leicester City in the Championship, the second tier of British soccer — more than 3,000 traveling fans will not take their seats to cheer on their beloved team, known as the Owls. Instead, they will hold a five-minute protest outside Leicester's King Power Stadium against one man: Thai businessman Dejphon Chansiri, Wednesday's owner and the focal point of a growing crisis that may threaten its very existence. The team's financial problems are mounting, and unsuccessful attempts to sell it have dominated local sports media and online forums for months — and the crisis has much wider implications for the health of English soccer away from the glitzy riches of Liverpool and Manchester City. The problem is so acute that the British government has passed a new law that will launch a football regulator to police the buying and selling of teams and make sure owners are 'fit and proper.' For Wednesday, founded in 1867, that could be too little, too late. Some teams have bad offseasons, but this summer has seen Wednesday set new levels of chaos: Players and staff have not been paid on time in four of the last five months. As a result, there's a transfer embargo banning the club from buying new players until January 2027 — even if it could afford them. At least 15 players have left on free transfers or for a fraction of their market value this summer, leaving barely enough players to fill a match day squad of 11 starters and up to nine substitutes. 'It's becoming a soap opera,' said Dan Fudge, who co-hosts the popular podcast 'The Wednesday Week.' 'Usually, as podcasters, we're scratching for content to talk about during the summer,' Fudge said, 'but we seem to have had a new timeline of terror every single week to talk about.' The list of mishaps goes on. Talented young head coach Danny Rohl, a charismatic and cerebral German touted for big success in major European leagues, left by mutual agreement. The famous old Hillsborough Stadium is literally falling apart — Sheffield City Council refused to grant a safety license for the vast 9,000-seat North Stand due to concerns of uncovering wiring and cracks in the terrace. The club said in a statement this week it was working to fix this and would seek to place season ticket holders elsewhere if it was still shut by the first home game on Aug. 16. A disabled fan whose accessible seat is in the North Stand broke down in tears this week when telling the BBC what effect the crisis is having on him. Chansiri says he wants to sell, but no one so far has met his valuation for the club, which football finance experts say is too high. The owner is widely reported to have offered the club for 100 million pounds ($134 million). Kieran Maguire, a leading British football finance expert and commentator, puts the real value at 40 million pounds ($53 million), but Chansiri said in June that he rejected an offer at this price from a U.S.-based consortium. Maguire said it was unlikely Wednesday would go bust entirely, but he said that in any case the team would almost certainly be relegated to the league below and face a very tough season. 'He's not malicious in the sense that he doesn't want to destroy the football club, but he's very naive, has no knowledge of the industry,' Maguire said. English football culture is one of spending. This summer alone, the 20 Premier League teams have spent around 1.8 billion pounds ($2.4 billion) on transfer fees, with reigning champions Liverpool splashing out 252 million pounds ($335 million). And the contrast between the top and the rest of the football pyramid system is stark. Between them, the Premier League clubs made more than 6 billion pounds ($8 billion) in revenue in the 2024-25 season, an increase of 36% from the previous year, according to consultancy firm Deloitte. Meanwhile, every single team in the Championship, the fifth-most attended league in Europe, made an operating loss in the same period for the second season in a row. There is money from TV, sponsorship, player sales and match day revenue, but with huge wage bills, clubs are left to rely on player sales and, if they're lucky, wealthy benefactors to inject cash. The English Football League said Wednesday it was in 'advanced discussions' with Chansiri's lawyers on how he will sell his stake in the club. The league, criticized by some fans for not acting sooner, warned the Thai magnate that the club needed to 'meet its obligations or make good on his commitment to sell to a well-funded party, for fair market value.' Could things even get worse? Probably. This week, Morecambe FC, a team in the northwest seaside town of the same name, was suspended from the National League, the fifth tier of English football's sprawling pyramid-shaped league system, with the elite clubs at the top and smaller, more parochial clubs toward the bottom. Morecambe failed to meet its financial obligations, and if a new buyer who can support it can't be found, it could disappear for good. This happened to Macclesfield Town, Bury, Hereford and a handful of other teams whose owners couldn't support them and whose liabilities were too great. 'There's a sense of foreboding about the club. We've seen other clubs do it, and normally at the eleventh hour someone comes in and [stages] a takeover,' Fudge said. 'Then, over recent years, you look at teams like Bury and what's recently happened to Morecambe, and they've not had that white knight step in, and all of a sudden we're thinking, 'Oh hang on a minute, we could be the big scalp.'' Like many fans, Fudge has no doubt who is to blame. 'Pure ineptitude is how we've got here, regardless of the warning signs around Chansiri since about 2018.' Fans warmly remember the 1990s, when players such as Chris Waddle, David Hirst and Des Walker — all England internationals — lined up alongside some of the then-hottest talent in Europe, helping the club reach seventh place in the Premier League during the 1996-97 season. Fans were optimistic when Chansiri — a scion of Thai Union Group, a seafood conglomerate that owns the Chicken of the Sea canned tuna brand in the U.S. — took over in 2015. He promised and delivered some success, taking the team to the 2016 Championship playoff final, just 90 minutes away from a return to the Premier League. All this feels like a long, long time ago, with fans wondering what shape the new football regulator will take and whether it will make any difference. David Blunkett, a senior minister during Tony Blair's government in the 1990s and 2000s and now a member of the House of Lords, is a lifelong Wednesday fan and attended an online meeting with the football league on Thursday. He said it was 'vital' that the crisis at Wednesday is addressed before the regulator is set up. 