Europe edition

INTERNATIONAL NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR sATURDAy 19 FEBRUARy / sUNDAy 20 FEBRUARy 2022

Kaja Kallas, Estonian premier

There is ‘naivety over Moscow’
Big money, Simon Kuper on 30
LUNCH WITH THE FT

big stars and years of the English

Premier League
big impact LIFE & ARTS

Putin blames Kyiv for ‘escalation’ The parable of Peloton

A cautionary tale
LIFE & ARTS

and brings forward nuclear drills

3 Tensions rise in east Ukraine 3 Invasion fears heightened 3 US lifts Russian troop count
mAx SeddOn — MOscOw
ROmAn OleARcHyk — KyIV
Guy cHAzAn — BERlIN

Vladimir Putin blamed Kyiv for “esca-

lating” tensions in eastern Ukraine yes- Maître d’ for the world
terday as Kremlin-backed separatists
ordered an evacuation of civilians from
Jeremy King of the Wolseley
the region to Russia, and Moscow PERSON IN THE NEWS
revealed plans for nuclear exercises to
test ballistic and cruise missiles.
Putin will personally supervise the
drills, which will include units from the
air force, army and navy. Speaking after
meeting his Belarusian counterpart
Alexander Lukashenko, the Russian
president said: “We are seeing an escala-
tion in the Donbas.”
Moscow’s moves heightened fears
that Russia is planning to invade
Ukraine after the US warned that an
attack was “imminent” and raised its
estimate of Russian troops massed on
Ukraine’s border to more than 169,000. A Ukrainian border patrol
Putin denied that Russia was planning near the Russian frontier in Seasonal notes
Chernihiv — Valentyn Ogirenko/Reuters
to invade Ukraine but said: “Of course,
we are looking at what is happening
The diaries of Darwin’s father
around the world and around us. But we “A new war threatens to break out in Denis Pushilin, head of the self- attempts by Russia and its proxies to HOUSE & HOME
have clearly defined guidelines in line Inside the middle of our Europe,” Annalena proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, trigger a pretext for further aggression.
with the national interests of the Rus- 3 lviv holds Baerbock, Germany’s foreign minister, claimed in a video that Ukraine’s presi- Although the Kremlin said the annual
sian people and the Russian state.” firm, Page 2 told the Munich Security Conference dent, Volodymyr Zelensky, had given nuclear exercises — which were not held
The timing of the nuclear drills, which 3 FT View & yesterday. “This is one of the most the Ukrainian army orders to attack the in 2020 or 2021 because of the pan-
US officials see as a show of strength by Gillian Tett, dangerous moments, where from prov- separatists “in the next few hours”. demic — were long planned, the last
Moscow, will add to the sense of fore- Page 8 ocation and disinformation we can see But Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign time the exercises were moved to Febru-
boding in western capitals over Putin’s 3 Dmitri escalation.” minister, “categorically” denied what ary from their usual autumn timeframe
intentions in Ukraine. Joe Biden, US Trenin, Page 9 As Ukraine and Russia accused each he called “Russian disinformation”. was shortly before Russia invaded
president, warned on Thursday that 3 The day in other of shelling in the Ukraine region of “Ukraine does not conduct or plan any Crimea in 2014.
Russia was set to invade within “several markets, Donbas, the separatists fighting Kyiv such actions in the Donbas,” he said. Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s spokesperson,
days”, saying Washington believed that Page 14 said they would evacuate women, chil- Ukraine said ceasefire violations in said the exercises were regular and
the Kremlin was engaged in “a false flag dren and the elderly to Rostov in south- the war-torn region, including 43 artil- should not “give anyone cause for ques-
operation to have an excuse to go in”. ern Russia, the nearest big city. lery salvos in the past 24 hours, were tions and concern”.

Illegal crossings from Hong Kong pose

threat to mainland’s ‘zero-Covid’ drive
PRImROSe RIORdAn And Anyone arriving in China from over- nearly seven years and I’ve never seen
cHAn HO-HIm — HONG KONG seas or Hong Kong must spend two [anything like this],” he said.
tOm mItcHell — sINGAPORE weeks in a hotel or quarantine centre Hong Kong reported 3,629 Covid
China’s rigorous “zero-Covid” policy is before continuing their journey. cases yesterday. Its zero-Covid strategy,
facing an unexpected threat in the Fences and fortifications along Hong with some of the toughest curbs in the
teenage skater’s turmoil form of illegal border crossings by peo- Kong’s long land border with Shenzhen, world, has prevented mass deaths but
cuts into Olympic legacy ple fleeing the worsening outbreak in Guangdong’s second-largest city, were heightened business concerns that the
Hong Kong. originally built to stop illegal immigra- financial centre is being hurt by being,
Analysis i PAGE 3 tion from China into the territory. But it in effect, cut off from the outside world.
Some mainland cities have offered is relatively easy to travel by boat into The curbs have prompted some com-
rewards for information about people Guangdong, whose long coastline and panies to base executives outside the
Austria €5.70 Malta €5.30 smuggling after 15 individuals illegally river networks are difficult to police. city. Mark FitzPatrick, interim boss of
Bahrain Din2.20 Morocco Dh70
Belgium €5.70 Netherlands €5.70 entered Zhuhai, in Guangdong prov- “Mainland cities are concerned about insurer Prudential, said its next chief
Bulgaria lev8.75 Norway NKr60 ince, by boat from Hong Kong. At least arrivals from Hong Kong,” said Tam executive could be forced to start the
croatia Kn39 Oman OR2.20
cyprus €5.30 Pakistan Rupee450 four had Covid-19 and travelled to other Yiu-chung, Hong Kong’s most senior role outside Hong Kong because of the
czech Rep
Denmark
Kc150
DKr59
Poland
Portugal
Zl 28
€5.30
parts of China, according to reports. representative in China’s National Peo- “friction” of Covid rules.
Egypt E£72 Romania Ron19 The cases come days after President ple’s Congress. “They are worried that Meanwhile, HSBC closed six branches
Estonia
Finland
€5.70
€6.10
Russia
serbia
€5.00
RsD720
Xi Jinping said containing the outbreak cases might get into their community.” in the city yesterday, including floors of
France €5.70 slovenia €5.30 must be Hong Kong’s top priority. The One Hong Kong resident, who asked its head office, after staff tested positive.
Germany €5.70 south Africa R140
Greece €5.30 spain €5.30 city is weighing mandatory testing for not to be identified, told the FT that his Additional reporting by Ian Smith and
Hungary
India
Ft1800
Rup260
sweden
switzerland
sKr62
sFr8.30
its entire population followed by quar- family was considering fleeing to Fujian Tabby Kinder
Italy €5.30 Tunisia Din9.00 antine for anyone found to be infected. province. “I’ve been in Hong Kong for Australia reopens page 2
lithuania €5.70 Turkey Tl50
luxembourg €5.70 UAE Dh29.00

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2 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

INTERNATIONAL

smartphone technology

WORLD|
EU accuses China of patent power grab
WEEK IN REVIEW| Brussels contacts WTO around half the market rate previously nies pay less for the technology from ‘We must suffered. Companies reinvested licens-
agreed between western technology overseas providers. In August 2020, ing fees in research, the commission
over companies’ loss of providers and manufacturers such as China’s Supreme People’s Court decided protect said. Valdis Dombrovskis, EU trade

Judge rules Trump must testify

licensing fee revenues Oppo, Xiaomi, ZTE and Huawei, it that Chinese courts can impose “anti- the EU’s commissioner, said: “We must protect
added. suit injunctions”, which forbid a com- the EU’s vibrant high-tech industry, an
in New York civil investigation aNdy BouNds — Brussels The lower licensing fees set by Beijing pany taking a case to a court outside the vibrant engine for innovation that ensures our
deprive smartphone makers and other country. Those that do are liable for a high-tech leading role in developing future inno-
Donald Trump and two of his adult children must The EU is taking China to the World mobile telecommunications businesses €130,000 ($147,000) daily fine and the vative technologies. EU companies have
testify under oath in a civil investigation by New Trade Organization for alleged patent of a crucial source of revenue to reinvest judgments of courts elsewhere are industry’ a right to seek justice on fair terms when
York attorney-general Letitia James into their fami- infringements that are costing compa- in research and development. ignored. their technology is used illegally. That is
ly-owned business. nies billions of euros, as part of what “It is part of a global power grab by the The policy of driving down licence why we are launching WTO consulta-
James is investigating whether the Trump Organi- officials in Brussels claim is a “power Chinese government by legal means,” costs has been backed by the People’s tions today.”
zation routinely inflated the value of its real estate grab” by Beijing to set smartphone tech- said a commission official. “It is a means Congress, China’s national assembly, The EU believes China’s actions are
assets to secure financing and other benefits while nology licensing rates. to push Europe out.” although it has not been put into legisla- inconsistent with the WTO Agreement
understating them for other purposes. In a January Businesses, including Sweden’s Erics- Smartphone makers have agreed glo- tion, the commission said. on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellec-
court filing, she said her office had uncovered “signif- son, Finland’s Nokia and Sharp of Japan, bal standards for telecommunications After Ericsson lost a court case, it said tual Property Rights. Huawei declined
icant evidence” of fraud committed by the business. have lost money after China’s Supreme networks. In return, technology manu- licensing revenues would fall by to comment. The Chinese foreign minis-
Lawyers for Trump, Donald Jr and Ivanka argued Court banned them from protecting facturers must license their patents to €100mn-€150mn a quarter. US tech- try, ZTE and Oppo did not respond to
they were being unfairly targeted because of the their patents by securing licensing deals others. If they cannot agree on a price, nology R&D company InterDigital and requests for comment.
former president’s political standing. Judge Arthur in foreign courts, the European Com- they go to court to set it. Chinese courts EU research institutes such as the The US and Japan have also expressed
Engoron ruled the Trumps must submit to question- mission said. generally set prices at half the level of Fraunhofer network in Germany, which concerns and are expected to join the
ing within 21 days. Chinese courts set licence fees at those in the west, meaning their compa- also license new technologies, have also EU’s request for consultations.

Fed introduces tough rules to

restrict trading activity of staff ukraine. lviv
The Federal Reserve has adopted rules that severely
restrict the trading activity of top officials and staff.
First announced in October, the rules bar buying
Nationalist stronghold prepares for war
individual shares and other investments and limit
transactions to “purchasing diversified investment
vehicles, like mutual funds”. City that has become bastion
The US central bank said trading in cryptocurren- of patriotism remains defiant
cies, foreign exchange and commodities would also
be prohibited, along with short selling securities. in the face of rising tensions
The measures come after two regional bank presi-
dents were found to have been participants in finan-
PoliNa ivaNova — lviv
cial markets while the Fed was intervening to miti-
gate damage from the pandemic. Both of them later As warnings flooded in that Russia was
resigned. set to launch a full-blown military
assault on Ukraine, Orest Putsentela
wondered whether he too should pack
his bags — despite living more than
British royal settles sex assault 700km from the Russian border.
lawsuit with accuser Giuffre While normal life continued in Lviv
this week, the pressure and anxieties of
the escalating conflict have reached the
tram-crossed cobbled streets of the city
in Ukraine’s far west.
On Wednesday, Putsentela rushed to
collect his children after a false bomb
threat at their school, one of several
intimidating calls to city institutions
this week. Then a cyber attack targeting
a number of Ukrainian banks left him
struggling to withdraw cash.
“And that was just one day,” said the
violin maker, sitting in his apartment
surrounded by musical instruments.
“The situation is quite stressful.”
Prince Andrew settled a lawsuit brought by virginia Ukrainian authorities blamed Russia
Giuffre, an accuser of Jeffrey epstein, who alleged the for the cyber attack and previously
British royal sexually assaulted her when she was 17. accused it of being behind bomb threats.
Terms were not disclosed, but they included a Despite the uncertainties, Lviv’s
“substantial donation” from the prince to a victims 700,000 residents were sticking with Standing firm, “We can welcome everybody here, few months have sobered us,” Andriy by Russia is an unwelcome reminder of
charity run by Giuffre. their routines. clockwise from we’ve got lots of space,” said Yurko Sadovyi, Lviv’s mayor, said. its Soviet past.
“Everyone is going to their jobs, the left: street Nazaruk, co-owner of a hospitality com- Officials have stocked up on medical During the 2014 Maidan protests,
kids were at school again the next day. performer pany that employs about 2,000 people and blood supplies, mapped sites such which ousted Ukraine’s former Moscow-
It’s normal life,” said Putsentela, 39. One Michael, violin in Lviv. He flashed a grin and waved to as pedestrian underpasses that could be backed president, Lviv residents were
DNA elephant tusk analysis used street performer said he sensed no fear maker Orest the former glass factory below his office, used as bomb shelters, made plans for “very active, the most active,” Kmet
to track ivory-smuggling cartels or panic among passers-by he stopped Putsentela and offering to convert the hipster bar space maintaining water supply if power was said.
to photograph in the city’s main square. businessman into a “diplomatic co-working” spot, cut, and worked out how to accommo- As Ukraine’s sense of national identity
Lviv, located closer to the Polish bor- Yurko Nazaruk complete with flagpoles. date an influx of refugees. hardens in the face of threats, many in
Scientists examining the genetic make-up of more der than to Kyiv, this week became Gaelle Girbes/FT
Nazaruk’s ventures are often tongue- The city’s energetic response to the Lviv feel their city is again playing a key
than 4,000 African elephant tusks seized from home to several western embassies that in-cheek, such as Pravda beer, known threat may be due to its unique identity role. Firearms training has been made
poachers are helping law enforcement agencies to relocated there on security concerns, for lampooning world leaders on its bot- in Ukraine. The region, annexed by the mandatory for municipal employees,
track international criminal cartels. setting up makeshift offices in local tle labels. Next, he said, might be a Soviet Union in 1945, is almost entirely and workshops for the public are wide-
They published DNA analysis showing how tusks hotels, unsure when they could return. depiction of French president Ukrainian-speaking, a rarity in a coun- spread. Putsentela’s 15-year-old son will
from genetically related elephant groups were split Organisations such as the World Bank Emmanuel Macron’s recent meeting, try where the Russian language is wide- visit a shooting range for the first time
up before being shipped out to Asia, the main desti- and IMF followed suit. across a now infamously long table, with spread. It is also known as a stronghold next week in a trip organised via his
nation for poached African ivory. Many in Ukraine, who have experi- Russian president Vladimir Putin. of patriotism and nationalism. school.
Investigators believe three to five interlinked enced eight years of war in the eastern The US warned yesterday that the sit- “Lviv was always a centre for dissi- The craftsman said he did not object,
gangs dominate the illegal trade. The slaughter of Donbas region, have reacted with incre- uation was escalating sharply, with up to dents,” said Vasyl Kmet, director of the nor did he mind the effects that the war
elephants for their tusks has pushed the animals dulity to the rising tensions this week, 190,000 Russian troops stationed on library at Lviv’s Ivan Franko University. threats have had on his business, though
towards extinction in the wild. Africa’s elephant pop- when some flights were cancelled and a Ukraine’s borders, up from 100,000 last He described the city as having a long painful, as the currency fluctuated and
ulation has fallen from 5mn in 1900 to about dozen countries called on their citizens month. tradition of revolt, honed against the imports become more expensive.
400,000 today. to leave Ukraine. The government in Lviv has made preparations for any many powers that have ruled over it It was better, he said, to “suffer a bit,
Kyiv urged calm, and argued the embas- assault. “We became relaxed in recent over the centuries. again, but to have sovereignty”.
sies’ switch to Lviv was alarmist. years . . . But the tensions of the past For many in Lviv, any encroachment see FT view, FT Big Read and opinion

Reopening
MAKE A SMART INVESTMENT
Subscribe to the FT today at FT.com/subscription Australia ready for tourist wave as foreign visitor ban lifted
FRIDAY 31 MARCH 2017 WORLD BUSINESS NEWSPAPER UK £2.70 Channel Islands £3.00; Republic of Ireland €3.00
Nic Fildes — sydney ers as restrictions have eased. First, hospitality business during this time virus, according to Tourism Australia,
Trump vs the Valley A Five Star plan? Dear Don...
locals looking for safer outdoor activi- we’ve struggled, so we’re super excited and the industry has more than double
Tech titans need to minimise
political risk — GILLIAN TETT, PAGE 13
Italy’s populists are trying to woo
the poor — BIG READ, PAGE 11
May’s first stab at the break-up
letter — ROBERT SHRIMSLEY, PAGE 12
The return of foreign visitors to Aus-
HMRC warns Lloyd’s of Brussels Insurance market ties returned to the surf, followed by to welcome back international tourists.” the workers the mining industry has.
tralia after two years cannot come soon
UK £3.80; Channel Islands £3.80; Republic of Ireland €3.80 SATURDAY 1 APRIL / SUNDAY 2 APRIL 2017
Briefing
to tap new talent pool with EU base
customs risks THE END
i US bargain-hunters fuel Europe M&A

domestic tourists and backpackers who The end of a ban on dancing and sing- And while Sydney is tourism’s hub,
Europe has become the big target for cross-border
dealmaking, as US companies ride a Trump-fuelled
equity market rally to hunt for bargains across the
HOW DRIVERLESS
OF THE TECHNOLOGY IS
Atlantic.— PAGE 15; CHINA CURBS HIT DEALS, PAGE 17

being swamped
enough for Craig Wachholz, who runs a
i Report outlines longer NHS waiting times
A report on how the health service can survive CHANGING AN
ROAD
more austerity has said patients will wait longer for
AMERICAN WAY OF LIFE

entered on work visas and headed ing in public in Sydney also meant the businesses in more remote areas of Aus-
non-urgent operations and for A&E treatment while

by Brexit surge
some surgical procedures will be scrapped.— PAGE 4 Censors and sensitivity
i Emerging nations in record debt sales Warning: this article may be
FT WEEKEND MAGAZINE
FEBRUARY 4 2017

Developing countries have sold record levels of upsetting — LIFE & ARTS

surf school on Sydney’s Bondi beach.

government debt in the first quarter of this year,
taking advantage of a surge in optimism toward
emerging markets as trade booms.— PAGE 15

Credit Suisse
3 Confidence in IT plans ‘has collapsed’ Art of persuasion Mystery deepens

straight to Sydney’s most famous sands. venue could resume putting on shows. tralia are also counting on a recovery.
i London tower plans break records
3 Fivefold rise in declarations expected
A survey has revealed that a
record 455 tall buildings are
planned or under construction over disputed painting of Jane Austen How To Spend It

JAMES BLITZ — WHITEHALL EDITOR
A computer system acquired to collect
duties and clear imports into the UK
may not be able to handle the huge
engulfed in
adjust its negotiation position with the in London. Work began on
EU, a Whitehall official said. “If running almost one tower a week
our own customs system is proving during 2016.— PAGE 4
much harder than we anticipated, that
ought to have an impact on how we i Tillerson fails to ease Turkey tensions

fresh tax probe

surge in workload expected once Britain
leaves the EU, customs authorities have
admitted to MPs.
HM Revenue & Customs told a parlia-
mentary inquiry that the new system
needed urgent action to be ready by
March 2019, when Brexit is due to be
completed, and the chair of the probe
said confidence it would be operational
“You don’t know what you’ve got until Wachholz said that within days of a “We’re definitely going to throw some Matt Cameron-Smith, CEO of Voyages
press for certain options in Brussels.” The US secretary of state has failed to reconcile
In a letter to Andrew Tyrie, chairman
of the Commons treasury select com-
mittee, HMRC said the timetable for
tensions after talks in Ankara with President Recep
Tayyip Erdogan on issues including Syria and the
extradition of cleric Fethullah Gulen.— PAGE 9
Chic new lodgings
delivering CDS was “challenging but
achievable”. But, it added, CDS was “a i Toshiba investors doubt revival plan
in Scotland
complex programme” that needed to be In a stormy three-hour meeting, investors accused MAGAZINE
linked to dozens of other computer sys- managers ofhaving an entrenched secrecy culture
tems to work properly. In November, 3 UK, France and Netherlands swoop
and cast doubt on a revival plan after Westinghouse

it’s gone,” said Wachholz, known as travel bubble to Singapore opening last sort of party,” she added. Indigenous Tourism Australia, which
in time “has collapsed”.
Setting up a digital customs system
HMRC assigned a “green traffic light” to
CDS, indicating it would be delivered on 3 Blow for bid to clean up Swiss image
filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.— PAGE 16

has been at the heart of Whitehall’s
Brexit planning because of the fivefold
increase in declarations expected at
time. But last month, it wrote to the i HSBC woos transgender customers
committee saying the programme had The bank has unveiled a range of gender-neutral
RALPH ATKINS — ZURICH it followed “a strategy offull client tax
been relegated to “amber/red,” which DUNCAN
titles such asROBINSON — BRUSSELS
“Mx”, in addition to Mr, Mrs, Misscompliance”
or but was still trying to

FINANCIAL TIMES
British ports when the UK leaves the EU.
About 53 per cent of British imports
come from the EU, and do not require
means there are “major risks or issues Ms, in a move to embrace diversity and cater togather the information about the probes.
apparent in a number ofkey areas”. Credit
needs Suisse hascustomers.
of transgender been targeted by
— PAGE 20 HM Revenue & Customs said it had
HMRC said last night: “[CDS] is on sweeping tax investigations in the UK, launched a criminal investigation into

28821, Coslada, Madrid. legal deposit number

checks because they arrive through the track to be delivered by January 2019, France and the Netherlands, setting suspected tax evasion and money laun-

single market and customs union. But
Theresa May announced in January that
Brexit would include departure from
both trading blocs. HMRC handles 60m
declarations a year but, once outside the
Wacca to fellow surfers. Overseas tour- year, wannabe surfers from the city- Tourism chiefs have jumped on the relies on foreign visitors to Uluru in the
and it will be able to support frictionless back Switzerland’s attempts to clean up dering by “a global financial institution
international trade once the UK leaves
Datawatch
its image as a tax haven. and certain ofits employees”. The UK
the EU . . . Internal ratings are designed The Swiss bank said yesterday it was tax authority added: “The international
to make sure that each project gets the
focus and resource it requires for suc-
Terror attacks inwith
co-operating western Europe after
authorities
offices in London, Paris and Amsterdam
Recent reach
itsattacks
notably the message
2011
— of this investigation sends a clear
that there is no hiding place for
The lure of the exotic
Robin Lane Fox on the flair

(deposito legal) M-32596-1995;

customs union, the number is expected cessful delivery.” were contacted
Highlighted attack byOthers massacre bythose seeking to evade tax.”
local officials

Bracken House, 1 Friday street, london eC4M 9BT.

to hit 300m.
The revelations about the system,
called Customs Declaration Service, are
HMRC’s letters to the select commit-
tee, which will be published today, pro-
vide no explanation for the rating
Lloyd’s of London chose Brus-
insurers to follow. Most of the
“concerning client tax matters”. Anders BreivikDutch in prosecutors, who initiated the
AFP Dutch authorities said their counter- action, said they seized jewellery, paint-
Norway, the of foreign flora — HOUSE & HOME
EU, with Dublin and Luxem- parts in Germany wereBrussels attacks in Paris
also involved, ings and gold ingots as part of their
and Nice, and the while French officials said their

likely to throw a sharper spotlight on
whether Whitehall can implement a
change, but some MPs believe it was
caused by Mrs May’s unexpected deci-
sels over “five or six” other
cities in its decision to set up an
business written in Brussels
will be reinsured back to the
bourg thought to be more likely
homes for the industry. But
ists were a large proportion of the state were on the beach looking for les- reopening. A new A$40mn ($29mn) Northern Territory for half its revenues,
while Australia’s revenue department
Norway probe;
said it was investigating a Swiss Brussels suicide
Paris Nice bank. investigation had revealed “several

Publishing director, roula Khalaf;

host of regulatory regimes — in areas
ranging from customs and immigration
to agriculture and fisheries — by the
time Britain leaves the EU.
Problems with CDS and other projects
sion to leave the EU customs union.
Timetable & Great Repeal Bill page 2
Scheme to import EU laws page 3
Editorial Comment & Notebook page 12
Philip Stephens & Chris Giles page 13
EU base to help deal with the
expected loss of passporting
rights after Brexit.
John Nelson, chairman of the
centuries-old insurance mar-
syndicates at its City of London
headquarters, pictured above.
The Belgian capital had not
been seen as the first choice for
London’s specialist insurance
Mr Nelson said the city won on
its transport links, talent pool
and “extremely good regula-
tory reputation”.
Sources: Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Centre terror incidents in
Lex page 14
bombings — have
The inquiries threaten to undermine thousand” bank accounts opened in
bucked the trend
efforts by the country’s banking sector Switzerland and not declared to French
of generally low
to overhaul business models and ensure tax authorities.
fatalities from
customers meet international tax The Swiss attorney-general’s office
requirements following a US-led clamp- western Europesaid it was “astonished at the way this
down on evaders, which resulted in operation has been organised with the

Publishing Company, The Financial Times limited,

essential to Brexit could force London to JPMorgan eye options page 18 ket, said he expected other groups after the UK leaves the Insurers set to follow page 18
billions of dollars in fines. deliberate exclusion of Switzerland”. It

subscriptions & customer service

10,000-20,000 people who took lessons sons. “We are right at the front of it,” he advertising campaign with the tagline said the reopening felt like a long time
The probes risk sparking an interna- demanded a written explanation from
tional dispute after the Swiss attorney- Dutch authorities.

