Tom Saunders

Saba Capital just sees "an opportunity to get it on the cheap.” Read my interview with Jonathan Simpson-Dent, the chairman of the embattled Edinburgh Worldwide Investment Trust, as it gears up for an existential shareholder vote next week. telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/…

EXC: The UK's first prediction market might be launched as soon as this week. EasyBet is launching a similar product in February. Matchbook will launch its product at the end of January at the latest, and is also providing a white-label product for easyBet telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/…

In years past, Venezuela bonds removal from JPM EMBIG after US sanctions were a massive factor in their significant drop in value

This is quite a big deal re Venezuela bonds. JP Morgan Emerging Market Bond Index has increased V bond weighting yesterday, by 30bps. That equates to a lot of forced buying (spread over months) that will likely see bonds head up to 60/70c.

As one hedge fund told me, trading in Venezuelan bonds after the country defaulted in 2017 was essentially a way to trade the Monroe Doctrine The bonds are now trading ~40c, up from lows of around 15c at the start of the year. It's unsurprising then, that some are contemplating investing further on the basis that Maduro's ouster is just the start. telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/…

Last week, the US military stormed a supertanker after it departed Venezuela's Puerto José terminal, carrying roughly 1.1 barrels of oil. Barely a week after the ship was captured, a tanker carrying British insurance departed from the exact same terminal telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/…

NEW: FCA to allow crypto retail trading on margin The FCA has released its latest set of proposals for regulating crypto in the UK. While the rules are broadly similar to those set out in May by the agency, there are a few key differences. Namely, retail traders will now be able to trade crypto on margin. FCA said in May it would ban margin trading, over concerns that retail investors rarely understand the risks involved in leveraged trading - though they appear to have reversed their initial position. Crypto platforms wont be required to issue credit checks before lending digital assets to customers, nor will they be required to exercise forbearance in the case of a default. However, traders won't be allowed to lose more money than the collateral they put up to trade, meaning the heavy retail losses that were common in 2021/2022 are unlikely to be repeated.

Read the full article here: #comment" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/…

Two weeks ago a climate study widely used by central banks and other influential organisations was retracted from Nature, over concerns that its findings were exaggerated. That paper formed a key part of some of the climate scenarios published by the Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS), an influential global coalition of central banks and financial supervisors. The NGFS was forced to issue a warning about its scenarios after the paper was retracted, and has committed to changing the way it models the economic toll of global warming by next year. However, some these now-flawed NGFS scenarios have formed a key part of a number of UK banks own climate forecasts. It's unclear how banks use these forecasts, though they could well have influenced who they choose to lend to and where they decided to invest.

Unfortunate timing: Yesterday: Dame Debbie Crosbie, Nationwide CEO, appointed government's new Women in Finance champion Today: Nationwide fined record £44m over financial crime controls, including failing to spot a customer receiving £27m in fraudulent Covid furlough payments!

Some personal news - after 3 years at The Times, I've joined The Telegraph as Financial Correspondent. So anyone with anything interesting to say about banks, hedge funds and the like - please do drop me a message!

You can read our contribution to this investigation, as well as those of our 13 other partners, here: ftm.eu/files/the-shad…

Honoured to have won the European Parliament's Daphne Caruana Galizia Prize for Journalism with @jameshurley and 13 other newsrooms across Europe. Our investigation looked at former owners of ships now in the Russian Shadow Fleet. europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-…

EXC: The Treasury opposed government plans to force a Chinese company to sell its stake in a UK chipmaker on national security grounds. With @GeorgeGreenwood thetimes.com/business-money…

Particular credit goes to the team at @FTM_eu who led the investigation and did much of the early digging into this! Take a read of the investigation and partner contributions (including ours) here: ftm.eu/files/the-shad…

Honoured to have been shortlisted for the Daphne Caruana Prize for Journalism with @jameshurley and journalists at 13 other newsrooms for our collective investigation into the former owners of ships in the Russian Shadow Fleet. daphnejournalismprize.eu/edition-2025-f…

EXC: At least 7 vessels exported Iranian oil or related products while holding British insurance from two British shipping insurers. thetimes.com/business-money…

We’re in @thetimes today with Enterprise Nation member @MousCase It’s about the scrapping of a scheme providing grants for small businesses to attend overseas trade shows which has been blamed for a fall in the number of UK firms going to the events: ow.ly/GqZE50W9TA2

AstraZeneca remained active and profitable in 🇷🇺 — and in April sponsored a Moscow forum where its Russia head joined a panel that included sanctioned Kremlin officials. @tomjs of @thetimes reports, with comments from @KSE_Institute’s @LeaveRussiaOrg. thetimes.com/business-money…

Spelthorne council, which invested over £1 billion in properties including BP's main campus, is to be taken over by government-appointed commissioners. I wrote about bad property bets made by the council and three others in London's commuter belt last year. thetimes.com/article/reside…