'Parliamentarians, including those representing the city, the Supporters' Trust and other fans will clearly continue to pressurize for an immediate resolution of the crisis at Hillsborough,' he told NBC News. Hailing from the north side of Sheffield in South Yorkshire, a city famous for its steel, Wednesday became an early member of the Football Association (the term 'soccer' is an abbreviation of 'association'), as the football craze swept through working-class communities across the North and the Midlands. The team got its unique name from cricket: In the mid-19th century, there were multiple teams in Sheffield playing this game, and the one that played on Wednesdays started a football team. The name stuck. On Sunday, fans will raise banners and shout slogans in an attempt to preserve that history. Even if some would rather just watch the game. 'There's a lot of people that are very much in the camp of 'Let's protest, let's get this message out as much as we can,' which I completely agree with, but it's not everybody's bag, because a lot of people use the football to spend time with their family and their friends,' Fudge said. Despite the turmoil at the club, Wednesday sold out its allocation of 3,287 away tickets for Sunday's game. It's not immediately clear how many more Wednesday games there will be.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
How much do you need to invest in the stock market each month to aim for £1m
Becoming a stock market millionaire is an investment objective shared by many investors. After all, who doesn't love the idea of having a seven-figure portfolio and the financial freedom it provides? Obviously, joining the top-5% of British wealth owners is no easy task. But it's not as impossible as many might think. And following a strategy as simple as investing consistently in high-quality companies each month might be all that it takes for patient individuals. The journey to £1m Sticking with low-cost index funds is arguably one of the best ways to start putting money to work. These clever investing vehicles automatically diversify a portfolio and match the performance of the stock market with next to no effort. Historically, that's translated into an average annual return of around 8% a year. So, providing this continues to be the case moving forward, consistently investing £500 each month will allow investors to enter millionaire territory within around 34 years when starting from scratch. Starting Capital Time To £1m With £500 Per Month At 8% £0 33.5 Years £10,000 32 Years £20,000 30.5 Years £50,000 27 Years £100,000 23 Years Even when starting off with a chunky lump sum, the journey towards a seven-figure portfolio is a lengthy one. And it may take even longer than expected should the stock market decide to throw a tantrum along the way. After all, 30 years is more than enough time for multiple crashes and corrections to materialise. So one way to speed things up is by simply investing more each month. But for those unable to spare any additional funds, stock-picking could be the silver bullet to accelerating the wealth-building process. The power of stock picking By allocating capital exclusively to individual businesses with wide competitive moats and ample long-term growth prospects, a portfolio can go on to vastly outperform. A perfect example of this over the last 15 years is Rightmove (LSE:RMV). Today, Rightmove is the largest online property portal used by home buyers and sellers across the country. But that wasn't the case back in 2010. And investors who spotted the potential for such a service have reaped an annualised return of 18.4%. To put this into perspective, investing £500 each month at this rate cuts the journey to reaching £1m down to just 19 years when starting from scratch. Starting Capital Time To £1m With £500 Per Month At 18.4% £0 19 Years £10,000 18 Years £20,000 16.5 Years £50,000 14 Years £100,000 11.5 Years Still worth considering in 2025? Rightmove controls more than 80% of the online property marketplace. And even with fierce competition emerging, the power of its network effect has so far prevented it from being disrupted. Pairing that with growing demand and chunky profit margins suggests that Rightmove's days of delivering market-beating returns aren't over. Of course, there are never any guarantees. Rightmove is highly sensitive to the cyclical property market. During downturns, the group may be forced to slash the price of its marketing packages. This could impair both growth and earnings, sending shares firmly in the wrong direction – an opportunity that its growing list of competitors may take advantage of. Having grown substantially, it's unlikely that Rightmove will continue generating an 18.4% annualised return indefinitely. So, investors hunting these sorts of gains will have to search for other promising stocks that have yet to take off. However, Rightmove's growth story isn't over yet, that's why I think its still worthy of a closer look. The post How much do you need to invest in the stock market each month to aim for £1m appeared first on The Motley Fool UK. More reading 5 Stocks For Trying To Build Wealth After 50 One Top Growth Stock from the Motley Fool Zaven Boyrazian has no position in any of the shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has recommended Rightmove Plc. Views expressed on the companies mentioned in this article are those of the writer and therefore may differ from the official recommendations we make in our subscription services such as Share Advisor, Hidden Winners and Pro. Here at The Motley Fool we believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. Motley Fool UK 2025 Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