City watchdog sends a clear message as

general’s office expressed “astonish- In 2014, Credit Suisse pleaded guilty
ment” that it had been left out of the in the US to an “extensive and wide-
actions co-ordinated by Eurojust, the ranging conspiracy” to help clients THE RISE
Escape OF
the taper ECO-GLAM
trap
banker loses job over WhatsApp boast
subscription offers: www.ft.com/subscription registered office as above. local representative office;
EU’s judicial liaison body. evade tax. It agreed to fines of $2.6bn.
Credit Suisse, whose shares fell 1.2 per Additional reporting by Laura Noonan in How high earners can evade
cent yesterday, identified itself as the Dublin, Caroline Binham and Vanessa
subject ofinvestigations in the Nether- Houlder in London, and Michael Stothard a pension headache — FT MONEY
lands, France and the UK. The bank said in Paris Austen’s descendants insist the Rice portrait depicts her as a girl — see magazine

with his company each year, but that said of the recovery. “Don’t Go Small, Go Australia” recently coming after so many false starts. “You
Bridgeman Art Library

C/ infanta Maria Teresa 4, bajo 2, 28016, Madrid. issn

Berrys after discussions with regulators. media at work, but banks are unable to

Contact: +44 207 775 6000, fte.subs@ft.com

LAURA NOONAN — DUBLIN
JENNIFER THOMPSON — LONDON
Christopher Niehaus, a former Jeffer- ban people from installing apps on their

Brussels takes tough stance on Brexit

A boastful WhatsApp message has cost ies banker, passed confidential client private phones.
a London investment banker his job information to a “personal acquaint- Andrew Bodnar, a barrister at Matrix
and a £37,000 fine in the first case of ance and a friend” using WhatsApp, Chambers, said the case set “a precedent

with Spain handed veto over Gibraltar

Shutdown risk as border

1135-8262.
regulators cracking down on commu- according to the FCA. The regulator said in that it shows the FCA sees these mes- 390_Cover_PRESS.indd 1 19/01/2017 13:57

Manage your personal account: mma.ft.com

wall bid goes over the top nications over Facebook’s popular Mr Niehaus had turned over his device saging apps as the same as everything
chat app. to his employer voluntarily. else”.

flow dried up as the borders shut. The big wave of visitors strikes next launched across Europe and the US. go from watching the news with one eye
Congressional Republicans seeking to The FCA said Mr Niehaus had shared Information shared by Mr Niehaus
avert a US government shutdown after The fine by the Financial Conduct confidential information on the messag- included the identity and details of a
April 28 have resisted Donald Trump’s Authority highlights the increasing ing system “on a number of occasions” client and information about a rival of ALEX BARKER — BRUSSELS ambitious trade and airline access deals. mise. If Britain wants to prolong its

uae: Masar Printing & Publishing, P.O. Box 485100,

attempt to tack funds to pay for a wall problem new media pose for companies last year to “impress” people. Jefferies. In one instance the banker GEORGE PARKER — LONDON Gibraltar yesterday hit back at the status within the single market after

advertising
on the US-Mexico border on to
stopgap spending plans. They fear
that his planned $33bn increase in
defence and border spending could
force a federal shutdown for the first
that need to monitor and archive their
staff’s communication.
Several large investment banks have
banned employees from sending client
information over messaging services
Several banks have banned the use of
new media from work-issued devices,
but the situation has become trickier as
banks move towards a “bring your own
device” policy. Goldman Sachs has
boasted how he might be able to pay off STEFAN WAGSTYL — BERLIN clause, saying the territory had “shame- Brexit, the guidelines state it would
his mortgage if a deal was successful. The EU yesterday took a tough opening fully been singled out for unfavourable require “existing regulatory, budgetary,
Mr Niehaus was suspended from Jef- stance in Brexit negotiations, rejecting treatment by the council at the behest of supervisory and enforcement instru-
feries and resigned before the comple- Britain’s plea for early trade talks and Spain”. Madrid defended the draft ments and structures to apply”.
tion of a disciplinary process. Living wage rise to pile clause, pointing out that it only reflected Mr Tusk wants talks on future trade

dubai. editor in Chief: roula Khalaf. “We’ve been on Bondi beach for 27 week with the full return of tourism. International visitors were worth closed to saying ‘is this real?’,” he said.
explicitly giving Spain a veto over any
time since 2013, as Democrats refuse including WhatsApp, which uses an clamped down on its staff’s phone bills Jefferies declined to comment while pressure on care services “the traditional Spanish position”. to begin only once “sufficient progress”

Tel: +44 20 7873 4000 asiaads@ft.com,

to accept the proposals. encryption system that cannot be
US budget Q&A and accessed without permission from the
Trump attack over health bill i PAGE 8 user. Deutsche Bank last year banned
WhatsApp from work-issued Black-
as iPhone-loving staff spurn their work-
issued BlackBerrys.
Bankers at two institutions said staff
are typically trained in how to use new
arrangements that apply to Gibraltar.
Facebook did not respond to a request Senior EU diplomats noted that has been made on Britain’s exit bill and
for comment. About 2.3m people will benefit from European Council president Donald Mr Tusk’s text left room for negotiators citizen rights, which Whitehall officials
Additional reporting by Chloe Cornish today’s increase in the national living Tusk’s first draft of the guidelines, to work with in coming months. Prime believe means simultaneous talks are
Lombard page 20 wage to £7.50 per hour. But the rise which are an important milestone on minister Theresa May’s allies insisted possible if certain conditions are met.
will pile pressure on English councils, the road to Brexit, sought to damp Brit- that the EU negotiating stance was Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary,

emeaads@ft.com France: Publishing director, Jonathan slade, 46 rue la

which will have to pay care workers a ain’s expectations by setting out a largely “constructive”, with one saying it reassured European colleagues at a
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19 february/20 february 2022
Teenage skater
doping scandal
taints legacy of
Beijing Games
Valieva affair exposes problems IOC
faces in solving problems at own event
sArA GErMAno And tHoMAs HAlE
Beijing
And EdWArd WHitE — Seoul
Hundreds of medals have been won at
the Beijing Winter Olympics, but the
athlete who will be remembered as the
face of the Games is a figure skater who
finished fourth.
Fifteen-year-old Kamila Valieva, who
was told she had tested positive for a
banned substance two days after her
Russian Olympic Committee finished
first in the team figure skating, stood in
tears on Thursday after a disastrous
performance destroyed her medal
hopes in the individual event.
That she even took the ice on Thurs-
day has subjected the International
Olympic Committee to criticism of its
handling of the most significant doping
scandal since Russia’s state-sponsored
programme at the 2014 Sochi Games.
It was just one of many controversies
and challenges that the IOC has had to
navigate at Beijing 2022, ranging from
the threat from coronavirus to a host of
simmering political tensions including a
western diplomatic boycott over China’s
human rights abuses.
“The intensity of this Olympic experi-
Thomas Bach:
spoke of ‘chilling’
reception Kamila
Valieva received
from her coach at
the competition
ence was above and beyond what I have
experienced before in Olympic Games,”
Thomas Bach, IOC president, said in his
closing press conference.
He cited moments of camaraderie
between athletes before spending close
to an hour discussing the “disturbing”
final scenes of Valieva’s skate, and the
“chilling” reception she received from
her coach, Eteri Tutberidze, after crum-
pling under the pressure.
Valieva fell and stumbled several
times during her routine on Thursday
and was reprimanded by Tutberidze
after she left the ice. “Why did you stop
fighting? Explain it to me,” she
demanded, according to television foot-
age cited by Bach.
The Valieva affair has demonstrated
the difficulty the IOC faces in rectifying
problems quickly at its own event.
Because the positive sample came dur-
ing a domestic competition in Decem-
ber, the case was handled by the Russian
Anti-Doping Agency (Rusada), which
granted her the ability to compete while
on appeal.
Asked if the Olympics were ultimately
damaged by Valieva’s participation in
Beijing, Bach pointed to the IOC’s subse-
quent appeal of the Rusada decision.
“We did not want her to participate and
we lost the contest. We have to respect
the rule of law”, he said.
Fellow competitors said it was diffi-
cult to escape the maelstrom that had
engulfed the women’s figure skating
sentiment survey
Europe’s consumers squeezed
by high prices and Covid rules
MArtin Arnold — frankfurt
European consumers are feeling the
pinch from the rising cost of living and
continued pandemic restrictions,
according to a monthly EU survey.
The European Commission said yester-
day that its flash consumer confidence
indicator for the eurozone had fallen 0.3
points to minus 8.8 this month, its low-
est level since March 2021. Confidence
among consumers in the wider EU fell
0.2 points to minus 10.2.
That defied economists’ forecasts
polled by Reuters for the measure to rise
slightly and indicated that consumers
are feeling squeezed by rising prices
after eurozone inflation hit a record 5.1
per cent in January.
Their mood may brighten in the com-
ing weeks after Germany announced
plans to ease coronavirus restrictions,
following the lifting of almost all such
rules by Denmark, Sweden and Norway
and Austria’s decision to end its lock-
down on unvaccinated people.
“Looking ahead, the fact that some
governments have started to ease the
★ FTWeekend 3
INTERNATIONAL
event. Karen Chen, a US figure skater
who stumbled through her own routine
on Thursday to finish 16th, said: “I’ve
been pretty fatigued from everything
skating-related and not-skating
related”.
The furore over Valieva has distracted
from tensions surrounding China that
were central in the run-up to the Games
and in early press conferences, but these
issues have never been far away.
They ranged from the treatment of
Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang that
prompted the western diplomatic boy-
cott, to the wellbeing of Peng Shuai, the In tears: Kamila Valieva reacts to her score in Beijing with choreographer Daniil Gleikhengauz, right, and coach Eteri Tutberidze — Matthew Stockman/Getty
tennis player who made and then
retracted allegations of sexual assault
against a top Chinese official last year.
Margaret Lewis, a China law expert
and professor at Seton Hall University,
said the IOC had “not been a robust
force for human rights” and that Peng
“is just part of that”.
“Now the question is: what is the
international community going to do
about it?” she added. “Is this just going
to ‘wash, rinse, repeat’ every four years?
Or is there really a mechanism to
review?”
The authorities have repeatedly
emphasised the apolitical nature of the
competition, with Bach stressing on the
eve of the Games that his organisation
would not comment on “political
issues”. Yet sensitive topics also crept in
towards the end of the final week.
Yan Jiarong, a Beijing organising com-
mittee spokesperson, said on Thursday
in response to questions about the possi-
ble sourcing of clothing from Xinjiang
that “so-called forced labour” in the
region was “lies”. Bach, a day later,
referred to the incident as a “problem”
and said the IOC had contacted the
organisers over it.
For China, the Games were a success
not only in terms of performance — the
country was fourth in the medals table
going into the closing weekend, with
eight golds — but also the effectiveness
of measures to stop the spread of coro-
navirus, which became a test case of its
wider response to the pandemic.
From late January through to Thurs-
day, there were 607 cumulative cases
identified by more than 1.6mn tests
from tens of thousands of participants.
Ultimately, amid the myriad contro-
versies and questions surrounding the
Games, the IOC took the initiative on
Valieva and appealed to have her
removed from competition. The Court
of Arbitration for Sport, in its decision to
deny the appeal, said taking away her
ability to participate would cause the
skater “irreparable harm”.
Days later, Bach could only shift the
onus of responsibility away from the
IOC. He pointed to investigations by the
World Anti-Doping Agency and Rusada
into Valieva’s entourage.
“We can only hope for her to see that
this is addressed in the right way”, he
said, “and there is not a traumatic expe-
rience for such a young woman.”
remaining virus restrictions suggests
that consumer sentiment will start to
pick up over the coming months,” said
Melanie Debono, senior Europe econo-
mist at Pantheon Macroeconomics.
Google mobility data is already show-
ing a rebound in visits to retail and rec-
reation venues in many eurozone coun-
tries this month and restaurant book-
ings are rising in Germany. That follows
‘The relaxation of
restrictions will allow
services spending
to spring back’
a disappointing Christmas for shops
after retail sales fell 3 per cent in Decem-
ber on the previous month, amid record
infections caused by Omicron.
“The relaxation of restrictions will
allow services spending to spring back,”
said Debono, forecasting that eurozone
household spending would stagnate in
the first quarter of this year before pick-
ing up in the second quarter.
4 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

INTERNATIONAL

monetary policy Economic partnership

Inflation ‘far too high’, warns Fed official
New York president
Williams calls for rate rise
and cut to balance sheet
ColBy smith — New York
A top official at the Federal Reserve said
the US central bank should “steadily”
raise interest rates from their current
near-zero levels in March, in a bid to
damp demand and tame inflation.
The comments from John Williams,
president of the Federal Reserve Bank of
New York, yesterday came amid sub-
stantial uncertainty about how quickly
the central bank will increase its main
rate after “lift-off” expected in March.
As one of Fed president Jay Powell’s
inner circle, Williams’ views carry sig-
nificant weight as policymakers engage
in a heated debate about the lengths the
Fed needs to go to counter inflation.
“With today’s strong economy and in-
flation that is well above our 2 per cent
longer-run goal, it is time to start the
process of steadily moving the target
range back to more normal levels,” he
said at an event at New Jersey City
University.
“I expect it will be appropriate to raise
the target range at our upcoming meet-
ing in March,” he added.
Williams did not comment on the
potential size of March’s adjustment,
but acknowledged that inflation, which
latin america. drug trafficking
has reached its fastest pace in four dec-
ades, is at a level that is “far too high”,
and said monetary policy had an “imp-
ortant role to play” in helping to tame it.
“Demand for goods and some services
is now far outstripping supply, resulting
in elevated inflation,” he said. “With the
labour market already very strong, it’s
important to restore the balance
between supply and demand and bring
inflation down.”
He also suggested the Fed “steadily
and predictably” reduce its nearly $9tn
balance sheet, and start scaling back its
holding of Treasuries and agency mort-
gage-backed securities later this year.
“Taken together, these two sets of
actions, steadily raising the target range
for the federal funds rate and steadily
bringing down our securities holdings,
should help bring demand closer to sup-
ply,” he said.
Williams is the latest Fed official to
weigh in on the pace at which the central
bank should be moving from the ultra-
stimulative monetary policy settings
that have been in place for two years
since the onset of the pandemic.
James Bullard, president of the St
Louis Fed and voting member on the
Federal Open Market Committee this
year, has been one of the most vocal
advocates for “front-loading” the inter-
est rate rises. He has called for the fed-
eral funds rate to be 1 percentage point
higher from its near-zero level by July.
Bullard has also signalled his support
for a larger than usual half-point inter-
est rate rise next month, but would
defer to Powell.
Several Fed officials have resisted the
need for such a move, including Esther
George of Kansas City and Loretta
Mester of Cleveland. San Francisco’s
Mary Daly has instead called for a
“measured” approach to lifting the fed
funds rate.
Divisions within the Fed are even
sharper over the balance sheet, with
some officials making the case for out-
right asset sales of agency mortgage-
backed securities and others preferring
to no longer reinvest the proceeds of
maturing securities.
UAE and India
seal free trade
deal aimed at
boosting jobs
and exports
simEon kErr — dubai
BEnjamin parkin — delhi
The United Arab Emirates and India
have signed a free trade deal that is
expected to double bilateral non-oil
trade to $100bn within five years as the
Gulf state intensifies its economic part-
nership with its second-largest trade
partner.
The comprehensive economic partner-
ship agreement is expected to boost
growth, exports and job creation in both
nations, said Thani al-Zeyoudi, the
UAE’s minister of state for foreign trade.
“It’s a comprehensive win-win,” he told

Honduras arrest puts US cocaine fight in focus the Financial Times.

Former president facing
extradition had been feted by
Washington as a valued ally
miChaEl stott — loNdoN
ChristinE murray — MexiCo CitY
Juan Orlando Hernández extolled his
achievements as Honduran president
with the words: “Together we made
history”.
This week, the one-time Washington
ally earned his place in the record books
for a different reason — less than a
month after leaving office — as he
became the first former Latin American
leader to be arrested and face extradi-
tion to the US on drug-trafficking
charges.
As dozens of armed police led a hand-
cuffed Hernández from his luxury
home in the capital, Tegucigalpa, many
Hondurans celebrated his downfall, let-
ting off fireworks and singing “Juanchi,
you’re going to New York”.
“It’s not an easy moment, I wouldn’t
wish it on anyone,” the former president
said in an audio message posted online
shortly before his arrest. Hernández
vowed to clear his name.
Prosecutors allege for the past 18
years, Hernández “participated in a vio-
lent drug-trafficking conspiracy” to ship
hundreds of tonnes of cocaine to the US
via Honduras and received “millions of
dollars in bribes and proceeds” in
return, according to the extradition
request seen by the Financial Times.
Hernández was not the first Latin
American leader exposed for drug ties.
Ernesto Samper had his US visa revoked
while president of Colombia in 1996
after cocaine traffickers helped fund his
election. Samper admitted that drug
money helped fund his campaign but
said he was unaware of it. Manuel Nori-
ega, Panama’s de facto ruler, was
deposed and captured in a 1989 US inva-
sion after being indicted on drug-traf-
ficking charges.
But what was unusual about Hernán-
dez is that he was lauded by the US as a
valued ally even as law enforcement
agencies were investigating him and his
brother for drug trafficking. Despite the
widespread and well-publicised influ-
ence of drug money in Honduras, the US
continued to back him.
In 2017, Joe Biden, then US vice-presi-
dent, phoned Hernández and “praised
Honduras’s progress in improving
security and tax administration”,
Detained: according to a White House statement.
police take Juan Cruz, the top White House offi-
Juan Orlando cial on Latin America from 2017-19, told
Hernández from the FT that when then-vice-president
his home in Mike Pence met Hernández and other
Tegucigalpa. Central American presidents in Guate-
Below, locals mala in 2018, “I was part of the team
react to his preparing the briefing and I can tell you
arrest we didn’t have a clue” that Hernández
Honduran Police/AFP/Getty;
Gustavo Amador/EPA-EFE
was an alleged drug trafficker.
A former senior US government offi-
cial said the state department and
White House were not informed about
justice department or Drug Enforce-
ment Administration (DEA) investiga-
tions into Hernández despite asking
repeatedly. The US justice department
declined to comment.
For years Hernández talked tough on
drugs in public, but in private, accord-
ing to the extradition request, Hernán-
dez was promising to protect traffickers.
US prosecutors say Hernández’s first
presidential election campaign in
2013-14 was oiled by a $1mn bribe from
Mexican cartel boss Joaquín Guzmán in
exchange for promises to protect ship-
ments by his Sinaloa cartel through
Honduras, a key transit point in drug
routes to the US. Hernández’s successful
re-election bid in 2017-18 was also alleg-
edly lubricated with $1.5mn of drug-
trafficking proceeds, according to the
US extradition request.
But by 2019, his luck was running out.
His brother Tony went on trial in the US
and was later sentenced to life imprison-
ment for smuggling more than 185
tonnes of cocaine. Lurid testimony
implicated Hernández.
Back home, Hondurans protested in
the streets, demanding the removal of
their “narco-presidente”. Yet less than
two months after Tony Hernández’s
conviction, then-president Donald
Trump welcomed his brother at a sum-
Hernández mit in Florida. Trump praised Hernán-
dez and boasted: “We’re stopping drugs
allegedly at a level that has never happened.”
took part Patrick Leahy, a US senator, was
scathing, saying through “years of
‘in a violent decay, depravity, and impunity, succes-
drug- sive US administrations sullied our rep-
utation by treating Hernández as a
trafficking friend and partner”, adding: “By making
conspiracy’ excuse after excuse for a government
that had no legitimacy and that func-
and tioned as a criminal enterprise, US offi-
received cials lost sight of what we stand for.”
Ultimately, experts said, Hernández
‘millions of won US backing because he was pre-
dollars in pared to do what Washington most
wanted: reducing the flow of migrants
bribes and from Honduras to the US border.
proceeds’ Tired of corruption under Hernán-
dez, Hondurans voted in a leftwing pres-
ident, Xiomara Castro, by a landslide
last year. She took office last month with
strong US support but faces daunting
odds tackling endemic graft.
“It’s going to be really difficult,” said
Salvador Nasralla, Castro’s incoming
vice-president.
“Drug traffickers are in the institu-
tional structures of the country, in the
ministries, in Congress, in the Supreme
Court. Honduras is a living example of a
narco state.”
Nirmala Sitharaman, India’s finance
minister, on Thursday described a deal
with the UAE as a gateway for trade into
the Gulf and Africa. “This is an outcome
of several years of engaging,” she said.
“The UAE is the threshold of the entire
African Union and the Middle
East . . . An agreement with the UAE
opens the doors for India in these two
regions as well.”
The UAE expects the deal to add
$9bn, or 1.7 per cent, to gross domestic
product by 2030. It also forecasts an
increase of exports to India by 1.5 per
cent, or $7.6bn, and imports to the Gulf
state rising by $14.3bn, or 3.8 per cent,
by the end of the decade.
It also expects the pact to deliver an
additional 140,00 skilled jobs into its
workforce over the same timeframe.
“We will continue to encourage tal-
ented people to the UAE and there will
be flexibility over visas in priority sec-
tors for people to come and work with
us,” said Zeyoudi.
The UAE has a population of 10mn, of
which about 9mn are expatriates.
Elimination of tariffs on commodi-
ties, such as aluminium, copper, steel
and various petrochemicals, is one ben-
efit of the deal, he said. Overall, about 80
per cent of products and services will
have tariffs removed, said Zeyoudi.
Anti-dumping measures and rules of
origin are also clearly set out in the deal
to protect manufacturers, he added.
Indian and Emirati businesses will be
able to apply for various government
contracts in each country.
Finalising a deal with the UAE is a
coup for India, which has been seeking
bilateral trade agreements since quit-
ting the pan-Asian RCEP group over
concerns about China’s membership.
Free trade deals remain controversial
in India, and the country has long
sought to guard access to large sections
of its economy. But Prime Minister
Narendra Modi’s government has in
recent months sought to accelerate the
completion of trade deals as activity
rebounds from the Covid-19 pandemic.
India is also close to finalising a pact
with Australia, whose trade minister
visited New Delhi last week. India
started trade talks with the UK last
month after a visit by British trade min-
ister Anne-Marie Trevelyan, and last
year relaunched EU talks.
The UAE sees trade as central to its
drive to diversify away from oil. It is tar-
geting a doubling of its overall economy
from $381bn to $762bn by 2030.
The UK has opened negotiations with
Gulf Cooperation Council countries, but
in the event of slow progress with the
six-member bloc, the UAE is willing to
open bilateral trade talks, say officials.

California. mayoral election

Billionaire shakes up Los Angeles race with pledge on crime and homelessness
Caruso wants return to tough
law enforcement methods
after last-minute poll entry
ChristophEr GrimEs — los aNgeles
In the wake of the 1992 Los Angeles
riots, wealthy Republican businessman
Richard Riordan was elected as the
city’s mayor after claiming he was the
only candidate “tough enough to turn
LA around”.
With gang-related crime sending
homicides to an all-time high of almost
2,000 a year, Riordan’s promises to put
thousands of new police officers on the
streets resonated with a fearful public.
Thirty years on, the city’s residents
are on edge again — and another
wealthy businessman is running for
mayor with a pledge to restore order to a
city plagued by rising homicides and
widespread homelessness.
Rick Caruso, a billionaire property
developer who once served as the city’s
police commissioner, shook up this
year’s mayoral race by entering the con-
test a day before last week’s deadline. “I
know that we can end homelessness,
crime and corruption,” he said on Twit-
ter. “But the politicians can’t.”
Caruso, a longtime Republican who
defected to the Democratic party this
year, has been outspoken in his opposi-
tion to progressive police reforms that
have taken hold in California.
He favours a return to the “broken
windows” law enforcement methods
championed by William Bratton, the
former New York police chief whom he
recruited to take over the LA force, and
ex-New York mayor Rudy Giuliani.
He enters the LA race as rising crime
in big US cities has forced Democrats to
balance calls for a fairer criminal justice
system with citizens’ concerns about
safety. New York elected Eric Adams, a
former police captain, as its mayor last
year, while San Francisco’s London
Breed pledged to be “more aggressive”
in fighting crime.
Another question is whether liberal
LA wants a billionaire as its mayor.
Caruso’s $4.3bn fortune, built on a prop-
erty portfolio that includes his signature UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Initia- made LA the carceral capital of the
high-end outdoor malls, will make him tive, citing demographic changes, with country.”
a serious contender in the race, experts Los Angeles becoming more Latino, less In the 1990s, violent crime was heav-
say. But the electorate that Caruso will white and more Democratic. ily concentrated in LA’s poorer areas
face in November’s poll is far different “Today this is a majority Latino city where gang wars were being fought. But
than the one that elected Riordan, when that has been clear about what policies it in the past two years, homicides and
pro-business Republicans dominated prefers,” Diaz said. “Rhetoric by candi- burglaries have occurred across the city,
California. dates or moneyed interests saying we even in its wealthiest quarters. Los
“We’re not in that era any more,” said need to go back to ‘broken windows’ Angeles Magazine captured the spirit of
Sonja Diaz, founding director of the policing is incredible. Broken windows the moment when it ran a cover story
this month with the headline: “Are you
safe?”
The effectiveness of Caruso’s law and
order message may be blunted by the
fact that other candidates have staked
out similar territory. Frontrunner
Karen Bass, who served as chair of the
Congressional Black Caucus and was
considered by President Joe Biden for
vice-president, said this month that she
would put hundreds more police on the
streets.
Caruso’s message may overlap even
more directly with that of Joe Buscaino,
a former police officer serving on the
city council who has called for 1,300
additional officers. Other contenders
Rick Caruso: once served as LA police commissioner — Gary Coronado/Los Angeles Times/Getty include councilman Kevin de León, the
most prominent Latino on the ballot,
and Mike Feuer, the city attorney who
wants a crackdown on gun violence.
Much harder to articulate is a solution
to the city’s high homeless population,
the issue that polls say the city’s resi-
dents are most concerned about. In
2020, 66,000 people in the county were
homeless; last year’s count was can-
celled. Like crime, homelessness has
spread across the city.
Eric Garcetti, the outgoing mayor who
is standing down after two terms,
claimed “full responsibility” for the
response to the crisis, but homelessness
swelled during his tenure.
As the race to replace Garcetti heats
up, the question is whether LA is anx-
ious enough to elect a law and order can-
didate, perhaps one who is extremely
wealthy.
“There may be an opportunity for a
‘tough on crime, crack down on home-
lessness’ message,” said Dan Schnur, a
University of Southern California pro-
fessor. “But it will be a greater challenge
today than it was for Riordan when he
ran.”
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 5
6 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

FT BIG READ. UKRAINE CRISIS

The US says it has published detailed intelligence about Russia’s military plans in order to make it harder
to launch an eventual invasion of Ukraine. But some allies fear the tactics are exacerbating tensions.
By James Politi, Aime Williams, Max Seddon and Roman Olearchyk

Biden’s information war with Putin

S
peaking before the UN Secu-
rity Council, Antony Blinken
distilled in just a few minutes
Washington’s most dire warn-
ings about Russia’s intentions
towards Ukraine — ones that America
and its allies fear could become true
within days.
The secretary of state ran through
what he said was Vladimir Putin’s play-
book: the misleading military pullback,
the false pretexts for war and the man-
ner of the potential attack on his neigh-
bour, using tanks, troops, missiles and
cyber attacks.
Yet Blinken knew that in order to be
credible in levelling such accusations,
America had to deal with the legacy of
Colin Powell and the George W Bush
administration. Speaking to the very
same body in February 2003, Blinken’s
late predecessor gave a presentation
about Iraq’s possession of weapons of
mass destruction — an assessment that
would later be roundly debunked.
“I am mindful that some have called
into question our information, recalling
previous instances where intelligence
ultimately did not bear out,” Blinken
said on Thursday. “But let me be clear: I
am here today not to start a war but to
prevent one.”
Blinken’s words were the latest salvo
in a high-stakes information war
between Moscow and Washington over
the fate of Ukraine — one that Joe
Biden’s administration has openly
embraced. Having been blindsided by
Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea and its
2015 intervention in Syria, Washington
wants to dominate the narrative before
any conflict breaks out.
The US effort has included an almost
unprecedented, methodical real-time
declassification of sensitive informa-
tion. Not only have US and western offi-
cials detailed the huge build-up of Rus-
sian military forces along Ukraine’s bor-
der, but they have also warned repeat-
edly of “false-flag” operations, plots to
create a puppet government in Kyiv and
the many ways an assault might unfold.
A senior Biden administration official
told the Financial Times that their pur-
pose was to make an “invasion harder to
execute, and then should it be executed,
to make it harder to claim legitimacy”.
But the US official added that it was also
about openly countering Russia’s
repeated use of misinformation over the
past 15 years to gain strategic advantage.
“We have learnt a lot about how Rus-
sia uses the information space as part of
the theatre of war. We have seen them
run these kinds of plays before in
Ukraine and Georgia, across Europe, in
Syria,” the senior US official said. “We
have not just learnt from that and learnt
how to counter it, I think we have learnt
to take the fight to them”.
If accurate, the published intelligence
suggests that US officials have managed
to get to the heart of Putin’s methods
and reasoning in a way that they have
struggled to do for decades.
However, some in Europe and
Ukraine fear that the US approach
might exacerbate the risk of conflict by
making diplomacy harder. US officials
also know they face strong public mis-
trust — not least because of the intelli-
gence used to justify the Iraq war.
The western claims have been
derided in Moscow as inaccurate, fanci-
ful and provocative. Russian officials
US president Joe Biden,
centre, wants to fight
misinformation by
Russia’s Vladimir
Putin, top right
FT montage/Reuters/Getty Images/
Maxar Technologies via Reuters
‘We have accuse Washington of stoking tensions
and undermining any chance of a diplo-
learnt a matic solution to the stand-off. Russia
lot about has denied it has any plans for a full-
blown invasion of Ukraine.
how Russia “Please announce the schedule of our
uses the ‘invasions’ for the coming year. I’d like
to plan my holiday,” quipped Maria
information Zakharova, spokesperson for Russia’s
space as foreign ministry.
part of the Putin’s small circle
theatre of The barrage of intelligence about Putin’s
war. We plans has been especially striking
because it has become harder to spy on
have seen the Kremlin over the past three decades.
them run One former US intelligence official
these kinds says that in the early 1990s, the arrival
of mobile phones and the “indiscreet”
of plays nature of Russia’s elite meant its govern-
before’ ment could be read “like an open book”.
But Putin, a former KGB officer, is
harder to analyse. Meetings with him
are limited to a small circle of trusted
advisers, which means the chances of
getting information leaked from the
heart of the Kremlin are slim.
Putin’s circle has shrunk further still
due to his extensive social distancing
precautions. Even defence minister Ser-
gei Shoigu was forced to sit at the other
end of a comically long table from the
president at a meeting on Monday.
“Nowadays Russian politics is a lot
more controlled . . . it’s not what it was
in the 1990s, and we see a lot less of it,”
says the former US intelligence official.
“These people now are trained security
operatives and so their discipline is
much better.”
Still, some developments have
worked in the west’s favour. “We have
good technology and we have good over-
head capabilities, and we can get into
other country’s computer networks,”
said the former intelligence official.
There is also a growing abundance of
so-called “open-source” intelligence —
meaning it is available to anyone who
knows where to look — which is increas-
ingly used by governments. “We have
some very, very good [intelligence] col-
lection on Russia,” the former US intelli-
gence official said. “Often the problem is
not so often getting the information, but
processing the information.”
The US started ramping up its strat-
egy of sharing and releasing intelligence
on Russia’s plans for Ukraine back in
October when the signs of a military
build-up along the border became an
increasing concern.
According to the senior Biden admin-
istration official, the US began to hold a
series of videoconferences and in-per-
son meetings to share intelligence about
Russia with other countries, moving
beyond its traditional Five Eyes intelli-
gence alliance and also involving the
North Atlantic Council, Nato’s main
decision-making body.
The next step was to share the infor-
mation publicly, which began in Decem-
ber with the release of the first details of
Russia’s troop build-up along the
Ukrainian border. But this involved
overcoming the intelligence commu-
nity’s traditional reluctance to release
their findings for fear of compromising
sources and methods.
“I remember being in meetings and
learning things that I thought it would
be useful to tell the American people
about and to tell the world about,” says
Michael McFaul, the former US ambas-
sador to Russia. “And there were so
many times that our intelligence com-
munity said, well, we can’t do that
because that would expose the ways by
which we acquired this intelligence.”
John Sipher, who served as a former
CIA agent based in Moscow, says there
were periods when the US would rou-
tinely hold back intelligence in the hope
of building a better relationship with
Moscow. “We had a tremendous
amount of information on Putin’s
money and his efforts to murder people
and so on,” says Sipher. “And the admin-
istration would not want to publish it
and would say — ‘no, let’s give him a
chance and mend relations.’”
However, after a very tumultuous
relationship between the White House
and the intelligence community under
Donald Trump, and a rough start under
Joe Biden with the Taliban taking con-
trol of Afghanistan last year, Avril
Haines, the director of national intelli-
gence, and Bill Burns, the CIA director,
appear to be working in lockstep
with the rest of the administration.
“If people did not want to do this there
would obviously be sniping and moan-
ing, and you’re not seeing that,” says
Anthony Vassalo, a former US intelli-
gence officer now at Rand’s national
security research division.
A danger for dialogue?
The US drive to share intelligence has
generally been supported by its Euro-
pean allies, though some worry the
strategy could hurt the chances of dia-
logue with Moscow.
“It’s a way of saying — we know what
you’re up to. And that’s a way to put
pressure on the Russians. [But] we
believe you shouldn’t escalate in pub-
lic,” says one German official.
“Germany’s intelligence assessment is
the same as the US and UK one. The
Russians have everything in place for an
invasion. But the question is: how do
you interpret this information? The US
and UK assume he’s going to act. But we
see it slightly differently,” said another
German official.
In Ukraine, officials including Volody-
myr Zelensky, the president, have
played down and at times bristled at
some of the intelligence disclosures, for
fear that they would sow panic in the
country. But others say they have been
effective and necessary.
“It’s better that we prevent something
from happening than to actually learn
that it was true after that happens,” says
Andriy Zagorodnyuk, a former Ukrain-
ian defence minister and current
adviser to the Zelensky administration.
“If you are reactive, you are already
catching up with Russia, and Russia
already has the initiative,” he says.
The senior Biden administration offi-
cial concedes that intelligence is just a
“series of reports and inputs” that can
offer a “picture” but “almost never a
perfect smoking gun”. Yet overall it
showed a “remarkable consistency”
about Putin’s plans, helping to push US
allies and partners towards a more mus-
cular stance that they hope has put the
Russian leader off kilter and maybe
even changed his calculations.
But the strategy could have unin-
tended consequences. Some in Wash-
ington question the tactics. “Every time
[the US] pre-bunks information or
exposes these plans, it runs the risk of
looking like the boy who cried wolf,”
says Andrew Lohsen of the Center for
Strategic and International Studies.
In Moscow, Alexander Gabuev, senior
fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center,
‘We don’t says in Russia the intelligence leaks are
know already being portrayed as the west’s
version of disinformation. “We don’t
whether the know whether the US has really good
US has intelligence or not. I think a lot of the
really good assessments could be worded a lot more
carefully, and we know that Biden has a
intelligence. habit of slips of the tongue,” he says.
A lot of the The most damning critique of the US
tactics comes from a Kremlin official
assessments who suggests they might be pointless.
could be “This is all in one man’s head. Only he
knows when and how to escalate or tone
more things down,” the Russian official says.
careful, and “He has decided that this is the right
place and time to make these demands.
Biden has He worked in security for so many years
a habit of — you and I can’t even imagine all the
threat scenarios he sees in his head.”
slips of the Additional reporting by Guy Chazan and
tongue’ John-Paul Rathbone

Obituary PJ O’Rourke, the conservative humour-

ist, was a freewheeling journalist with an
The episode was one of many in a
journey — and career — filled with
Miami University of Ohio as an English
major (a subject chosen, he told the
Buckley, a peculiarity of style that made
him, some said, “the rightwinger [that

Writer who
unerring eye for the killing detail who examples of political irony, absurdity, Financial Times in 2014, because, “I saw leftwingers] liked”.
never let a tricky situation go to waste. and hypocrisy, for which he had a keen English and thought — I speak that!”). He was twice married, first to Amy
In autumn of 1984, having elected to sense and a withering disdain. Vanity While there, he had a phase of drug- Lumet, daughter of the movie director

sought out take a vacation in Lebanon, which was

then in the grip of a civil war, with the
Fair never ran his Lebanon diary; it was
“much too weird to publish”.
fuelled, youthful radicalism, eventually
revealing to his grandmother that he
Sidney, and then to Tina Mallon with
whom he had two daughters, and a son.

political irony
aim of writing about the “holiday pleas- O’Rourke, who has died aged 74, had a had become a communist. “Well,” she is To many, O’Rourke represented a
ures of Beirut and its environs” for Van- career that spanned National Lampoon, reported to have replied, “at least you bygone genre of American conservative.
ity Fair magazine, he found himself held Rolling Stone, The Atlantic and count- aren’t a Democrat!” His self-effacing humour, disdain for

and absurdity at gunpoint by a teenaged guard.

The Beirut checkpoint, as he would
later write, was “manned — or I should
say boyed — by 15 and 16-year-old mem-
bers of the militant Islamic fundamen-
PJ O’Rourke talist Hizbollah”. Seizing on his US pass-
Conservative satirist and journalist port, the boy with the gun harangued
1947-2022 O’Rourke for 20 minutes about “Amer-
ica Satan Devil and how the US had
caused the Lebanese civil war, colonial-
ism, imperialism, Zionism, and every
other problem he could think of”. At last
his passport was returned and O’Rourke
was waved through, but not before the
boy delivered his parting shot: “As soon
as I get my green card I am going to den-
tist school in Dearborn, Michigan”.
“I bet the teenager who pointed
the gun at me is now a wealthy ortho-
dontist living in Bloomfield Hills,”
O’Rourke reflected.
less freelance assignments. His writing
was legendary, though it often danced
on the border of distastefulness. His
copy was so clean that editors had only
one job: “Weed out the joke that went
too far”, remembered Corey Seymour
from Rolling Stone.
Patrick Jake O’Rourke was born in
November 1947, in Toledo, Ohio, into
what he described as “a family so nor-
mal as to be almost a statistical anom-
aly”. His mother was a housewife (later
a school administrator) and his father a
car salesman. He joked that he was the
eldest of 2.5 children since “my sisters
are identical twins and no one noticed
they had separate identities until they
married different men”.
O’Rourke may have inherited some of
his conservative libertarianism from his
family. In the mid 1960s he attended the
The radicalism faded, but his grand-
mother’s antipathy for Democrats, lib-
erals and leftists of all stripes rubbed off
on him. His conservatism began to truly
develop when, after attending Johns
Hopkins University for an MA on the
Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, he got a
job as a writer at National Lampoon, a
satirical magazine. His first pay cheque,
for $300, had $140 taken out for taxes,
health insurance, and social security. He
would never again look kindly on big
government.
What marked O’Rourke’s humour
was its reflexivity. Despite being a regis-
tered Republican, he was just as willing
to turn his fire on conservative politi-
cians as on Democrats. This, plus his
scurrilous wit and vaunted capacity for
substance abuse, put him closer to
Hunter S Thompson than William F
PJ O’Rourke was as happy to turn his
fire on Republicans as on Democrats
His copy was so clean
that editors had only
one job: ‘Weed out the
joke that went too far’
“family values”, and willingness to back
Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in
2016 — she was, he claimed, “wrong
about absolutely everything, but . . .
wrong within normal parameters” —
seem to stand in stark contrast to many
of his Republican peers and successors.
That view might have been rosy-
hued. O’Rourke held plenty of opinions
modern progressives would abhor, but
he was under no illusions that America
needed to be made “great again”. He
imagined no lost glory to which it must
return, remarking, “In general, life is
better than it ever has been, and if you
think that, in the past, there was some
golden age of pleasure and plenty to
which you would, if you were able,
transport yourself, let me say one single
word: ‘dentistry’.”
Joshua Wolens
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 7
8 ★
SATURDAY 19 FEBRUARY 2022
Drumbeats of war are
sounding in Europe
Moscow appears to be manufacturing a pretext to invade Ukraine
Europe faces a moment of great peril.
Hopes earlier this week that Vladimir
Putin was backing away from a potential
invasion of Ukraine quickly faded. After
Moscow announced some of the troops
it had amassed around its neighbour
would return to base, satellite images
showed the opposite. Russia’s presi-
dent repeated baseless claims of “geno-
cide” against Russian speakers in east-
ern Ukraine. By yesterday, an upsurge
in violence around Russian-occupied
Donbas, followed by separatist leaders’
announcement of a mass evacuation of
civilians, appeared ominously like a
choreographed attempt by Moscow to
create a pretext for military action.
Western efforts to deter a Russian
invasion through diplomatic engage-
ment and warnings of severe economic
sanctions may ultimately fail. Yet
through their vigorous campaign to
counter Russian disinformation, west-
ern allies have managed to strip away
any surprise, save over the precise tim-
ing and form of any attack, and any
possible subterfuge about its motives.
If an assault occurs, few in the world’s
advanced democracies, beyond the
political fringes, will be in any doubt
that this is aggression based on an arti-
ficial crisis stirred up by Moscow.
This is a big change from 2014. After
protests toppled Ukraine’s Russian-
leaning president Viktor Yanukovych,
the appearance of Russian troops in
Crimea and then east Ukraine caught
the world off-guard. Some western
intellectuals and politicians were taken
in by Russia’s fake narrative of a west-
ern-backed “neo-Nazi coup” in Kyiv,
used to justify its military intervention
to protect Russian-speakers.
Today, the west is not playing
catch-up with Russia, but is prepared
for what may come. The US has shone a
spotlight on Russia’s military build-up
since at least November, sharing intelli-
gence with allies. That has helped to
Canada’s illiberal
response to protesters
Freedom Convoy occupation has been mishandled by the authorities
It is hard to understand, for those not
on the ground, what it is like living in
the section of downtown Ottawa occu-
pied by the so-called Freedom Convoy
of anti-government protesters. Resi-
dents tell stories of harassment, being
kept awake by almost constant honk-
ing and feeling as if they are trapped
within their own homes. The encamp-
ment itself is reported to be both a
“state within a state” of co-ordinated
services such as medics, electricians
and healthcare as well as an unlawful
street party, with sound stages, hot
dogs and even a couple of saunas.
Canadian leader Justin Trudeau’s
invocation of the Emergencies Act this
week in response to the occupation was
a step too far, however. The measures
are designed to respond to insurrec-
tion, espionage and genuine threats to
the Canadian constitution rather than
peaceful protest, no matter how irritat-
ing and inconvenient. The right to such
protest is fundamental to a free society.
Such protests often involve inconven-
iencing people, whether that means the
pickets of striking workers, Britain’s
anti-climate change group Extinction
Rebellion, or the Freedom Convoy.
It is similarly hard to understand
how things were allowed to get to this
point. Originally sparked by restric-
tions on cross-border travel by unvac-
cinated truckers — an example of gov-
ernment over-reach given how little
risk these workers pose — the protests
have since broadened out to reflect a
mix of general anti-government senti-
ment and opposition to coronavirus
restrictions, in particular. Their focus is
often misguided, concentrating on
Trudeau when plenty of these rules are
matters for provincial governments
rather than the national one. Many
Canadian truckers, the majority of
whom are vaccinated, see the protests
as an embarrassment.
Police seem to have been hamstrung
cement solidarity among western
allies, despite some wobbles, and forge
consensus over punitive sanctions.
This unity may have surprised the
Kremlin. Putin clearly assumed that
the US, after its ignominious with-
drawal from Afghanistan, was weak-
ened and careless with its allies. He cal-
culated that a looming presidential
election in France and a political tran-
sition in Germany would play to his
advantage. But at the Munich Security
Conference on Friday, Germany’s for-
eign minister Annalena Baerbock
insisted her country — though it has
seemed to waver in its readiness to con-
front Moscow — was ready to pay a
“high economic price for unprece-
dented sanctions” on Russia, specifi-
cally naming the Nord Stream 2 gas
pipeline as a potential target.
The west has been careful, too, to
leave Putin an off-ramp by offering to
continue talks on European security.
Though the west has made clear it can-
not give the absolute guarantees Russia
seeks that Ukraine would never join
Nato, Moscow would, like its counter-
parts, have much to gain from revital-
ised agreements on conventional
forces and nuclear arms.
If Moscow chooses the military path,
it will trigger a conflict in Europe on a
scale that has long seemed unimagina-
ble. Its human and economic costs are
hard to contemplate. It would take the
continent into a new phase in its his-
tory, in which much of Europe would
be in an indirect conflict with Russia.
Yet the west has in recent weeks sig-
nificantly increased the price Russia
would pay. It would be a pariah in the
western community, facing sanctions
that would have an impact on its econ-
omy that could rebound on Putin polit-
ically. Russia’s president has in the past
been seen as a shrewd tactician.
Unleashing war in Europe might prove
his biggest miscalculation.
in their response by naivety as well as
Canada’s separation of powers between
local, provincial and federal authori-
ties. Fears that violence could be
sparked — many of the protesters have
children with them — have also delayed
a more forceful response. Residents
have nevertheless lost faith in the
authorities, speculating that the police
either sympathise with the protesters
or feel outnumbered and outmatched.
It was amid these circumstances that
on day 17 of the protests the federal
government used the Emergencies Act
for the first time in Canadian history.
This sweeping legislative authority
allows the federal government to
clamp down on the financial backers of
the protest — many are in the US — in
order to break what is seen as a siege
without direct confrontation with the
protesters. The act also allows the fed-
eral government to more closely direct
the local police.
Yet such measures were not needed
to reopen the Ambassador Bridge
between the US and Canada. The
blockage of the trade route — which
carries about a quarter of US-Canada
trade — was ended before the powers
were invoked. Existing laws should be
enough, if enforced, to prevent harass-
ment and property damage.
Trudeau’s use of emergency powers,
whatever the merits, has appeared to
unblock the situation. The police on
Friday had begun to move in, and
arrested some of the protest leaders. In
the long run, however, Canada’s force-
ful approach may only encourage the
conspiracist mindset that has helped to
fuel the protest and other anti-lock-
down movements elsewhere. With a
risk that Canada’s protests spread to
the US, foreign governments should
look to the country as an example both
of the costs of allowing such occupa-
tions to get out of hand, and the diffi-
culty of controlling them when they do.
FTWeekend
Letters
Ukraine will have to search for other ways to manage its security if Nato entry proves an unrealistic ambition, writes Dmitri Trenin — Ewan White
Putting loss centre stage makes ‘Sex and the City’ relevant
In “A #wokemoment won’t make you
more relevant” (Opinion, Life & Arts,
FT Weekend, February 12) Jo Ellison
expresses her disappointment — for a
second time in her exceptional weekly
column — with the Sex and the City
reboot. Not funny, she writes, too
woke, and a “relentless campaign to
seem more relevant”.
But what can be more relevant
than the portrayal of a sudden,
unexpected death?
Odesans looked on Putin
as a tiresome drunk
Your article on Odesa “Divided port
city fears eruption of violence”
(Report, February 12) I felt
misrepresented the city’s character.
Though founded, as the article says,
by Russia’s Catherine the Great, it was
always one of the most international
cities of the empire, as you would
expect from a big port only 30km from
the present-day Moldovan border.
Its first two governors were
Frenchmen and its population was
ethnically mixed: Jewish, Ukrainian,
Polish, Romanian, Greek and German
as much Russian. Hence its popularity
as a holiday spot with the tsarist
middle classes — it was almost like
visiting Europe. Though Stalin’s purges
and the Holocaust reduced its
diversity, its sardonic internationalist
spirit very much lives on.
On the violence following Ukraine’s
Maidan “revolution of dignity” in 2014,
there was indeed a day of dreadful
street-fighting, on May 2. It ended in
the death of 42 pro-Russian protesters
after a building where they had
barricaded themselves, and from
which they were shooting, caught fire.
The numbers involved in the protest
were small — a few thousand on each
side. The vast bulk of Odesans stood to
In Russia and
elsewhere, the
information fog
has partially
lifted. But to
what end?
Notebook
by Gillian Tett
The show’s depiction of loss and its
aftermath rang deeply true for this
mid-fifties widow.
I am not a New Yorker with a closet
full of designer clothes, but a business
executive raising two teenagers in
suburban Virginia.
Still, the experiences were mine —
ugly funeral homes, awkward
conversations, filling some of the hole
by meeting new friends, a loss of
tolerance for the pettier parts of life,
one side, appalled. Their view — that
they wanted no trouble from anyone —
was encapsulated by a beautifully
understated YouTube campaign of the
same date, in which Odesans of every
age and background told Vladimir
Putin, in the same tone one might use
on a tiresome drunk, to “go home”.
Anna Reid
Trustee, Ukrainian Institute London
London W6, UK
A takeover euphemism
causes ex-banker to smile
After reading Edwin Heathcote’s story
of what happened to One Wall Street,
an Art Deco skyscraper in the heart of
New York’s financial district (House &
Home, February 12) I must commend
the author for his use of the word
“transition” as a euphemism to
describe the hostile takeover of the
Irving Trust Company by the Bank of
New York. As a former employee, I had
never heard it described like that.
Rosanne Bricker
New York, NY, US
How Japanese-American
internees set medal record
I was fascinated to read about Ben
Sakoguchi’s exhibition “Towers” —
artistic reflections on his and his
Some 30 years ago, as a rookie reporter
in the Soviet Union, I spent a lot of
time sitting in far-flung cities as the
communist empire collapsed, waiting
for war to break out or reporting on
conflicts. Which is why last week, as
the news about Ukraine became
increasingly frenzied, I was gripped by
a documentary published on YouTube
last year by Alexei Navalny, the
Russian opposition leader.
Putin’s Palace reveals blueprints of a
huge mansion on the Black Sea,
complete with helipad, casino, pole-
dancing stage and cinema — all built,
it claims, for the Russian president at
a cost of more than $1bn. The film also
tries to lift the lid on the network of
financiers and oligarchs that surround
Putin, allegedly helping make him one
of the richest men in the world.
Putin has dismissed the accusations
as lies but the material seems well
researched and highly relevant as
western governments ponder the
merits of sanctions against assorted
individuals and Kremlin-linked
businesses.
However, for me, the most startling
detail about the film is that despite its
anti-Putin agenda, it went viral in the
Russian-speaking world. It has
received an estimated 150mn views on
YouTube, making it the platform’s
most-watched piece of Russian
content in 2021. The independent
Russian pollster Levada last year
found that one-quarter of Russian
adults had seen it.
As someone who lived in the Soviet
Union, I find this cheering: it suggests
If you are not satisfied with the FT’s response to your complaint, you can appeal
to the FT Editorial Complaints Commissioner: complaints.commissioner@ft.com
playing the dead husband card and
opening to the mystery of life.
The show may have got many things
wrong, but loss, in all of its dimensions,
it got right. Couldn’t we all use a
common, yet light-hearted viewing
experience telling a story with death
at its centre? We rarely personalise
this inevitable part of life, despite the
past two years of the pandemic and
millions of people gone. This show
starts that conversation.
family’s time when held in the
incarceration camp at Poston, Arizona
(Life & Arts, February 12).
I have visited one of these camps in
Arizona. But what some readers might
not realise from the US government’s
wish to “keep 160,000 Japs on the
Hawaiian Islands . . . as a military
necessity” is that the 442nd Infantry
Regiment, composed of 2,868
Hawaiian Japanese and 1,500 from
“incarceration camps” in California,
was the most decorated unit in the US
Army in the second world war.
They won seven Presidential
Citations, 21 Medals of Honour and the
unit was awarded the Congressional
Gold Medal. Not all Japanese
Americans were “the enemy”!
Christopher Lavender
Hong Kong
Not a great idea for those
with a heart condition
Regarding the Lex note on wireless
charging technologies (February 12)
there is another problem with
magnetic tarmac. I quote from the
American Heart Association website:
“If you have an ICD or pacemaker,
avoid close or prolonged contact with
magnets or their magnetic fields.”
Stewart Vaughan
Paris, France
that Putin’s aura of omnipotence may
not be as impregnable as it usually
seems to westerners. Yes, he has
crushed numerous protests, and
Navalny, who survived an
assassination attempt in 2020, is in jail
facing a new tribunal.
But maybe Navalny’s message
cannot be easily silenced, given this
21st-century form of samizdat (the
dissident pamphlets of Soviet times)
has reached such a wide audience. It
will be interesting to see if variants of
cyber samizdat emerge this year, and if
this creates new challenges to Putin,
particularly if the Russian economy
weakens or a Ukrainian war results in
mass casualties.
The emergence of films such as
Putin’s Palace also reveals a wider point
about information flows. In some
ways, my Soviet-era experience
carries echoes of what is unfolding in
Ukraine. In Baku, Dushanbe, Riga and
Moscow, as in Kyiv today, there was a
sense of dread and confusion.
But what was so different then was
that everyone, including journalists,
lived in an information fog. To get
“news”, I would frantically listen to
shortwave radio, talk to anyone and
offer local phone operators cigarettes
as gifts to secure a line to call contacts.
But whatever perspective I had was
limited and local.
Today a veritable army of citizen
journalists is producing texts, pictures
and videos from Ukraine and the
surrounding regions. Satellites are
beaming details about troop
movements on to websites that
19 February/20 February 2022
Email: letters.editor@ft.com
Include daytime telephone number and full address
Corrections: corrections@ft.com
Becoming a widow is a reflection of
the human condition — even when
dressed up in Jimmy Choos and
Alexander McQueen. Portraying it
allows us to talk about the really hard
parts of life, but also the path to the
other side. A path made better when
you have good friends — no matter if
they are not named Charlotte, Miranda
or Carrie — helping you along the way.
Sue Deagle
Great Falls, VA, US
Copernicus was right on
central bank independence
Your editorial “Economics should
never waste a good crisis” (FT View,
February 12) says Nicolaus Copernicus
was the first to articulate the quantity
theory of money. Most of your readers
will know that theory states the price
level is determined by the supply of
money. I am not sure that this is what
Copernicus had in mind in his writings
on money. What comes out more
strongly is the necessity for the
sovereign to control the mint of his
country since, otherwise, merchants
debase the currency and, in this way,
ruin the trade and prosperity of the
country. Few more convincing cases
against the independence of central
banks have been made since.
Jan Toporowski
Professor of Economics and Finance
Soas University of London
London WC1, UK
Correction
c British cyber security company
Darktrace’s share price has risen 62 per
cent since its initial public offering in
2021. It was incorrectly omitted from a
chart on London’s top tech listings in last
weekend’s newspaper.
ordinary citizens access. Western
governments are trying to
turbocharge this information flow to
counter Russian misinformation.
Transparency has become not just the
norm but a weapon of war.
Increased transparency does not
always produce the desired results.
One consequence is a rise in distrust
and cynicism. As a recent survey by
the public relations group Edelman
shows, trust in governments and
media has collapsed in many
countries over recent years.
When Levada asked Russians last
year if their view of Putin had
worsened after watching the film, less
than one-fifth said yes. The majority
treated it as confirmation of their
existing views (and some supported
him nonetheless). Levada’s Denis
Volkov recently told the FT that the
anti-Ukraine propaganda on state TV
had done its job: “Society is ready for
war, in that it has absorbed the
Kremlin and Russian state media’s
depiction of the situation.”
Yet even if we live in an age marred
by misinformation and cynicism, it is
still better than the information fog of
three decades ago. It was the power of
social media and transparency that
helped to spark the Ukrainian
uprising in the first place. Let’s hope
that tweets, photos, films and videos
continue to pour out of both Russia
and Ukraine, along with enough
crowdsourcing to determine their
accuracy. And let’s also hope that the
internet keeps working, even amid
cyber hacks. It is a modern miracle.
19 February/20 February 2022
Dmitri
Trenin
T
he European security crisis
is peaking off. The dates
which, according to US
president Joe Biden, were
set for Russia’s invasion of
Ukraine have passed uneventfully. The
Russian-Belarusian military drills are
going to end on February 20, and Rus-
sia’s naval exercises in the Black Sea are
also going to end soon.
Crucially, President Vladimir Putin
authorised foreign minister Sergei Lav-
rov to continue negotiating with the US
on European security issues — even
though Moscow’s core demands have
not been met. True, the Russian parlia-
ment has called for formal recognition
of the self-proclaimed republics of
Donetsk and Luhansk, but at this point
it looks more like another instrument to
The Wolseley’s
founder has been
at loggerheads with
financiers before,
writes Alice Hancock
I
t might seem unlikely that a genteel
restaurateur such as Jeremy King
should find himself in the midst of a
venomous financial dispute.
Yet the impeccably polite and
immaculately attired founder of hal-
lowed London eateries The Wolseley
and The Delaunay, who is widely cred-
ited with reinvigorating the fusty 1980s
London dining scene with his partner
Chris Corbin, is locked in a boardroom
battle that exploded into the open this
month. Thai hotel conglomerate Minor,
majority shareholder of the restaurants’
owner Corbin & King, pushed the group
into administration, saying that it had
failed to reimburse Minor for £34mn
of loans.
The step was the latest salvo in a con-
tinuing battle for control of Corbin &
King, with Minor pushing for a world-
wide rollout of Wolseley dining rooms
and calling for steep cost cuts during the
pandemic, both against chief executive
King’s wishes, the restaurateur has said.
King took to YouTube to reassure reg-
ulars that the restaurants would run as
usual, thanks to protections under the
UK’s insolvency laws, which Minor
described as “legally questionable”.
Minor also said it “had serious concerns,
prior to the onset of the pandemic, over
the way Corbin & King is run at the oper-
ational level by Mr King”.
On Tuesday, a High Court judge threw
out an unusual move by Minor to block
King and his fellow directors from
accepting fresh financing that would
allow them to pay off the debt and
thereby loosen Minor’s hold.
A person familiar with Minor’s think-
ing said that the group did not believe
King’s backer, the US investment firm
Knighthead, was credible. They added:
“It’s in [Minor’s] interests to keep the
bidding war alive because it gives them a
more attractive asset in the market if
they do want to sell.”
It is not the first time King’s old-world
ways have put him at loggerheads with
financiers. In 1981, funding for King and
Corbin’s first venture, Le Caprice, fell
apart three months into the project
because they “didn’t see eye to eye [with
the funders] on how the restaurant
should be”, one person involved said.
King turned to his parents, who put
their house up as guarantee for alterna-
tive loans. Thirty five years on, he fell
out with the Grosvenor Estate, owner of
Mayfair’s Beaumont hotel, which had
agreed to back Corbin & King’s £75mn
redevelopment of the property. In 2018,
Grosvenor put the Beaumont’s lease
back on the market.
Zuleika Fennell, Corbin & King’s man-
aging director, says that King “has a
bizarre ability to helicopter out and see
the whole of the business but also zoom
in and know the exact angle a teaspoon
should be on a teacup”, which makes
him “both a pleasure and a curse to
work with”. Several others who know
King describe him as “steely” and “sin-
gle-minded”.
It is perhaps a surprise that King
ended up in restaurants at all. His
mother “dreaded cooking and enter-
taining”, he says, and after leaving
boarding school at Christ’s Hospital in
Arms accords stand a chance despite the threat of war
pressure Kyiv into implementing the
Minsk accords than a real prospect. As
the war alert is receding, what are the
takeaways? The Kremlin has not suc-
ceeded in getting the US and Nato to for-
mally withdraw their invitation to
Ukraine and Georgia to join the alliance,
and to forswear any further enlarge-
ment. However, it has gained something
else. Washington has demonstrated that
it will not send US forces to Ukraine
even if it were attacked and facing
defeat and occupation. This is essen-
tially the same as saying that Nato will
not admit Ukraine as long as Russia
views this as a casus belli.
And not only for 10 years, as US offi-
cials suggest, but as long as Russia per-
sists in its opposition, which may mean
indefinitely. Thus, no Ukraine in Nato,
and no Georgia either, unless Moscow
changes its mind. Nothing in hand for
the Kremlin, of course, but real security
guarantees are provided by those seek-
ing them, not granted by opponents.
By contrast, another Russian demand
— banning intermediate nuclear forces
Person in the News | Jeremy King
A genteel restaurateur
faces a boardroom fight
1973 he went straight to the City as a
merchant banker.
In an effort to boost his £1,050-a-year
salary, he took a job in a Chelsea wine
bar owned by Searcy’s. “It was quite a
good way of getting out and not spend-
ing any money,” he says.
He ended up working there full-time.
King met Corbin in the late 1970s
while he was at the New York-style res-
taurant Joe Allen and Corbin was at Lan-
gan’s Brasserie. Corbin, the classically
trained restaurateur, complimented
King’s self-taught and slightly maverick
eye. Both aspired to make restaurants
theatrical and egalitarian — as Peter
Langan, who opened his eponymous
eatery with the actor Michael Caine,
would say, places “where a duchess
could sit down next to a taxi driver”.
“The thing about Chris and Jeremy’s
restaurants is that they are clubs with-
out the membership rigmarole. Once
you go in, you tend to stay,” says theatre
producer Nick Allott.
King says a great restaurant should be
★ FTWeekend
Opinion
from Europe — appears to stand a
chance of being codified in some form of
written agreement. The US proposals
handed to the Russians open a path to
negotiations on that issue. When Putin
made a similar proposal in 2019, he was
ignored. Not this time. The reason was
probably less the deployment of Rus-
sian forces along Ukraine’s borders than
the successful testing of Russian hyper-
sonic missiles, such as the Zircon, which
could counterbalance any deployments
of American INF systems in Europe. US
proposals on mutual transparency may
contribute to resolving the longstanding
dispute about the capabilities of a Rus-
sian cruise missile suspected to have a
longer range and the US Aegis Ashore
missile defence system that might be
converted for INF purposes.
This, of course, does not add up to the
west succumbing to the Kremlin’s “ulti-
matum”. But if Putin accepts it as an
important first step towards reforming
the European security architecture
from its current US-dominated, Nato-
heavy model to a structure supported
“a catalyst” for “meeting friends or fam-
ily, doing business, interviews, reun-
ions, seduction or even divorce”. Not
somewhere that only exists for its own-
ers’ ends.
In 1998 the pair sold their trio of res-
taurants — The Ivy, Le Caprice and J
Sheekey — to former PizzaExpress chair
‘His restaurants are clubs
without the membership
rigmarole. Once you go in,
you tend to stay’
Luke Johnson for £13mn and after plans
to open an initial hotel were thwarted,
they opened The Wolseley in 2003.
The former car showroom on Picca-
dilly was soon a magnet for artists, mod-
els, politicians and financiers. The food
critic Giles Coren, who gave it a scathing
review when it opened, says he only
sniped at it because he couldn’t get in.
by two pillars, one western and one Rus-
sian, and regulated by arrangements
between the two, will the Kremlin be
able to sell the outcome to the Russian
people? Or will Russians see the whole
exercise as a useless and dangerous
adventure and, even worse, as a diplo-
matic defeat for Putin, who was
confronted by the west’s joint forces,
It is now official:
the US and Nato will not
defend Ukraine in the
case of Russian attack
blinked and began withdrawing Russian
forces from the Ukrainian border?
One needs to keep in mind that most
Russians, while fully exposed by the
country’s state-run television to the
west’s fears of war and accusations of
Moscow’s misbehaviour, never believed
in the possibility of a war with Ukraine.
That same TV made no attempt to pre-
Minor became Corbin & King’s fourth
backer when it bought a majority stake
for £58mn in 2017. Months after the
deal was inked, Minor began to push for
a global expansion of the group’s brands,
two people with knowledge of board
meetings said, something King said he
would not countenance.
The tension festered and then the
pandemic hit, forcing even the most
successful restaurants deep into debt as
the government mandated that venues
close their doors.
Minor faced steep losses, not least
because it had just acquired the Spanish
company NH Hotels for €2.3bn, and
pushed Corbin & King to cut costs.
King no longer scooters between all
his restaurants but, at 68, he has insisted
that, whatever happens to Corbin &
King, he is too young to retire. If his
attempt to retake the business with his
new backers is unsuccessful, he says he
“would love to do another hotel”.
alice.hancock@ft.com
pare the Russian population for some
sort of “liberation of Ukraine”. If any-
thing, some Russians feared a possible
attempt by Kyiv to regain Donbas by
force, on the model of Mikheil Saakash-
vili’s ill-fated 2008 strike in South Osse-
tia — a move to which Moscow would
have to respond.
Most serious Russian analysts did not
think that Moscow would launch a
major offensive against Ukraine. True,
geopolitical tensions and the prospect of
severe sanctions led to a substantial
drop in the value of Russian stocks and
depressed the rouble. Still, stock prices
are not a useful measure of Russia’s eco-
nomic health. As for rouble volatility, it
came with a sharp rise in the oil price to
$95 per barrel, the highest since autumn
2014. Finally, the story of grumbling, or
worse, in the ranks of long-retired silo-
viki, or figures with a military and secu-
rity background, has been blown out of
proportion. To many members of that
group, Putin has been too lenient on
Ukraine and its western backers.
The passing of the peak of the crisis
Fear of taking medicine
causes people real harm
John
Gapper
All Consuming
M
illions of middle-aged peo-
ple received some good
news this week. Many of
the aches and pains expe-
rienced by those who take
medication to lower their cholesterol
levels and protect against heart disease
are caused not by the pills themselves
but by fears about their effects, interna-
tional research has found.
This will come as a relief to readers of
the Express newspaper and website.
“The ‘sudden’ and disturbing sensation
that can occur in the knee”; “Three
after-effects . . . that affect the eyes;
“The ‘strange’ feeling that has been
reported in men”. These are some of its
recent scary headlines about reactions
to taking statins.
Some of their own physical sensations
may not have been side-effects of the
medicine, but of reading the Express.
The study in the European Heart Jour-
nal of 4.1mn patients found that fewer
than 10 per cent were statin intolerant,
but many more described symptoms
such as head and muscle aches.
The latter were instead experiencing a
nocebo response, the opposite of pla-
cebo and the term for pain that is not
caused by a condition or treatment
itself. Instead, it is brought on by anxi-
ety, by mistaking the cause of another
ailment such as a sore knee, or by antici-
pating ill-effects so keenly that they
then materialise.
That does not make it imaginary. The
symptoms of nocebo are often identical
to the ailments they match: scans show
similar changes in the chemistry of the
brain. “A nocebo response feels exactly
the same as the side-effect from a drug,”
says Ted Kaptchuk, professor of global
health and social medicine at Harvard
Medical School.
But it is a problem. Up to half of
patients prescribed statins are esti-
mated to stop taking them or reduce
their dose because they feel unwell.
Since statins are now cheap and widely
prescribed (I take them myself), resist-
ance increases the risks of heart attacks
or strokes across the population.
Nocebo causes serious harm.
It has been recognised for a long time.
Walter Kennedy, a British doctor, came
up with the word in 1961 as the “evil
twin” of placebo (“I shall harm” in
Latin, instead of “I shall please”). More
recently, researchers proposed the term
“drucebo” for responses that are not
direct side-effects of taking drugs.
I don’t think I am imagining that
nocebo is spreading. One reason people
have refused to be vaccinated against
Covid-19 is the fear of serious adverse
reactions such as loss of fertility, or
heart attacks. No matter how much doc-
tors and public health officials try to
reassure, anxieties persist.
Top reads at FT.com/opinion
3 Keeping asylum seekers in limbo is bad
for everyone
‘Human capital’ is damaged when people
are forced to sit idle, writes Sarah O’Connor
9
does not mean it is over. At best, we will
be on a plateau of high tension, where
both sides will continue to use various
means of hard power and the informa-
tion war will carry on unabated. But —
and this is an important but — diplo-
mats will be negotiating on the issues
where agreement is possible even now,
making the worst scenarios less likely.
Perhaps the most serious takeaway
from the crisis concerns not Russia but
Ukraine. It is now official: the US and
Nato will not defend Ukraine in the case
of a major attack. It was true this past
week, and it will remain true in the years
ahead. Given this precious piece of intel-
ligence, Kyiv will have to look for other
ways of managing its security. The idea
of neutrality for Ukraine, aired then
played down by Vadym Prystaiko, its
ambassador in London, is interesting.
The US and Nato might not have to with-
draw their membership promise to
Ukraine if the bid itself were dropped.
The writer is director of the Carnegie
Moscow Center
Clinical trials for Covid-19 vaccines
confirmed past proof of nocebo
responses: many people who did not get
the vaccine, and were instead injected
with a placebo substance, experienced
ill-effects. A research study published
last month found that 35 per cent of peo-
ple receiving a placebo for their first
trial dose had adverse reactions else-
where in their bodies.
It follows that many of the symptoms
about which people complained were
due to nocebo. I felt a bit ill after one of
my Covid jabs, but now wonder whether
it was a drug side-effect, or simply
because I expected it: I was surrounded
by friends and colleagues telling me
what they had felt, and whether they
had needed to lie down.
This is amplified by the febrile state of
media and social media. To be fair to the
Express, its stories on statin side-effects
are more balanced than the headlines,
but it knows how to grab its elderly
readers. Bad news, including reasons to
worry about drugs, is compelling.
Then there is the stream of insight,
information, inflamed opinion and
deliberate deceit that flows across social
media and private message groups.
There are plenty of people who want to
scare others about side-effects and it
can become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Underlying all this is a knotty medical
problem — doctors are obliged to inform
patients fully about the risks as well as
the benefits of medication, and to do no
harm to them. But if the very act of tell-
ing patients about all of the possible
The nocebo effect is
brought on by anticipating
ill-effects so keenly that
they then materialise
side-effects is likely to create adverse
reactions, what should they do?
Especially with nervous patients,
some are tempted to skip over warnings
and rely on the leaflets that come with
pills (which I have never read).
Kaptchuk, who studies placebo and
nocebo effects, condemns such tactics:
“Telling them less is totally unethical,
destroys informed consent and is decep-
tive,” he says.
He has another suggestion: that doc-
tors should briefly explain the possible
side-effects of medicines but add that
people have also had similar reactions
through nocebo. He calls this “putting in
a speed bump” to stop patients being
flooded with information, and make
them better informed, not worse.
It would all be a lot easier if our bodies
generated clear information, rather
than ambiguous aches and pains that
might be illness, or side-effects, or
nocebo. But we were not built that way,
and it will take medical science more
time to produce a precise signal.
Until then, public health is at risk
from nocebo. We have more to fear than
fear itself, but it still hurts.
john.gapper@ft.com
3 Putin, US intelligence and the global
fight for the Ukraine narrative
Iraq war casts a shadow over the credibility
of US warnings, writes Gideon Rachman
10 ★ FTWeekend 19 february/20 february 2022

stormy leather Hermès given a hiding by on the QT Quantitative tightening marks

investors amid supply chain woes — LEX profound shift from pandemic moves — mARKETS

Allianz chief faces bonus cut Meituan feels pressure as

Beijing gets tough on fees
after US scandal hits net profits RyAn MCMoRRow — bEijiNg

Chinese food delivery giant Meituan

shed $26bn in value yesterday after
3 Structured Alpha funds to cost €3.7bn 3 Insurer plans €1bn share buyback regulators said they would push to
lower the fees food platforms can
charge restaurants for delivery.
China’s latest crackdown comes amid a
flurry of government restrictions added
to the country’s tech sector over the past
year, which have mainly been aimed at
reining in the country’s high-flying con-
sumer tech companies.
The announcement by China’s state
planner, the National Development and
Reform Commission, and 13 other agen-
cies came in a package of proposals to
help the country’s struggling service
industry, which has been hit hard by the
campaign to suppress Covid-19
infections.
The body said it would “guide” deliv-
ery platforms to “take another step to
lower the service fees charged to restau-
rants in order to lower their operating
costs”. The NDRC added it would also
ask platforms to give discounts to res-
taurants in areas hit hard by Covid.
The guidelines immediately sent
Meituan’s Hong Kong shares tumbling,
down 15 per cent for the day, while
shares of Alibaba, which controls its
main rival Ele.me, shed 2.9 per cent.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Tech index lost
3 per cent.
Meituan controls about 70 per cent of
China’s food delivery market and the
segment contributed more than half of
its revenue in the third quarter of last
year.
“There is a lot of uncertainty about
the future policy direction. Before this,
it seemed like [regulators] wanted to
slow down the tightening policies, that
they didn’t want to add new policies to
restrict the internet industry,” said Li
Chengdong of Haitun, a tech think-tank.
“But this will directly impact Meit-
uan’s profit model and maybe even its
Meituan controls
about 70 per cent
of China’s food
delivery market
and is no stranger
to scrutiny
ability to draw profits from food
delivery in the long term,” he said.
China’s antitrust regulators last year
fined Meituan Rmb3.4bn ($537mn) for
abusing its market position and
demanded that the company make a
number of changes to its operations,
including better treatment of its riders
who deliver meals across cities.
The pressure to lower the commission
rate while lifting riders’ pay has made it
difficult for Meituan to increase profits.
In the third quarter it reported an oper-
ating profit of Rmb876m on Rmb26bn
in turnover for its food delivery unit.

Travel & leisure

DraftKings braced for wider

Oliver Bäte says the Allianz board will face bonus cuts despite what he describes as a ‘stunning’ operational performance by the insurer last year — Drew Angerer/Getty
olAf sToRbeCk — fRANKfuRT
iAn sMiTH — LoNdoN
Allianz chief executive Oliver Bäte said
he would take a “significant” cut in his
bonus after Europe’s largest insurer dis-
closed that a scandal at its US asset man-
agement business wiped almost €3bn
from its annual profits.
The German insurer is under
investigation by the US Department of
Justice and Securities Exchange
Commission over funds that were mar-
keted to investors as safe but collapsed
during the market turmoil triggered by
the eruption of the pandemic in early
2020.
In a first step towards quantifying the
financial fallout, Allianz late on Thurs-
day night announced a €3.7bn provision
to pay for settlements with investors
who put money into the Structured
Alpha funds. As the provision cut the
group’s tax burden, the hit to the bottom
line was €2.8bn.
The funds, which were marketed to
investors as a safe and a better alterna-
tive to passive investments that tracked
blue-chip indices, would “behave
independently of market direction”,
according to the funds’ marketing
material.
The insurer initially rejected any alle-
gations of misconduct after the implo-
sion of the funds triggered a wave of law-
suits from investors.
However, Allianz, which has con-
ducted its own investigation, issued a
profit warning in August last year and
apologised to investors after new infor-
mation came to light.
The disclosure of the DoJ probe wiped
almost €7bn from Allianz’s market capi-
talisation in a single day. Its shares have
since recovered, but were down 1 per
cent yesterday, giving the group a mar-
ket value of €86bn.
“We are taking [the Structured
Alpha] matter extremely seriously and
we regret really the losses, particularly
[those] suffered by Structured Alpha
investors,” Bäte said yesterday.
“Management will carry our fair share
of the burden and there will be a signifi-
cant impact on our compensation for
each and every board member.”
He declined to disclose the size of
the bonus cuts, adding that they would
be disclosed in the annual report in
March. Bäte was paid €6.4mn in total
last year, including €3.6mn of variable
pay, according to the 2020 annual
report.
‘We expect that Allianz
will incur some additional
expenses before these
matters are resolved’
He also cautioned that the provision
to settle the litigation stemming from
the episode would eventually exceed
€3.7bn. Talks with “some remaining
investors” as well as the DoJ and the SEC
were ongoing, he added. “We expect
that Allianz Group will incur some addi-
tional expenses before these matters are
finally resolved,” he said.
The DoJ declined to comment and the
SEC did not respond to a request for
comment.
The insurer’s board will face bonus
cuts despite what Bäte described as a
“stunning” operational performance
last year. Although the group’s net prof-
its fell 2.9 per cent to €6.6bn because of
the hit from Structured Alpha, its oper-
ating profit climbed 25 per cent to a
record €13.4bn.
The profits were a reversal from 2020,
which was dominated by Covid-19. Even
with higher payouts from a year of natu-
ral catastrophes, the group’s combined
ratio — claims and expenses as a share of
premiums — in its property and casu-
alty division improved 2.5 percentage
points to 93.8 per cent.
The company expects to generate
between €12.4bn and €14.4bn in oper-
ating profit this year and promised to
increase earnings per share by 5-7 per
cent a year for the next three years.
The insurer announced a new share
buyback programme of €1bn to mollify
investors.
Additional reporting by Stefania Palma
losses as spending steps up
AliCe HAnCoCk — LoNdoN
AlexAndRA wHiTe — NEw YoRK
DraftKings, the fantasy sports and bet-
ting group, forecast that losses would
widen during 2022 as it increased
spending on sales and marketing in the
highly competitive US market.
The shares dropped 18 per cent in early
New York trading yesterday after the
release of the earnings statement, sig-
nalling doubts from investors over the
success of DraftKings’ efforts to increase
its market share.
The Boston-based company forecast
that its adjusted loss, before taking into
account interest, taxes, depreciation
and amortisation, for 2022 would be in
the range of $825mn to $925mn. Ana-
lysts polled by Refinitiv had estimated a
loss of $550.1mn.
The outlook for deeper losses comes
as DraftKings’ costs climbed. The com-
pany stepped up the amount it spent on
sales and marketing from $495mn in
2020 to $981.5mn in 2021.
“DraftKings is clearly performing
well, but FanDuel is stronger in betting,
BetMGM is stronger in gaming, and all
other operators are determined to grow
share,” said Paul Leyland, an analyst at
Regulus Partners. “Outspending indi-
vidual competitors does not seem to be
moving the overall dial, making it a
worse than nil-sum game.”
The US sports betting market has
become heated as groups pour money
into attracting customers with free bets
and bonuses, in particular ahead of last
weekend’s Super Bowl game.
Several executives and analysts have
commented that the level of expendi-
ture is unsustainable and that only the
biggest companies will be able to sur-
vive the frenzy.
Some of DraftKings’ expenditure has
gone into opening in states that have
recently legalised sports betting follow-
ing a ruling by the US Supreme Court in
2018 that overturned a federal ban
against the practice.
In January, DraftKings launched
mobile sports betting in the states of
New York and Louisiana and has opera-
tions in 17 states.
It said it could turn a profit in the
fourth quarter if it stepped back from
further state launches this year.

Executive consultants. Astrology

‘Bizarre’ yogi scandal sheds light on India’s mystic advisers

Ex-NSE chief’s alleged sharing
of official bourse data reveals
ubiquity of spiritual coaching
CHloe CoRnisH — mumbAi
An order by India’s regulator accusing a
former stock exchange executive of
“bizarre misconduct” for sharing confi-
dential information with an alleged yogi
in the Himalayas has pulled the curtain
back on the role of mystic advisers in the
country.
Chitra Ramkrishna quit the NSE in
2016 when the world’s largest deriva-
tives exchange was engulfed in an algo-
rithmic trading scandal.
The order alleges that she violated
securities laws when she consulted on
confidential NSE decisions with a per-
son she claimed was her spiritual
adviser whom she first met on the banks
of the Ganges.
“Senior leaders often seek informal
counsel from coaches, mentors or other
seniors in this industry,” Ramkrishna
told regulator SEBI in April 2018. “I felt
his guidance would help me perform.”
After the revelations, the NSE on
Thursday said it was “committed to the
highest standards of governance and
transparency and will extend full co-op-
eration to the regulator”.
The scandal has put the spotlight on
an industry of astrologers, numerolo-
gists and yogis who advise executives in
India. Their services range from reading
horoscopes of potential hires to advising
on auspicious timing for a product
launch or critical meeting.
“The topmost business families of
India do not move without consulting
good astrologers,” said Anupam V.
Kapil, astrology columnist for the Times
of India. He said he gave advice to busi-
nesspeople on subjects ranging from
brand names to board composition.
But experts have said the NSE case
goes far beyond the norm. “An astrolo-
ger can guide you,” said Arun Kumar, an
honorary professor at New Delhi’s Insti-
tute of Social Sciences, “but you don’t
give crucial information about your
company.”
Experts noted that Hindu astrology
was ubiquitous in Indian popular cul-
ture but that few openly spoke about it
in business. “It is a matter of ridicule if
[you] put it out in the open,” said to revamp an office building’s energy of the four billionaire Hinduja brothers,
Nupurnima Yadav, author of Astrology and shake off underperformance. in a video. “I strongly believe in planets.”
in India: A Sociological Inquiry. “All these Astrologers form part of growing Hinduja consults astrologers includ-
matters are usually kept very private.” numbers of executive coaches. The ing Sundeep Kochar, who introduces
In India, bespoke services cost any- International Coaching Federation esti- himself as an astro-consultant and life
where from $173 for a “corporate astrol- mates that there were 71,000 coach coach. Kochar reads horoscopes on a
ogy” horoscope reading to assess the practitioners in the world in 2020, an MacBook at his office in Mumbai, charg-
merits of a new board member or hire. It increase of a third compared with 2015. ing a flat rate of $250 for a 30-minute
can cost around $150 for numerology Some of India’s top business families consultation. An industrialist once
advice on a brand name. have endorsed astrologers. “I have seen hosted him on a private jet and the con-
Astrologers charge upwards of $1,000 many astrologists in our country and sultant has bought a $1mn home.
for an “astro-architecture” consultation abroad,” said Gopichand Hinduja, one In many ways, the astrologer-client
relationship resembles that of a thera-
pist or mentor. “You have to talk heart
to heart,” said Kochar. “Their market
price might go down if there’s some tur-
bulence going on, so the astrologer
should be their confidant.”
Kochar said business people had
asked him to read horoscopes of candi-
dates for jobs.
“The moment I see your date of birth,
time and place . . . I will understand
who you are,” Kochar said. “So your
strengths, your weaknesses, your poten-
tial . . . everything in 10 seconds.”
Executives at companies ranging
from banks to hotels have engaged
astro-architect Neeta Sinhato reconfig-
Chitra Ramkrishna met her yogi on the banks of the Ganges — Michael Nagle/Bloomberg ure offices. Using planetary readings, “I
consider the problem of the place and I
balance it,” said Sinha, who deploys
plants and colours to achieve harmony.
Other businesses want to ensure they
have selected auspicious names using
numerology. Sanjay B. Jumaani, a
numerologist, said that for company
brands and logos, “we equate the vibra-
tions and bring it on an auspicious
number which represents a planet
which is materialistic and auspicious”.
In the NSE case, SEBI alleged that
Ramkrishna was a “puppet” in the still
unidentified yogi’s hands and has fined
her Rs30mn ($405,000).
It said Ramkrishna’s yogi claims were
a “bizarre attempt at concealing the
identity of the unknown person.”
The scandal is unlikely to harm the
divination business and astrologers’
relationships with top executives.
Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar
Sharma, whose digital payments group
launched India’s biggest IPO last year,
tweeted his gratitude to astrologer
Bejan Daruwalla when he died.
“We shared our jokes and fond mem-
ories of working together way back in
early days,” said Sharma. “He always
will have special place in my heart.”
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 11

COMPANIES. WEEK IN REVIEW

Wood’s breathless In a 2018 video, Cathie Wood, founder

of Ark Invest, declared “monogenic
stem cell therapy” a $2tn revenue
about. Regardless, her revenue
projections are very, very hard to
believe, for any type of therapy — like
described as not quite right. Wood said
“we have already seen functional cures
for three blood-related diseases” in the
Search for
‘monogenic
cent from its peak in February 2021
and registered roughly $2.5bn of
outflows over the same period.

gene editing pitch opportunity, with “polygenic” versions

of the treatment worth “however many
trillions” more.
several orders of magnitude hard to
believe”.
Search Google for “monogenic stem
gene editing space. No companies have
secured regulatory approval for such
treatments, nor are they expected to
stem cell
therapy’
Investors will have lost money. Who
cares? Buyer beware and all that. But
the bursting of the biotech bubble, in

ought to worry us It was typical of the grand

pronouncements the fund manager
makes. Wood became the poster child
of the speculative tech boom last year
and a cult figure to legions of investors.
But she has been forced to defend her
stockpicking strategy after many of the
companies in her funds were
pummelled in a large correction.
It is unclear what Wood, who
majored in economics and finance, was
referring to in that video. Monogenic
The Top Line stem cell therapy is not a concept
scientists recognise.
cell therapy” and the only thing that
comes up is Wood’s comments.
Wood was talking about gene editing,
according to one person briefed on her
remarks, which is something different.
She is also a cheerleader for this
emerging field of medical science,
telling CNBC in December that three
listed companies in the space —
Intellia, Crispr Therapeutics and Editas
— represented a “trillion-dollar-plus
opportunity” (although in this instance
she was talking about their potential
combined market value, which stands
anytime soon.
Wood said Intellia had “announced a
functional cure” for ATTR amyloidosis,
which she described as an “exotic blood
disease”. ATTR is a protein misfolding
disorder, not a blood disease, and the
company is nowhere near announcing
a cure for it. The trial data she referred
to was derived from just six patients.
Intellia is more cautious and will only
say its drug “could potentially be the
first curative treatment” for the illness.
Wood’s breathless promotion of this
exciting but unproved technology
and all that
comes up is
particular, should worry us all. Plenty
of promising companies need to raise
cash on public markets to fund trials of
the Ark life-changing drugs, many of which
could come to fruition much more
founder’s quickly than gene editing therapies.
comments They now face an uphill struggle that
will slow them down.
Ark is a big proponent of “precision”
medicine, the idea that patients can be
matched with drugs targeting the
specific genetic drivers of their disease.
If she really wants to be part of the
genomics revolution, Wood could help

David Derrick Rossi, a stem cell biologist

whose research contributed to the
at roughly $12bn, rather than
revenue).
helped fuel a biotech bubble in 2020
that burst last year. Her Ark Genomic
by being a bit more precise herself.

Crow messenger RNA Covid-19 vaccines, said

he did not “know what she’s talking
The CNBC interview, too, contained
statements that could charitably be
Revolution fund rode the surge in
valuations but is down almost 60 per
david.crow@ft.com
Additional reporting by Eric Platt

Isis payment allegations put ericsson chief on back foot
Corporate
person in
the news
Borje ekholm
Chief executive, ericsson
Of all possible business partners to
have, there are few worse than Isis. So
it is little wonder that investors
dumped shares in Ericsson this week
after the Swedish telecoms
equipment maker said it might have
paid the terror group in Iraq.
The revelation is chastening for
Borje Ekholm, brought in as chief
executive in January 2017 to
restructure the group and tidy up its
compliance problems. That led to a
settlement of more than $1bn with
US authorities in 2019 over bribery
allegations in Djibouti, China,
Vietnam, Indonesia and Kuwait.
Andrew Gardiner, analyst at Citi,
noted that Ekholm was able to blame
those on previous management, but
“the alleged transgressions in Iraq
happened during the tenure of the
current CEO and CFO”.
Asked if he feels he is in the line of
fire this time, Ekholm replied: “I do. I
don’t think the bad conduct changed
on January 16 2017. Of course, we
hadn’t found everybody by then . . . I
know part of this involves me.”
The Iraq allegations, which were
part of an internal investigation, are
as pernicious as they are unproven.
Ericsson concedes that it made
payments for transport routes in
areas that were under the control of
terror groups, including Isis.
Since it was not able to prove who
received the payment, Ekholm and
Ericsson stopped short of classing it
as “material”. The 14 per cent drop in
its shares on Wednesday suggests
investors disagree.
Ekholm said it was all part of
‘There Ericsson’s journey to change its
culture. “It involves confronting past
is that issues. You don’t like it, it’s
journey we embarrassing, but you have to
confront it,” he said.
are going The 59-year-old was something of a
through. surprise choice as chief executive for
Ericsson. A longtime lieutenant of the
I don’t Wallenberg family of industrialists,
think we’re one of the Swedish group’s leading
shareholders, he had run Investor,
anywhere their main investment vehicle, but
near where had little direct telecoms experience.
His performance in turning round
we want Ericsson, hit by a massive profit
to be’ warning and thousands of job cuts just
before he arrived, and returning it to
the number one spot in the industry
has quelled many of those critics.
Ericsson’s shares had more than
doubled under his tenure as it fared
well in the shift to 5G networks.
His strategy has been
straightforward: excel in Ericsson’s
core business of mobile infrastructure
while trying to build up its presence in
dealing directly with companies in its
enterprise business.
Ekholm says he is excited by the
prospects for wireless technology, such
as using it for home broadband, while
its pending $6bn acquisition of Vonage
in the US aims to offer the possibilities
of 5G to app developers everywhere.
But as the previous sprawling foreign
corruption affair and now the Iraq case
show, Ericsson’s corporate culture
might be the hardest to turn around.
Ekholm talks of encountering
“watermelon KPIs”, key performance
indicators, when he first took over,
“green on the outside, and red on the
inside”, meaning that bad news was
being hidden.
Since he arrived all employees have
to do anti-bribery and corruption
training and sign a code of ethics. He
wants to install a “speak-up culture”
where staff are unafraid to speak out,
be it a snag in product development or
an issue in compliance.
“There is that journey we are going
Borje Ekholm says Ericsson must
confront past issues in order to
move forward as a company
Philippe Lopez/AFP/Getty
through. I don’t think we’re anywhere
near where we want to be,” he adds.
Ekholm, who lives in Colorado in the
US, was known as the “supreme
engineer” during his Investor days
where he built up its venture capital
business as well as heading Sweden’s
Royal Institute of Technology.
He has been unafraid of controversy,
lashing out at Ericsson’s home
government of Sweden for its decision
to ban controversial Chinese
competitor Huawei from its networks,
arguing that the move restricted free
trade and competition.
“As it looks right now, Sweden is a
really bad country for Ericsson,” he
texted one Swedish minister, adding
that in his situation “you fully
understand why Europe has very few
tech companies”.
Europe’s apparent lack of support
for its two telecoms equipment
makers, Ericsson and Nokia, has also
drawn his ire.
But for now his focus is on dealing
with the fallout from the Iraq
allegations. Ericsson informed US
authorities about the case in 2019,
people familiar with the matter say,
but it is unclear whether the US
Department of Justice could open
another investigation. The DoJ
declined to comment.
The Swedish group has already
signalled the DoJ believes it breached
its deferred prosecution agreement
from 2019 in another matter.
“It hurts to see the share price
reaction, for sure. A lot of people are
hurting, demotivated,” said Ekholm. “I
would not tell you the truth if I said it’s
not impacting how we run the
company. You’re only a human being.”
Richard Milne and Stefania Palma
BEST OF
BUSINESS
$1bn Duty call
3 Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway disclosed
that it had purchased a nearly $1bn stake in activi-
sion Blizzard, the maker of games such as World of
Warcraft and Call of Duty, in the fourth quarter of
2021, weeks before the video game maker agreed to
sell itself to Microsoft for $75bn.
3 Institutional Shareholder Services, the shareholder
advisory group, recommended that apple investors
vote against Tim
Cook’s $99mn pay
and bonuses package.
3 Top private equity
firms Blackstone,
KKR and Carlyle
Group earmarked
$2mn in total pay and
benefits per
employee in 2021,
more than twice as much per employee as the leading
investment banks, according to calculations by the
Financial Times.
3 amazon reached a worldwide deal with Visa to
continue accepting payments from its credit cards
through its stores, ending a months-long stand-off
over rising transaction fees.
3 Barry McCarthy, new chief executive of Peloton,
dismissed the idea that the struggling home fitness
group could be put up for sale, pledging instead to
pursue growth by expanding to new countries and
increasing its product portfolio.
3 Nick Clegg was promoted to president of global
Former UK deputy premier
Clegg has been named global
affairs head at Meta to help
weather a regulatory onslaught

Media. Streaming affairs at Facebook’s owner Meta, giving the former

UK deputy prime minister more responsibility for
steering the social media company through an

Redstone braced for Paramount challenge onslaught of global regulation.

3 Blackstone intensified its bet that demand for

Investors cast doubt on ability
to compete with bigger rivals
in the entertainment market
anna nicolaou — new York
alex Barker — London
Two years after seizing the reins of her
family’s media empire, Shari Redstone
stood before investors on Tuesday and
declared: “I’ve never been more excited
about the future of the company.”
When the markets opened the next
day, shares in ViacomCBS, which was
this week renamed Paramount, fell 20
per cent. The unforgiving reception
highlighted a central problem for the
Redstone empire, a family dynasty
whose dysfunction helped inspire some
of the characters on HBO’s Succession.
Redstone has prevailed in the two-
decade saga over who runs the company,
fending off two of the most powerful
men in Hollywood, disgraced CBS chief
Les Moonves and her father, Sumner.
But the future of the $20bn business
remains unclear. Investors worry that
Paramount is too small to compete in an
entertainment industry that has consol-
idated into a few conglomerates, each
committing tens of billions of dollars
into a streaming battle.
Redstone has been informally speak-
ing with potential buyers. But talks have
not advanced because of the complexity
of the asset and the high price she would
seek, according to three people familiar
with the matter.
Paramount has made some notable
progress as a streaming challenger to
Netflix. Its portfolio of television chan-
nels, which includes CBS, Nickelodeon
and Comedy Central, are still throwing
off cash, and it sits on prized assets such
as the Paramount film studio. Redstone
herself has agitated for an even bolder
streaming strategy through Paramount
Plus, its flagship streaming service,
according to company insiders.
But investors are unconvinced that in
a landscape filled with much bigger com-
petitors — such as Netflix, Amazon and
Disney — Paramount can compete on its
own. For some investors and analysts, its
best move is to sell to a larger rival.
This has created a peculiar situation
where Redstone’s ambitions for her
company, and perceived willingness to
protect its independence, appear almost
inversely correlated to its stock market
performance. One former CBS execu-
tive described it as “a tragedy”.
After the presentation on Tuesday,
Bank of America analysts downgraded
their outlook for Paramount, conclud-
ing that a sale was not “imminent”.
“Swinging for the fences increases
risks,” they said.
Some people close to Redstone ques-
tion whether she would be ready to part
with the business. “She has spent years
of her life on this,” said a person who has
known her for years. “There is a tremen-
dous amount of emotion attached to her
controlling this business now.”
Another person who is close to the
company pushed back on that notion,
saying Redstone would do what was best
for shareholders. “She is a business per-
son and takes it extremely seriously,”
the person said.
Paramount’s problems illustrate the
wrenching transition that traditional
media companies face. Like its peers in
Hollywood, Paramount is trying to
transform its treasured film and televi-
sion businesses into an online streaming
service fit for the future.
But this is an endeavour that involves
heavy losses for years. With less finan-
cial flexibility than the likes of Amazon
or Netflix, Paramount had until
recently opted to be an “arms dealer”,
selling the licensing rights for its shows
to deep-pocketed tech companies.
This has constrained Paramount Plus,
which launched about a year ago,
because many of these licensing deals
last for years. It has therefore been una-
ble to offer some of the company’s big-
gest recent hits, such as Yellowstone, the
popular drama set on a Montana cattle
ranch, or Oprah Winfrey’s blockbuster
interview with Prince Harry and Meg-
han Markle. They were licensed out to
NBCUniversal’s Peacock and Amazon
respectively.
“They could never enact a broad,
assertive strategy because they needed
‘They could the short-term money [from licens-
ing],” said one former executive.
never enact Paramount last year changed its strat-
a broad, egy with the advent of Paramount Plus,
but must wait for licensing deals to
assertive expire to act on it.
strategy It also touted the progress Paramount
Plus has made, helped by its live sports
because offering, particularly National Football
they League games, as well as popular chil-
dren’s programming.
needed the Paramount added 9.4m subscribers
short-term across its streaming services in the
fourth quarter, outpacing HBO Max. By
money’ the end of 2021, it had reached 56m sub-
scribers across its streaming services,
including 33m for Paramount Plus.
The company is set to lose $1.5bn on
its streaming business this year and
plans to increase spending on streaming
content to $6bn a year by 2024. To fund
this, it has been selling assets, such as
the CBS Studio Center where Seinfeld
was shot, leaving it with more than $6bn
in cash at the end of the 2021.
As for the entire company, bankers
say Comcast, Amazon or Warner would
be the most likely buyers. But Amazon
is unlikely to want to take on the tradi-
tional TV channels, including CBS News,
that come with it, they say, while Com-
cast already has distribution deals giv-
ing access to Paramount’s library on the
cable group’s Xfinity devices.
In her presentation, Redstone tried to
Shari Redstone: persuade investors to stick with her for
prevailed in the the ride. “[Paramount is] greater than
fight for control the sum of its parts,” she said. “We can
of the media deliver the [return on investment] that
company but its you expect and deserve.”
future remains Additional reporting by Christopher
unclear Grimes in Los Angeles
warehouse space will persist with a €21bn recapitali-
sation of its European logistics business Mileway.
3 norton rose Fulbright, one of the oldest UK law
firms in Hong Kong, laid out plans to “pivot to China”
as the city comes under increasing pressure from
Beijing to align with the mainland.
3 Sequoia capital, the Silicon Valley venture capital
group, plans to move deeper into cryptocurrency
markets, earmarking at least $500mn for invest-
ments in digital assets.
3 Christoph Schweizer, the new head of Boston con-
sulting Group, said he wants to hire climate activists
$500mn €4.9bn
Investment in Record annual
digital assets profits posted by
planned by Airbus last year,
Sequoia Capital up from €1.7bn
as the consultancy pushes to advise more companies
on their plans to reach net zero emissions.
3 Heineken warned that “off the charts” cost infla-
tion will further push up the price of a pint “Across
the board we are faced with crazy increases,” said
chief executive Dolf van den Brink.
3 airbus reported record annual profits of €4.86bn
last year, up from €1.7bn a year earlier, and restored
its dividend, striking an optimistic note about pros-
pects for a sustained rebound in the aviation industry.
3 Former Google chief executive eric Schmidt is to
launch a $125mn philanthropic project to fund artifi-
cial intelligence research that solves “hard prob-
lems” in the field, including issues of bias, harm and
misuse and scientific limitations of the technology.
12 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

COMPANIES & MARKETS

Partners’ dispute leads to Novalpina collapse

Rift over landmine clearance plan ended in investors seizing control of private equity firm behind spyware maker NSO
KAye WigginS — London

The private equity firm behind Israeli

spyware maker NSO Group held talks to
buy a landmine clearance company that
works for Saudi Arabia in Yemen — a
divisive deal that contributed to the
group’s unravelling.
Novalpina executives considered
acquiring UK-based SafeLane Global in
late 2019 and early 2020, according to
six people familiar with the matter and
emails between the co-founders.
At the time, Novalpina was coming
under criticism from human rights
groups for its fund’s investment in NSO,
whose software has been used by nation
states to spy on political opponents,
activists and journalists. NSO has since
been sued by Apple and WhatsApp,
while the US has added it to a trade
blacklist.
The acquisition of SafeLane was
pushed by Novalpina’s co-founder
Stephen Peel, a former British Olympic
rower who had previously worked at
Goldman Sachs and TPG.
But he met stiff resistance from his
two co-founders Bastian Lueken and
Stefan Kowski, widening a rift between
the men which ultimately led to inves-
tors seizing control of the private equity
firm last year.
Kowski and Lueken believed using
some of Novalpina’s €1bn fund, whose
investors include the pension pots of
Yorkshire public sector workers and
British Gas employees, would add to the
embattled firm’s reputational risk.
In an email to 18 colleagues in Febru-
ary 2020, later submitted to a Luxem- Novalpina work,” Ainsworth said. NSO declined to deals with insufficient reason. Peel Ainsworth said Mine Action Review’s Co-founder pursuit of their aims”, Ainsworth said.
bourg court as part of a legal dispute, co-founder comment. seemed to take “criticism of the comments were “anecdotal” and the Kowski had suggested more questions
Lueken said the proposed SafeLane Stephen Peel. SafeLane “is just doing humanitarian deal . . . as an effort to undermine him organisation had not visited the project. Peel was should be asked about the arrange-
deal, known as Project Matisse, did not Below, Diana, work”, Ainsworth said. “We’re just pick- personally”, one person close to the Yemen is contaminated with mines ‘quite upset ments behind Project Masam if talks on
appear “quite right”. Princess of ing up ordnance.” matter said. “That’s where the conse- from a series of conflicts since the 1960s. the deal were to proceed, and Lueken
He expressed concern that SafeLane Wales’s He added: “If you’ve, God forbid, ever quences [for] the relationship between Saudi Arabia intervened militarily in that you had said he was concerned that the con-
could be criticised for “making money association with been somewhere where you’ve seen the founders began to show.” Yemen’s civil war in 2015 when it led an somehow tract for the project could end if there
in war zones” and “putting locals in landmine some kids playing catch with a cluster After the SafeLane deal was aban- Arab coalition against Iranian-aligned was political change in Saudi Arabia.
harms [sic] way”. That “may be a harsh clearance bomb and see what happens when they doned, Novalpina continued to pursue Houthi rebels. The UN says the conflict believe your A lack of transparency and oversight
way of articulating the story but given added to Peel’s drop it — if you can make sure that clus- other deals, buying the French pharma- has triggered the world’s worst man- investment in state finances are “major problems”
the flak were [sic] already getting this positive view ter bomb isn’t there for them to play ceuticals business Laboratoire XO and made humanitarian crisis. in Saudi Arabia, according to a 2020
may well be how this comes out in the of SafeLane, catch with, you genuinely can make Romanian gambling operator MaxBet, “A big part of the conflict has been the judgment report by Transparency International.
media”, Lueken said in the email. according to one lives better.” using its fund. use by all sides, but by the Houthis in trumps Ainsworth said that while Saudi
Peel told Kowski he did not want to person involved. In a February 2020 email about the But the rift between the co-founders particular, of landmines,” said Peter Arabia ultimately controlled Project
work at a firm where colleagues stopped Right, a branch SafeLane deal submitted in the court proved irreparable. Lueken and Kowski Salisbury, a senior analyst on Yemen at mine’ Masam in Yemen, his company had a
him from doing deals. of NSO in Israel dispute between the three men, Peel wrote to Novalpina’s investors last June, the International Crisis Group. contract with a Dubai-based company,
In an email, Peel told Kowski he was Tim Graham Photo Library via
Getty/
told Kowski: “I blame myself for trying shortly before the trio were stripped of Saudi Arabia funds humanitarian Dynasafe Middle East Project Manage-
“quite upset that you somehow believe to set up a governance that was egalitar- control, saying Peel had proposed to work including clearing mines in Yemen ment, to work on it.
your investment judgment trumps ian”, and “I am saddened but now accept wind up the firm unless decisions were at least partly because it “clearly sees “I invoice them,” he said. “They pay
mine” and that “if you and I cannot that is where we are.” taken that they thought were “inappro- value” in bolstering local support for the me . . . Where their money comes from,
agree on this, we should face up to it that One person with knowledge of the dis- priate for our fund”. military campaign and for Yemen’s what they do, that’s their business, that’s
there is not a future for the firm”. pute said that one of Peel’s colleagues SafeLane, which has worked in more internationally recognised government, not part of my contract.”
Novalpina ultimately did not make a was satisfied with the company’s safety than 60 countries and counts Den- which it backs, he added. He said SafeLane “conducts extensive
binding bid for SafeLane. record and compliance and corporate mark’s former prime minister Helle SafeLane is “an apolitical organisa- compliance checks on its counterpar-
Rather than further jeopardise the conduct policies, and believed Lueken Thorning-Schmidt as a board member, tion” that does not “partner or collabo- ties” and noted that Saudi Arabia was a
public perception of Novalpina, Peel and Kowski were opposing too many is working on Project Masam, a Saudi rate with any national militaries in the large humanitarian aid donor to Yemen.
appeared to believe the investment project to clear landmines in Yemen. “I believe Project Masam was a small
would help the firm. He had a “romantic The Yemen project was SafeLane’s part of that programme,” he said.
picture” of SafeLane and associated it largest and most profitable contract at Proponents of the SafeLane deal
“with the image of Lady Diana” walking the time Novalpina considered the deal, within Novalpina argued that the com-
through an active minefield in Angola, two people with knowledge of the mat- pany’s work in conflict zones was high-
in the view of one person close to the ter said. margin and a good source of cash flow,
matter. After the criticism over NSO, the The project has cleared more than and that it could expand its work on
person said, “the association with a 300,000 mines, improvised explosive building projects in the UK and Ger-
humanitarian cause was seen as a really devices and other items of unexploded many, clearing unexploded ordnance
good thing”. ordnance in its first four years, the com- from the second world war, one of the
In response to a summary of reporting pany said. people said.
by the Financial Times and a request for Twenty-eight people working on the SafeLane made pre-tax profits of
comment, Peel said: “These fictions do Yemen project for SafeLane have died in $7.7mn in 2020, down from $15.4mn in
not merit comment.” Kowski and that time, according to the company, of 2019, its latest published accounts show.
Lueken declined to comment. which 10 died in demining incidents and Asked about the workers’ deaths, the
Lueken’s concerns about SafeLane 18 in security incidents. company said its “thoughts and prayers
“making money in war zones” were The research group Mine Action are with all our lost friends and col-
rejected by the landmine clearance Review said in a report in October that leagues”.
company’s chief executive Adam Ains- the project “has not undergone inde- SafeLane added: “The project is
worth, a former officer in the British pendent investigation and verification operating in an ongoing armed conflict,
Army. to inform the sector on circumstances with ever changing front lines and ter-
“It seems counter-intuitive for surrounding its casualties, thought to be rorist activity, and has not been without
Bastian Lueken to express a view among the highest recorded by a single incident.”
such as this given the nature of NSO’s project”. Additional reporting by Andrew England

Utilities Automobiles

EDF to receive €2bn state injection
SArAh White — Paris
The French government is set to pump
more than €2bn into EDF in an effort to
restore the state-controlled energy
group’s finances, which are suffering
due to nuclear reactor outages and pro-
duction declines just as it gears up for
investment in new plants.
EDF, which yesterday reported a rise in
profits and revenues for 2021, faces big
setbacks. Its electricity production fore-
casts have dropped to their lowest point
in three decades, with five of its 56
nuclear reactors offline as it inspects
flaws in pipe weldings.
The company will also shoulder some
of the cost of government measures to
cap electricity bill increases this year at
4 per cent — a move that senior manag-
ers had argued against, people familiar
with the matter said.
EDF estimated a net hit of some
€13bn to its core profits this year from
this double-whammy, as price rises off-
set part of the bleed. Core profits had
advanced 11.3 per cent year on year in
2021 to reach €18bn, helped by a higher
nuclear output and trading revenues.
The government, which owns almost
84 per cent of EDF, said it would inject
€2.1bn into the group as part of a
planned €2.5bn rights issue. The com-
pany also said it would offload assets
worth €3bn in the next two years.
“EDF is going through a bad financial
patch,” French finance minister Bruno
Le Maire told reporters. He said it was
“vital” to inject fresh funds into the
company as it gears up for investments
in nuclear reactors and renewable
energy projects, adding the state sup-
port was a “very strong signal aimed at
EDF has been plagued by reactor
outages and production declines
private investors to say they can put
their trust in EDF”. EDF shares were
down 2.4 per cent in Paris yesterday.
French president Emmanuel Macron
last week announced the biggest
nuclear power push in France for dec-
ades, going full tilt on atomic energy as
part of a lower-carbon strategy as he
heads towards an election in April.
This will include building six next
generation European Pressurised Reac-
tors at an estimated cost of almost
€52bn.
Jean-Bernard Lévy, EDF chair, called
Macron’s energy initiative “a turning
point for the next three decades” and a
moment of “refoundation”.
Part of the nuclear push will be
funded by the state, but EDF is expected
to have to borrow to finance the pro-
gramme, as it also invests in extending
the lifecycle of existing plants.
The state-backed capital injection
was partly aimed at avoiding further
credit downgrades this year, a French
government official said, adding that
EDF had needed fresh funds and not
nationalisation, because that would not
provide new money.
Renault fears Russia parts shortage
peter CAmpbell —London
SArAh White — Paris
Renault has warned of a potential sup-
ply chain crisis for its plants in Russia if
the dispute with Ukraine deteriorates.
The French carmaker said its Russian
business AvtoVaz could face problems
securing components for its two facto-
ries in the country.
About 90 per cent of the sales from
the AvtoVaz plants, which make the
Lada brand, stayed in Russia and the
company was financed largely from the
country, Luca de Meo, the chief execu-
tive, said yesterday. But “potentially
there could be another supply chain cri-
sis linked to parts that would have to
come from abroad”, he told investors.
As well as two AvtoVaz plants, the
company owns a dedicated Renault
facility in Moscow.
Vladimir Putin, the Russian presi-
dent, has tried to shelter the country’s
economy and industries from potential
sanctions through a “Fortress Russia”
programme that reduces links with out-
side businesses. But car plants such as
Renault’s still rely heavily on imported
components, because of the scale of the
global business.
De Meo said that Renault was “doing a
study, just a preventive move” to assess
where else it could source parts for the
plants. About 20 per cent of parts for the
AvtoVaz plants are imported, while it is
close to 40 per cent for the Renault Mos-
‘Potentially there could be
another supply chain crisis
linked to parts that would
have to come from abroad’
cow facility. “We are looking at this
piece by piece, if it comes from China, it
is not the same as if it comes from Ger-
many or the US,” he said.
The supply chain warning came as
Renault reported its first annual profit
in two years with cost-cutting and a
focus on its more lucrative models off-
setting the global chip shortage that has
beset the car industry.
The carmaker’s net income was
€967mn last year, a sharp reversal from
an €8bn loss in 2020, when the lock-
downs designed to stem the spread of
coronavirus hammered manufacturers.
The group, which also lost money in
2019, said yesterday that a turnround
strategy based on delivering “value over
volume” was ahead of schedule.
Some parts of the plan were two years
ahead of schedule, de Meo said, and the
company would “go above the initial
€2bn target” for cost cutting.
About 85 per cent of vehicles were
higher specification models, leading to a
pricing increase of 6 percentage points.
The higher mix improved profits by
€1.1bn, while increased productivity
boosted earnings by €850mn.
Higher raw material prices cost the
group an additional €470mn.
Its profit margins hit 3.6 per cent last
year, ahead of the 2.8 per cent it had
forecast, and the group is targeting 4 per
cent this year. Sales rose 6 per cent to
€46.2bn, as the carmaker benefited
from the reopening of major economies.
But Renault warned that it still
expected to produce 300,000 fewer
vehicles this year because of the chip
shortages that dogged the industry over
the past year.
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 13

COMPANIES & MARKETS

Fixed income. Monetary policy Commodities

Eni expects
Investors braced for banks’ gas supply to
retreat from bond portfolios remain tight
for four years
Tom Wilson — LONdON

Natural gas markets will remain tight

for at least the next four years, Eni’s
chief executive has said, as the Italian
energy major reported its highest
annual profits since 2012 on the back of
soaring prices.
European gas prices are at record lev-
els and oil at a seven-year high as supply
has struggled to keep pace with resur-
gent demand.
Eni boss Claudio Descalzi said that the
imbalance predated the pandemic and
was a result of falling investment in oil
and gas production since 2015.
“I don’t think the situation can change
drastically as most of the major compa-
nies are engaged in the transformation,
in climate change action,” he said.
As such, he expected the oil market to
remain “structurally undersupplied”
for at least another two years, and the
gas market for the next four to five
years, until a planned major expansion
of liquefied natural gas production in
Qatar is completed around 2026.
These market dynamics helped Eni
rebound from a loss in 2020 to record
adjusted net profits of €4.7bn in 2021,
the highest in eight years. Profits for the
last three months of 2021 were €2.1bn,
up from €1.4bn in the third quarter,
beating company-compiled average
analysts’ estimates of €1.9bn.

would not begin reducing the size of its

Fed and BoE are expected to
begin process of quantitative
tightening in coming months
Tommy sTubbingTon — LONdON
KaTe duguid — New YOrk
The biggest buyers in bond markets are
poised to become sellers, as central
banks that have bought trillions of dol-
lars of debt since the 2008 financial cri-
sis start trimming their vast portfolios.
Major central banks such as the Fed-
eral Reserve and Bank of England are
widely expected to begin the process of
“quantitative tightening” in the coming
months, complicating the outlook for
bond investors already grappling with
runaway inflation and the spectre of
aggressive interest rate rises this year.
The looming tightening of monetary
policy marks a stark contrast to the
coronavirus response measures imple-
mented in early 2020, when central
banks around the world cut borrowing
costs to historic lows and launched the
type of large-scale asset-purchase
schemes that were used to arrest the glo-
bal financial crisis a decade earlier.
“Central bank balance sheets will
shrink in aggregate in size for the first
time in history,” said Ralf Preusser, glo-
bal head of rates research at Bank of
America.
“Some central banks may also experi-
ment with [actively selling bonds],
where we also have no experience.”
The BoE fired the starting gun on QT
earlier this month, saying it would begin
the process of gradually reducing the
£895bn stock of debt it has bought over
the past 13 years by ceasing reinvest-
ments of government bonds it holds as
Huge central bank balance sheets are set to shrink
$tn
Financial European Central Bank
crisis
Federal Reserve
Bank of England
2007 09 10 11 12 13 14
Source: Bloomberg
they mature, as well as offloading
£20bn of corporate debt. When interest
rates rise from 0.5 per cent currently to
1 per cent — which markets expect as
soon as May — the UK central bank will
also consider actively selling gilts.
The Federal Reserve will probably
begin the QT process later this year,
investors say. It may offer more details
of plans to wind down its $9tn balance
sheet at its meeting next month, at
which it is widely expected to raise
interest rates for the first time since the
start of the pandemic.
Now that employment and growth are
surging, a reduction of the Fed’s balance
sheet would allow it to withdraw some
of the stimulus it injected at the start of
2020 to shore up the US economy.
Such a prospect comes as markets are
pricing in more than six interest rate
rises in the US this year, with traders
betting that the Fed will move decisively
to stem surging inflation.
Another major source of demand for
bonds is set to dry up, with the Euro-
pean Central Bank expected to phase
out its own debt purchases later this
Coronavirus 10
8 debt — Charlie Bibby/FT
6 2008-09 financial crisis. Then, the Fed
4 years after its first interest rate rise.
2 tude of bond markets to the onset of QT
0 “If you look at the power of QE, it
15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
year — although ECB QT is thought to be
a long way off.
While expectations of rapid rate rises
from the Fed and the BoE has stirred up
markets in recent months, bonds
appear to have largely taken the notion
of QT in their stride. Longer-dated debt,
which is generally perceived to have
benefited most from quantitative easing
programmes, has sold off much less
sharply than short-dated bonds, which
closely track interest rate expectations.
Some market participants view that
as a sign that bond markets are remark-
ably complacent about the prospect of
central banks taking a step back.
“Long-term bonds are effectively liv-
ing in cloud cuckoo land,” said Craig
Inches, head of rates at Royal London
Asset Management. “Has the market
priced QT in? No. People seem totally
focused on rate hikes and aren’t think-
ing about balance sheets.”
The Fed at its January meeting said
that a significant reduction in its bal-
ance sheet would “likely be appropri-
ate”. In a set of “principles” laid out at
that same meeting, the Fed said that it
The Bank of
England plans to balance sheet until it has raised interest
begin gradually rates, but has otherwise not said any-
thing about the timing of such a move.
reducing its
£895bn stock of The Fed has also said that it could shrink
its balance sheet at a faster pace than
when it last carried out QT following the
waited until 2017 to begin — roughly two
To some investors, the relaxed atti-
makes sense.
wasn’t so much that the central bank
was buying bonds from the market but
the powerful signal it sent that rates
would stay low for a long time,” said Sal-
man Ahmed, global head of macro at
Fidelity International. “That’s the same
for QT — it has to be thought of in terms
of what it tells us about rates policy.”
Since the Fed has not indicated that
balance sheet reduction is an alterna-
tive to rate rises — insisting that short-
term interest rates remain its primary
tool for taming inflation — markets
assume that the two policies are com-
plementary, according to Ahmed. “An
early start to QT would be a signal that
rates are going to go up faster,” he said.
The UK may provide clues on how
‘Central markets respond to rate rises coupled
bank with QT. So far, the former appears to
have had a larger impact, with longer-
balance term debt faring much better than
sheets will short-dated bonds in this year’s sell-off.
“I’m sure the Fed is going to be watch-
shrink in ing the UK. It’s probably quite a useful
aggregate in control experiment,” said Steven Major,
HSBC’s global head of fixed income
size for the research. “If you look at [low long-term
first time in yields in the UK], the suggestion is there
are plenty of willing buyers if the central
history’ bank just gets out of the way.”
‘I don’t think the situation
can change drastically as
most majors are engaged
in climate change action’
“As with peers these are Eni’s best
annual results in a decade,” said Oswald
Clint, an analyst at Bernstein.
Eni was the last of the western energy
majors to report earnings but unlike its
rivals, all of which have reported bum-
per profits, it did not announce further
share buybacks. It confirmed a divided
of €0.86 for 2021. Any changes to the
dividend or buyback programme would
be announced in March, Descalzi said.
Eni shares rose 1 per cent in Milan
trading yesterday.
Like its peers, Eni is at the start of a
major restructuring, but has been more
willing than other supermajors to con-
sider hiving off parts of the company in
preparation for the energy transition.
It has listed a stake in Var Energi, its
Norwegian upstream oil and gas joint
venture, this year and is preparing an
initial public offering of Plenitude, its
retail, renewables and mobility busi-
ness. Plenitude’s earnings before inter-
est, tax depreciation and amortisation
increased 25 per cent year on year to
€600mn in 2021.
Eni, which will retain a majority stake
in the business, says floating Plenitude
will help it to access cheaper funding
and grow faster. Most of Eni’s rivals,
Our global such as Shell and BP, have argued they
team gives you
market-moving
will be better able to succeed in the en-
ergy transition as integrated companies.
news and views, Spinning off Plenitude, and possibly
24 hours a day
ft.com/markets
other divisions in future, while retaining
majority stakes, will enable Eni to create
“more agile vehicles”, Descalzi said.

regulation Fixed income

Tesla lawyer accuses SEC of ‘muzzling
and harassing’ Musk over tweets
dave lee — saN FraNciscO
Tesla has accused the Securities and
Exchange Commission of going
“beyond the pale” and harassing its
chief executive Elon Musk over his
compliance with a 2018 agreement on
his use of social media, the latest salvo
in a lengthy dispute between Musk and
the US stock market regulator.
Earlier this month, the electric car-
maker revealed that it had been subpoe-
naed by the SEC in relation to its compli-
ance with the settlement, part of which
required a company lawyer to preap-
prove Musk’s tweets that contained
“material” information.
The SEC had requested information
on “governance processes around com-
pliance” with the order.
In a letter dated Thursday to Alison
Nathan, a federal judge in New York,
Alex Spiro, an attorney for Tesla,
accused the SEC of “devoting its formi-
dable resources to endless, unfounded
investigations into Mr Musk and Tesla”.
He said it was in retaliation for Musk’s
position as an “outspoken critic of the
government” and that the SEC was hav-
ing a “chilling effect” on the multi-
billionaire’s first amendment right to
free speech. The SEC had wielded the
2018 agreement to “muzzle and harass”
Tesla and Musk, the letter said, asking
the court to “bring the SEC’s harassment
campaign to an end”.
The letter also accused the SEC of
improperly withholding $40mn from
Tesla’s shareholders, money gathered in
fines as part of the 2018 agreement.
Musk and Tesla each paid $20mn.
The SEC declined to comment.
The agreement at issue stemmed
Elon Musk: continues to be vocal
in his disdain for the regulator
from an August 2018 tweet in which
Musk said he had the “funding secured”
to take Tesla private at a share price of
$420. After the post, later said by Musk
to have been a joke with a marijuana ref-
erence to amuse his then girlfriend,
Tesla’s shares spiked 11 per cent, with
trading briefly halted in the confusion.
As well as fines and restrictions, the
settlement required Musk to step down
as chair of Tesla’s board for three years.
The chief executive later said the tweet
had been “worth it”, and has continued
to be vocal in his disdain for the SEC.
“From what I can see they’ve done
nothing to protect investors, small or
large, from Wall Street short sellers,” he
told the Financial Times last year.
He has also suggested the agency be
renamed the “Short seller Enrichment
Commission”, among other criticisms.
Since the consent decree has been in
place, the SEC has sought to hold Musk
in contempt of court when he tweeted
Tesla would “make around 500k” cars
in 2019. Judge Nathan urged a compro-
mise between the two parties to resolve
the dispute; it came in the form of
updated guidelines adding greater spe-
cificity on what subjects were off limits.
Hawkish noises from policymakers spur
flight from European corporate debt
george sTeer — LONdON
Investors are pulling back from
European corporate debt as central
banks prepare to curtail the stimulus
that has offered unprecedented sup-
port to borrowers in a taste of the more
challenging environment ahead.
European high-yield funds registered
an outflow of €724mn in the week
ending February 16, according to a
survey of fund managers carried out
by JPMorgan, while outflows from
investment grade funds, which are con-
sidered less risky, were even larger at
€2.3bn.
Bank of America said in a note yester-
day that high-yield European funds had
so far this year shed 2.8 per cent of assets
under management, marking their
worst start to a year since 2018.
In another sign of selling in the mar-
ket, an Ice Data Services index tracking
European high-yield bonds has dropped
3.3 per since the end of last year, leaving
it on track for the worst two-month run
since the market ructions at the start of
the pandemic in March 2020.
The moves come as yields on short-
term government debt have jumped on
both sides of the Atlantic, rendering
returns from higher-risk corpo-
rate bonds less appealing to investors.
Markets are pricing in a 0.25 percent-
age point rise in US interest rates for the
Federal Reserve’s next meeting in
March, and have recently dialled up
their bets that the European Central
Bank will be forced into action sooner
than previously expected to tackle euro-
High-yield European
funds have shed 2.8% of
assets, their worst start
to a year since 2018
zone inflation, which last month rose at
an annual rate of 5.1 per cent.
As a result, the yield on two-year US
Treasuries, which are particularly sensi-
tive to potential changes in interest
rates, has more than tripled to 1.6 per
cent in just three months.
The yield on equivalent German debt,
although still in negative territory, has
also risen sharply, reflecting falling
prices.
Bill Ammons, portfolio manager at
AlbaCore Capital Group, said it was
unsurprising that fixed income prod-
ucts were coming “under a bit of pres-
sure” given the increasingly hawkish
noises emanating from both the Fed and
the ECB.
Yet the threat of corporate borrowers
defaulting on their loans remained low,
Ammons added, with “most companies
in really good shape”.
The ECB appears equally unfazed,
writing in its January economic bulletin
that lenders “continue to hold an overall
benign view of credit risks” thanks to
their confident stance on economic
growth.
Parmeshwar Chadha, global high
yield portfolio manager at Newton
Investment Management, said he
expected the high-yield market to
“enter a period of stabilisation” over the
coming months as markets moved past
“peak anxiety” around inflation.
With default rates at historic lows and
corporate fundamentals still “fairly
strong”, Chadha said high-yield would
probably remain the best performing
asset class within fixed income, return-
ing between 3 and 4 per cent over the
next 12 months.
14 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

COMPANIES & MARKETS

The day in the markets

On Wall Street
Crypto communities are What you need to know

not always neighbourly 3 Wall Street stocks heading for second

consecutive weekly fall
3 Sell-off leaves Russian stock market
UK’s blue-chip benchmark suffers biggest weekly fall in 3 months
FTSE 100 index, weekly % change
more than 10% down so far this year 3
3 Asian tech shares dip after Beijing
urges lower online food delivery fees
2
Wall Street stock markets were on course
hailed as a triumph for law enforcement Based on government documents, for a second consecutive weekly loss
Gary and that is true, to a point. Their arrests,
and the seizure of $3.6bn in bitcoin
Robinson suspects the authorities did
not trace the privacy coin. Whether they
amid heightened tensions about a
potential invasion of Ukraine by Russia.
1

Silverman allegedly in their control, demonstrated

the ability of authorities to respond to
were unable to crack the monero
community’s cryptography or did not
The S&P 500 was down more than 1
per cent at lunchtime in New York, 0
thefts on blockchains and recover the need to do so, Robinson reckons the leaving the blue-chip benchmark almost
proceeds. Just as the FBI secured the result could increase the crypto’s appeal 2 per cent lower since Monday.
nation’s banks against the John to bad actors. Moscow-backed separatists in eastern -1
Dillingers of the last century, high-tech “This might push launderers and Ukraine announced plans for a “mass
Software developers have a surprising crimefighters are making progress in criminals to use monero to a greater evacuation” of civilians to Russia. Russia
way with words. While people in other protecting cryptocurrency platforms extent — they will see how traceable the also unveiled plans for nuclear drills to -2
trades form chambers or associations, from computer hackers today. bitcoin was in this case and this will push test ballistic and cruise missiles, while
they join “communities” — the name The authorities benefited from the them to using monero instead,” he said. saying it would pursue talks with western -3
given to loosely organised groups that fact that blockchains are public. They “We have to accept that untraceable powers after US secretary of state
collaborate on the open-source software could track down the stolen bitcoin digital cash does exist. The question is Antony Blinken invited his Russian Nov 2021 2022 Feb
that makes our technological society because they never lost sight of it; the how we deal with it.” counterpart Sergei Lavrov to meet in
Source: Refinitiv
hum. proceeds from the hack moved to “wallet I would suggest that before more Europe next week.
As marketing language goes, it’s hard 1CGA4s” and most of it stayed there. The taxpayer funds are spent on another The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite
to beat; there are few warmer and fuzzier money-laundering investigation was 1.5 per cent lower, heading for a Street. “So that’s the transmission Lale Akoner, senior market strategist at
appellations in English. Think of involving privacy coins — and I would bet
communities and good things come to
Some developers, intent the Bitfinex bust did not come cheap —
weekly fall of more than 2 per cent.
Markets have swung sharply over the
mechanism between these geopolitical
risks around Russia and global markets.”
BNY Mellon Investment Management,
said stock markets were likely to remain
mind: families picnicking in a park, kids on thwarting laws aimed at one of our congressional committees or past week as developments in Ukraine Brent crude, the oil benchmark, edged under pressure until geopolitical risks
at the local school fundraising for someone in the executive branch should
charity, friends helping each other out
halting money laundering, summon representatives of the monero
added to investor jitters about inflation
and central banks raising interest rates.
up 0.1 per cent to $93.03 a barrel after
touching a seven-year high of $96.78 a
receded. “The market has been pricing in
the economic implications if sanctions
after a storm. are less nice than others community to talk things over. The S&P 500 is now more than 8 per barrel this week. Russia’s Moex share were implemented on Russia,” she said.
But some developers are less A little dialogue might go a long way. cent lower for the year, after hitting a index fell 3.4 per cent, taking its drop for In Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index
neighbourly than others, and we could There are reasons to worry about the record high at the turn of 2022, while the the year to more than 10 per cent. The dropped 1.9 per cent as Chinese techs fell.
use new words for them. A case in point tough part was linking the loot to the protection of personal privacy on the Nasdaq has lost more than 13 per cent. rouble lost 1 per cent against the dollar. The moves came after the National
comes from the blockchain world, where alleged perpetrators. By his reading of public blockchain, and based on their “If there were an invasion then we Europe’s region-wide Stoxx 600 index Development and Reform Commission,
there are communities working today to the complaint, Tom Robinson, chief writings, members of the monero know for sure the oil price will go higher, fell 0.8 per cent and London’s FTSE 100 Beijing’s top state planning agency, urged
thwart the enforcement of anti-money- scientist at Elliptic, a blockchain community mean well. “Monero’s state that’s inflationary, and that will make the lost 0.3 per cent, leaving the UK index online food-delivery platforms to lower
laundering laws through the creation of intelligence firm, said he believed the of the art cryptography obfuscates every Fed a bit more aggressive,” said Marija almost 2 per cent weaker for the week — the fees they charge restaurants.
so-called privacy coins. In other words, break in the case came in 2017 when US layer of a transaction”, they say on their Veitmane, senior strategist at State its worst performance since November. Naomi Rovnick and Hudson Lockett
cryptocurrencies designed to be difficult officials shut down a “dark net” site website, to empower people in
to track or trace. called AlphaBay. “It was necessary to “oppressive countries or depressed
The threat posed by privacy coins can trace the stolen bitcoins through economies” and protect “consumers and Markets update
be gleaned from the fine print of a federal AlphaBay in order to link these funds to companies from price manipulation,
criminal complaint filed this month, the two alleged launderers,” he said. supply chain exploitation, economic
which accuses a New York couple of Stopping hackers, however, is not the discrimination or the like”.
laundering proceeds from the August same as preventing criminals of a At the same time, the representatives US Eurozone Japan UK China Brazil
2016 hack of the Bitfinex exchange that traditional sort from using crypto to of the elected government should make Stocks S&P 500 Eurofirst 300 Nikkei 225 FTSE100 Shanghai Comp Bovespa
netted bitcoin worth $4.5bn at the time move their money across national it clear that even software developers Level 4340.46 1802.65 27122.07 7513.62 3490.76 113275.57
the government acted. Among the borders or to swirl it around to conceal its have responsibilities to the wider % change on day -0.91 -0.78 -0.41 -0.32 0.66 -0.22
techniques they allegedly used was origins. The significance of the Bitfinex community. Currency $ index (DXY) $ per € Yen per $ $ per £ Rmb per $ Real per $
converting some of the bitcoin into case in that battle is less certain because Money laundering is the way big-time Level 95.891 1.134 115.145 1.358 6.326 5.126
“anonymity-enhanced virtual of what seems to have happened to the criminals get away with their ill-gotten % change on day 0.095 -0.264 0.157 -0.294 -0.166 -0.798
currency”, the filing says, the most alleged launders’ monero, which gains. Giving up the fight against it would Govt. bonds 10-year Treasury 10-year Bund 10-year JGB 10-year Gilt 10-year bond 10-year bond
notable example being a privacy coin obscures its owners’ identities by using hand a victory to the kleptocrats, the Yield 1.930 0.189 0.215 1.296 2.794 11.195
called monero. “ring signatures”, meaning a number of terrorists, the racketeers, the drug Basis point change on day -4.160 -4.000 -0.340 -8.600 1.500 5.300
Lawyers for Ilya Lichtenstein and parties are involved in signing a traffickers and the pimps. World index, Commods FTSE All-World Oil - Brent Oil - WTI Gold Silver Metals (LMEX)
Heather Morgan have called evidence transaction so it is hard to tell which one
Level 463.99 92.90 89.77 1893.45 23.59 4803.70
against them weak. But the case has been initiated it. gary.silverman@ft.com
% change on day -0.81 0.03 -0.17 1.66 0.36 0.04
Yesterday's close apart from: Currencies = 16:00 GMT; S&P, Bovespa, All World, Oil = 17:00 GMT; Gold, Silver = London pm fix. Bond data supplied by Tullett Prebon.

Contractionary monetary policy will Main equity markets

bring big risks for financial managers

S&P 500 index Eurofirst 300 index FTSE 100 index
4800 1920 7680

7520
4640
so we have to prepare to manage banks. In a low inflation, low interest 1840 7360
liquidity mismatches at the fund level.” world that is not a problem. But in a
4480 7200
This a complex task. The risk of rising rate, inflationary world, the
being unable to buy or sell on demand dealers can be stuck with large,
| | | | | | | | |
will no longer be covered by central depreciating ex-Fed assets before 4320 || | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | 1760 || | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | 7040 | | | | | | | | | | |

banks. With the coming challenges to managing to sell those to institutional Dec 2022 Feb Dec 2022 Feb Dec 2022 Feb
markets, some of the mega US asset or small investors. Biggest movers
managers are setting up internal pools They finance that, however briefly,

P
% US Eurozone UK
to match, where possible, customers’ with the Fed dealer repo capacity, an
Dollar Tree 4.60 Commerzbank 4.03 Standard Chartered 3.80
oliticians everywhere would buying and selling. So far Amundi is arrangement for lending against
Sealed Air 3.00 Pernod Ricard 2.02 Antofagasta 2.26
be happier if persistent not taking that step, but Blanqué says acceptable high-quality securities.
Ups

inflation could be managed that it is more carefully “calibrating “Warehousing” government bonds in Ford Motor 2.34 Unilever 1.88 Reckitt Benckiser 1.97
down without triggering a liquidity risk for this juncture”. this manner has been a loss leader Consolidated Edison 2.33 B. Sabadell 1.57 Burberry 1.96
recession or market shocks. “Even after the events of March 2020 business during the era of quantitative Yum! Brands 1.64 L'oreal 1.16 Airtel Africa 1.65
Unfortunately, in the real world, it [the Covid crash] forgetfulness in the easing support programmes from the %
rarely works out that way. markets always returns, and most Fed. Interest rates were too low to leave Viacomcbs -17.81 Edp -5.37 Evraz -7.24
With elections coming soon in the US people are complacent again,” he says. much margins for the dealer-banks. Ppl -7.50 Adp -5.11 Aveva -6.36
Downs

and France, and with leadership Now, though, western central banks That is about to change. Let’s say, for Intel -5.79 Hermes Intl -4.14 Ocado -4.45
challenges elsewhere, threading the and treasuries are much less willing (or the sake of argument, that the Fed General Electric -5.71 Allianz -3.78 Flutter Entertainment -4.40
needle of non-inflationary growth will able) to rescue institutions, markets or ultimately raises the benchmark fed Albemarle -4.99 Omv -3.29 Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust -4.15
Prices taken at 17:00 GMT Based on the constituents of the FTSE Eurofirst 300 Eurozone
be problematic. A more contractionary investors. There is just too much fund target rate to 1 per cent in three or All data provided by Morningstar unless otherwise noted.
monetary policy will also lead to major four moves. That means the dealer can
risks for financial managers. warehouse a bond position with a 1 per
Liquidity is not just an abstraction in
‘Liquidity is asymmetrical, cent coupon with a cost of debt to fund
central bank economic models. It is and now it is disappearing it that is at least 25 basis points lower.
also the assurance that small savers
and investors can readily access their
when it is most needed’ And all this is against risk-free
counterparties, ie the Treasury and the
Wall Street Europe London
assets. Low cost, high speed electronic Pascal Blanqué, Amundi Fed. The banks can take the market
markets for mass investors have risk of intermediating the Fed’s de- TV streaming platform Roku tumbled Positive clinical trial data sent pharma Oil and gas services group Lamprell
created the illusion in recent years that official debt to manage at a time of high levering if the margins are higher than despite posting better than expected group Orion soaring. Germany’s Bayer soared on news it had received a notice
assets can always be valued, traded or inflation. they are now. earnings. For the fourth quarter, earnings announced that Nubeqa, a prostate- to start a project with a Saudi-based
cashed in within fractions of a second. We are coming now to the awkward But then they have less balance sheet hit $0.17 per share, almost double the cancer drug jointly developed with its contractor “in anticipation of the full
Most are unaware of the dealing costs part of what Blanqué calls “this available to finance other assets, such $0.09 that analysts had expected. Finnish peer, had shown statistically award in” the second quarter of this year,
incurred. Hedging, or managing juncture”. Political leaders want the as corporate capital spending or readily But its guidance for the current quarter significant benefits in patients when used it said. The contract, in the region of
dealing costs, becomes expensive as inflation to go away either quickly (the buying and selling other securities in spooked investors, with first-quarter alongside other medication. $51mn-$150mn, related to the delivery
markets melt down, or, for a moment Democrats, thinking of 2022 elections) those giant asset management revenue forecast to reach $720mn, which Jefferies said that Orion’s royalty rate and construction of jack-up lift barges.
or months, melt up. If you are or slowly (the Republicans, thinking of companies. And the real economy, and fell short of the $741mn estimate of Bank with Bayer was about 20 per cent, This early work, which begins
managing a huge balance sheet, or 2024 elections). But the likely cost of securities prices, are likely to contract. of America, which then lowered Roku’s including product sales. immediately, includes the sourcing of
directing vast flows of orders, both suppressing inflation is a hard sell — ie No wonder I got a mailer from target price. France’s Hermès sank after the fashion materials and the mobilisation of
sorts of melting are dangerous. a multitrillion-dollar reduction of the JPMorgan Chase asking me and my Another underwhelming outlook sent group admitted to “capacity constraints” Lamprell’s project management team.
“Risk is coming back this year with a Federal Reserve balance sheet small US checking account if I want to DraftKings down. The sports-betting towards the end of last year. Fourth- The scheme was scheduled to be
vengeance,” Pascal Blanqué, the deputy accompanied by a recession. be a customer of the private bank. group posted a fourth-quarter loss of quarter sales of €2.38bn were in line with completed in the second half of 2023.
chief executive and chief investment If the Fed sells to reduce its balance Thanks to the Fed, banks can make $0.80 per share, in line with expectations. consensus but its overall performance Lender NatWest slid despite posting a
officer of Amundi, the €1.8bn asset sheet, the trillions of official and money again on deposits. But that will But for 2022, it forecast an adjusted loss was less impressive than rivals such as net profit of £2.95bn last year against a
management group, says. “Liquidity is mortgage debt it has accumulated have be paid for with a recession. before interest, taxes, depreciation and LVMH, Kering and Richemont, said Citi. £753mn loss a year earlier. AJ Bell said
asymmetrical, and now it is to be bought by someone, in the first amortisation of $825mn-$925mn, which Swedish audiobook streamer Storytel that the share drop was down to
disappearing when it is most needed, instance the primary dealers or large john.dizard@ft.com was far worse than the $550.1mn loss Wall tumbled following news that its founder expectations being “set pretty high for
Street was predicting. Jonas Tellander was stepping down as the UK banks heading into their latest

Businesses For Sale

Arizona-based cyber security group chief executive with immediate effect. reporting season”.
NortonLifeLock slid after revealing it was The announcement came before year- London-based warehousing group
delaying its purchase of Avast, a end results that showed fourth-quarter Segro rose more than 8 per cent, only to
European peer. “We have revised the earnings per share of minus SKr1.97, turn lower in a late sell-off. The rally
timeline, in part, to continue to which was worse than the SKr1.44 loss followed an announcement of “record
productively engage with the regulators analysts polled by Refinitiv had expected. levels of rental growth” for 2021. Segro
to secure the remaining approvals in the French outsourcer Teleperformance generated £95mn of new headline rent
Business for Sale, Business Opportunities, Business Services,
UK and Spain,” it said. rallied after issuing “very strong results”, commitments last year against £78mn in
Business Wanted, Franchises Atara Biotherapeutics fell on news it with 2021 revenues and adjusted ebitda 2020, while adjusted pre-tax profits rose
Runs Daily had paused enrolment of new patients in ahead of expectations, said Bank of 20 per cent year on year to £356mn,
..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... a phase 1 study for an experimental America. Its midterm targets “point to a which beat the Refinitiv-compiled
Classified Business Advertising
cancer treatment following the death of a sustainable organic growth acceleration estimate of £348mn. Citi gives Segro a
UK: +44 20 7873 4000 | Email: acs.emea@ft.com
subject. Ray Douglas beyond 2022”, said BofA. Ray Douglas “buy” recommendation. Ray Douglas
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 15

MARKET DATA

WORLD MARKETS AT A GLANCE FT.COM/MARKETSDATA

Change during previous day’s trading (%)
S&P 500 Nasdaq Composite Dow Jones Ind FTSE 100 FTSE Eurofirst 300 Nikkei Hang Seng FTSE All World $ $ per € $ per £ ¥ per $ £ per € Oil Brent $ Sep Gold $

-0.91% -1.40% -0.73% -0.32% -0.78% -0.41% -1.88% -0.81% -0.264% -0.294% -1.62%
No change
0.157% 1.66%
Stock Market movements over last 30 days, with the FTSE All-World in the same currency as a comparison
AMERICAS EUROPE ASIA
Jan 19 - - Index All World Jan 19 - Feb 18 Index All World Jan 19 - Feb 18 Index All World Jan 19 - Feb 18 Index All World Jan 19 - Feb 18 Index All World Jan 19 - Feb 18 Index All World

S&P 500 New York S&P/TSX COMP Toronto FTSE 100 London Xetra Dax Frankfurt Nikkei 225 Tokyo Kospi Seoul
15,912.33 2,862.68
7,585.01 7,513.62 27,467.23
4,482.73 21,058.18 21,134.54 27,122.07 2,744.52
4,340.46 15,042.51

Day -0.91% Month -3.86% Year 10.92% Day -0.52% Month -1.16% Year 15.31% Day -0.32% Month -0.82% Year 13.66% Day -1.47% Month -2.89% Year NaN% Day -0.41% Month 0.20% Year -10.43% Day 0.02% Month 3.05% Year -12.42%

Nasdaq Composite New York IPC Mexico City FTSE Eurofirst 300 Europe Ibex 35 Madrid Hang Seng Hong Kong FTSE Straits Times Singapore
52,823.23 52,596.13 1,882.76 8,814.60 24,952.35 3,428.90
14,154.02 24,327.71
8,590.00 3,280.04
13,525.09 1,802.65

Day -1.40% Month -4.99% Year -2.42% Day -0.49% Month 1.29% Year 17.85% Day -0.78% Month -3.07% Year 13.37% Day -0.94% Month -0.26% Year 5.75% Day -1.88% Month 2.09% Year -21.83% Day -0.37% Month 5.60% Year 17.50%

Dow Jones Industrial New York Bovespa São Paulo CAC 40 Paris FTSE MIB Milan Shanghai Composite Shanghai BSE Sensex Mumbai
113,624.96 3,555.26
34,715.39 7,194.16 27,570.00 3,490.76 60,098.82
34,059.93 109,101.99
6,929.63 26,506.79 57,832.97

Day -0.73% Month -3.09% Year 8.11% Day -0.22% Month 1.23% Year -4.97% Day -0.25% Month -2.39% Year 20.18% Day -0.61% Month -2.67% Year 14.32% Day 0.66% Month 3.85% Year -4.50% Day -0.10% Month -1.80% Year 11.79%

Country Index Latest Previous Country Index Latest Previous Country Index Latest Previous Country Index Latest Previous Country Index Latest Previous Country Index Latest Previous
Argentina Merval 88951.46 89977.89 Cyprus CSE M&P Gen 68.46 68.68 Italy FTSE Italia All-Share 28901.63 29057.08 Philippines Manila Comp 7418.79 7438.93 Taiwan Weighted Pr 18232.35 18268.57 Cross-Border DJ Global Titans ($) 493.87 499.36
Australia All Ordinaries 7502.80 7574.80 Czech RepublicPX 1434.72 1438.61 FTSE Italia Mid Cap 46136.26 46272.75 Poland Wig 65819.21 66409.08 Thailand Bangkok SET 1713.20 1711.58 Euro Stoxx 50 (Eur) 4071.75 4113.19
S&P/ASX 200 7221.70 7296.20 Denmark OMXC Copenahgen 20 1618.16 1649.76 FTSE MIB 26506.79 26669.27 Portugal PSI 20 5632.20 5658.54 Turkey BIST 100 2032.44 2009.99 Euronext 100 ID 1302.45 1311.10
S&P/ASX 200 Res 5656.30 5663.60 Egypt EGX 30 11535.02 11568.14 Japan 2nd Section 7160.34 7201.18 PSI General 3919.25 3976.96 UAE Abu Dhabi General Index 8333.19 8358.50 FTSE 4Good Global ($) 10864.23 10948.61
Austria ATX 3816.10 3884.58 Estonia OMX Tallinn 1932.60 1945.13 Nikkei 225 27122.07 27232.87 Romania BET Index 13187.59 13139.68 UK FT 30 2858.70 2871.90 FTSE All World ($) 463.99 467.78
Belgium BEL 20 4045.10 4069.47 Finland OMX Helsinki General 11727.47 11812.64 S&P Topix 150 1655.77 1662.11 Russia Micex Index 3393.31 3511.08 FTSE 100 7513.62 7537.37 FTSE E300 1802.65 1816.83
BEL Mid 10133.52 10277.78 France CAC 40 6929.63 6946.82 Topix 1924.31 1931.24 RTX 1391.31 1450.02 FTSE 4Good UK 6911.10 6929.42 FTSE Eurotop 100 3460.54 3484.31
Brazil IBovespa 113275.57 113528.48 SBF 120 5356.60 5377.15 Jordan Amman SE 2162.03 2159.28 Saudi-Arabia TADAWUL All Share Index 12476.54 12495.22 FTSE All Share 4195.45 4212.87 FTSE Global 100 ($) 2829.58 2857.14
Canada S&P/TSX 60 1276.97 1281.53 Germany M-DAX 32972.66 33389.03 Kenya NSE 20 1903.54 1900.71 Singapore FTSE Straits Times 3428.90 3441.57 FTSE techMARK 100 6154.57 6248.94 FTSE Gold Min ($) 2223.44 2139.09
S&P/TSX Comp 21066.46 21176.33 TecDAX 3213.39 3286.46 Kuwait KSX Market Index 6633.44 6603.51 Slovakia SAX 400.33 401.64 USA DJ Composite 11377.55 11445.61 FTSE Latibex Top (Eur) 4440.00 4432.20
S&P/TSX Div Met & Min 1362.27 1368.82 XETRA Dax 15042.51 15267.63 Latvia OMX Riga 1263.54 1261.78 Slovenia SBI TOP - - DJ Industrial 34059.93 34312.03 FTSE Multinationals ($) 3051.70 3108.05
Chile S&P/CLX IGPA Gen 22821.36 22868.40 Greece Athens Gen 955.00 955.37 Lithuania OMX Vilnius 934.13 938.33 South Africa FTSE/JSE All Share 76368.34 76154.69 DJ Transport 14918.57 14999.06 FTSE World ($) 834.64 841.26
China FTSE A200 12341.87 12292.23 FTSE/ASE 20 2338.00 2338.55 Luxembourg LuxX 1742.45 1743.14 FTSE/JSE Res 20 79236.10 78011.83 DJ Utilities 914.15 915.00 FTSEurofirst 100 (Eur) 4762.15 4791.15
FTSE B35 9000.71 8988.96 Hong Kong Hang Seng 24327.71 24792.77 Malaysia FTSE Bursa KLCI 1603.05 1605.02 FTSE/JSE Top 40 69650.10 69406.88 Nasdaq 100 13983.52 14171.74 FTSEurofirst 80 (Eur) 5677.70 5730.24
Shanghai A 3658.50 3634.64 HS China Enterprise 8537.97 8711.40 Mexico IPC 52453.21 52712.06 South Korea Kospi 2744.52 2744.09 Nasdaq Cmp 13525.09 13716.72 MSCI ACWI Fr ($) 709.39 720.10
Shanghai B 286.37 284.74 HSCC Red Chip 4338.24 4291.54 Morocco MASI 13766.60 13760.26 Kospi 200 368.55 369.55 NYSE Comp 16361.71 16492.05 MSCI All World ($) 3009.09 3060.29
Shanghai Comp 3490.76 3468.04 Hungary Bux 50237.20 51305.38 Netherlands AEX 744.89 751.20 Spain IBEX 35 8590.00 8671.10 S&P 500 4340.46 4380.26 MSCI Europe (Eur) 1860.95 1874.71
Shenzhen A 2418.93 2408.84 India BSE Sensex 57832.97 57892.01 AEX All Share 1019.10 1029.58 Sri Lanka CSE All Share 12134.04 12352.38 Wilshire 5000 43784.66 44251.66 MSCI Pacific ($) 3043.31 3044.61
Shenzhen B 1155.16 1155.72 Nifty 500 14710.70 14772.05 New Zealand NZX 50 12141.89 12256.82 Sweden OMX Stockholm 30 2197.72 2229.15 Venezuela IBC 5417.69 5427.28 S&P Euro (Eur) 1888.05 1906.69
Colombia COLCAP 1261.61 1260.21 Indonesia Jakarta Comp 6892.82 6835.12 Nigeria SE All Share 47064.82 47063.28 OMX Stockholm AS 885.63 903.68 Vietnam VNI 1504.84 1507.99 S&P Europe 350 (Eur) 1856.86 1870.95
Croatia CROBEX 2013.05 2011.29 Ireland ISEQ Overall 8194.75 8309.99 Norway Oslo All Share 1017.37 1006.88 Switzerland SMI Index 12010.09 12075.27 S&P Global 1200 ($) 3298.03 3329.83
Israel Tel Aviv 125 2077.44 2087.81 Pakistan KSE 100 45675.87 45441.10 Stoxx 50 (Eur) 3714.74 3735.67
(c) Closed. (u) Unavaliable. † Correction. ♥ Subject to official recalculation. For more index coverage please see www.ft.com/worldindices. A fuller version of this table is available on the ft.com research data archive.

STOCK MARKET: BIGGEST MOVERS UK MARKET WINNERS AND LOSERS

AMERICA LONDON EURO MARKETS TOKYO Feb 18 %Chg %Chg Feb 18 %Chg %Chg Feb 18 %Chg %Chg Feb 18 %Chg %Chg
ACTIVE STOCKS stock close Day's ACTIVE STOCKS stock close Day's ACTIVE STOCKS stock close Day's ACTIVE STOCKS stock close Day's FTSE 100 price(p) week ytd FTSE 250 price(p) week ytd FTSE SmallCap price(p) week ytd Industry Sectors price(p) week ytd
traded m's price change traded m's price change traded m's price change traded m's price change Winners Winners Winners Winners
Tesla 93.1 846.47 -29.88 Glencore 283.9 422.00 1.30 Allianz Se Na O.n. 554.8 214.10 -8.40 Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha 1155.4 10280.00 280.00 Fresnillo 685.80 10.2 -21.9 Indivior 272.20 22.1 6.3 Menzies(john) 583.00 21.0 92.3 Health Care Equip.& Services 8273.85 33.7 0.6
Nvidia 82.9 234.29 -10.78 Shell 237.8 1957.00 -12.40 Novartis N 476.8 76.45 -0.14 Tokyo Electron 805.2 56810.00 -1410.00 Reckitt Benckiser 6273.00 6.4 6.4 Endeavour Mining 1895.00 8.3 17.0 Lamprell 38.40 18.9 6.0 Tobacco 35684.83 28.8 5.4
Advanced Micro Devices 53.4 111.11 -1.26 Unilever 225.0 3857.50 58.00 Roche Gs 467.0 328.07 -2.35 Softbank . 797.3 5184.00 67.00 Polymetal Int 1169.50 5.4 - Petropavlovsk 15.98 6.5 - Esken 14.40 13.9 7.3 Gas Water & Multiutilities index 6027.68 27.9 0.7
Apple 50.5 167.29 -1.59 Bp 173.1 391.40 -6.50 Nestle N 462.2 113.20 0.79 Mitsui O.s.k.lines, 626.8 9400.00 360.00 Sse 1612.00 4.2 -2.5 Bh Macro 3960.00 5.0 4.5 Fisher (james) & Sons 431.00 6.7 18.6 Pharmaceuticals & Biotech. 18484.88 23.6 1.6
Microsoft 36.8 289.32 -1.41 Astrazeneca 148.1 8801.00 -117.00 Asml Holding 414.0 570.40 -7.80 Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, 493.7 7800.00 260.00 Airtel Africa 153.90 4.1 15.3 Playtech 671.00 4.5 -8.2 Motorpoint 314.00 6.4 -7.0 Oil & Gas Producers 6849.99 23.5 -2.7
Amazon.com 34.1 3031.09 -61.96 Diageo 141.6 3658.50 42.50 Sap Se O.n. 345.8 102.26 -3.00 Recruit Hldgs Co Ltd 490.0 4722.00 -106.00 Standard Chartered 579.20 3.8 29.3 Centamin 95.14 4.3 8.5 City Of London Investment 526.00 4.4 2.9 Industrial Metals 7212.31 21.5 6.1
Meta Platforms 32.3 205.93 -1.78 Flutter Entertainment 134.2 10530.00 -485.00 Totalenergies 328.6 50.66 0.01 Sony 466.3 12075.00 -85.00 Astrazeneca 8801.00 3.4 1.5 Ultra Electronics Holdings 3016.00 4.1 -4.8 Fuller, Smith & Turner 726.00 4.3 6.5 Banks 3479.33 21.2 -0.7
Viacomcbs 25.9 29.58 -6.41 Hsbc Holdings 129.7 544.40 4.30 Lvmh 286.8 686.30 2.20 Toyota Motor 442.6 2184.00 23.50 Burberry 2033.00 2.9 12.2 Hochschild Mining 104.00 2.9 -19.4 Xps Pensions 140.50 4.1 -1.4 Electricity 9913.72 21.0 3.1
Alphabet 18.0 2628.31 -22.47 Rio Tinto 126.7 5657.00 69.00 Siemens Ag Na O.n. 280.0 136.34 -3.16 Mitsubishi Ufj Fin,. 407.9 726.30 -12.50 Antofagasta 1404.00 2.7 4.9 Bytes Technology 460.00 2.7 - Hostelworld 87.40 4.0 29.8 Beverages 28307.83 19.7 -2.4
Intel 16.6 44.82 -2.76 British American Tobacco 125.3 3409.00 -26.50 Intesa Sanpaolo 277.7 2.72 -0.02 Fanuc 325.6 21460.00 -1320.00 B&m Eur Value Retail S.a. 583.60 2.1 -8.2 Pagegroup 610.50 2.5 -6.5 Capital 98.00 4.0 15.6 Media 9465.43 16.4 0.1
Bunzl 2736.00 1.8 -6.8 Plus500 Ltd 1534.50 2.1 13.1 Capital & Regional 63.00 4.0 7.0 Aerospace & Defense 4257.84 16.2 3.2
BIGGEST MOVERS Close Day's Day's BIGGEST MOVERS Close Day's Day's BIGGEST MOVERS Close Day's Day's BIGGEST MOVERS Close Day's Day's
Segro 1265.50 1.5 - Gcp Infrastructure Investments 103.80 1.8 -3.1 Int Personal Finance 127.00 3.4 -1.6 Real Estate Investment Trusts 3209.16 15.6 -2.8
price change chng% price change chng% price change chng% price change chng%
Ups Ups Ups Ups Losers Losers Losers Losers
Dollar Tree 142.00 6.25 4.60 Standard Chartered 579.20 21.20 3.80 Pernod Ricard 197.10 3.90 2.02 Mitsui O.s.k.lines, 9400.00 360.00 3.98 Evraz 283.20 -36.3 - Darktrace 324.00 -20.2 - Dignity 547.00 -18.4 -7.9 Automobiles & Parts 3156.13 -33.9 -1.3
Sealed Air 69.37 2.02 3.00 Endeavour Mining 1895.00 55.00 2.99 L''''oreal 360.75 4.15 1.16 Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, 7800.00 260.00 3.45 Aveva 2519.00 -10.0 - Puretech Health 232.50 -17.1 - Slf Realisation Fund 10.98 -15.3 -25.4 Mining 18679.96 -23.7 9.4
Ford Motor 17.95 0.41 2.34 C&c 219.00 5.00 2.34 Nordea Bank Abp 10.28 0.11 1.08 Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha 10280.00 280.00 2.80 Int Consolidated Airlines S.a. 161.52 -7.5 12.6 Baltic Classifieds 160.50 -12.8 - Rm 156.00 -11.9 -20.0 Travel & Leisure 7603.43 -19.2 3.6
Consolidated Edison 83.35 1.90 2.33 Antofagasta 1404.00 31.00 2.26 Eni 13.47 0.14 1.02 Z Holdings 560.60 14.30 2.62 Natwest 234.50 -7.3 3.7 Future 2558.00 -12.1 -33.0 Honeycomb Investment Trust 860.00 -11.8 -9.0 Household Goods 14809.03 -16.3 -0.9
Yum! Brands 125.50 2.02 1.64 Grafton 1074.00 22.00 2.09 Danone 55.88 0.44 0.79 Daiichi Sankyo , 2547.50 64.00 2.58 Flutter Entertainment 10530.00 -7.3 -7.4 Synthomer 298.00 -11.8 - Funding Circle Holdings 74.00 -10.6 - Chemicals 12597.22 -11.6 -7.1
Barclays 191.16 -7.2 1.6 Wizz Air Holdings 4081.00 -11.6 -3.0 Metro Bank 93.80 -10.0 -1.6 Life Insurance 7255.49 -11.4 -2.6
Downs Downs Downs Downs
Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust 1015.00 -6.2 - Fdm (holdings) 885.00 -11.5 -30.9 Ao World 89.90 -9.1 - Food Producers 6799.19 -10.0 1.5
Viacomcbs 29.58 -6.41 -17.81 Evraz 283.20 -22.10 -7.24 Sartorius Sted Bio 331.00 -22.00 -6.23 Fanuc 21460.00 -1320.00 -5.79
Bp 391.40 -6.2 17.5 Petershill Partners 194.80 -10.6 - De La Rue 112.80 -8.7 - General Financial 11018.78 -7.1 -6.3
Ppl 26.03 -2.11 -7.50 Aveva 2519.00 -171.00 -6.36 Adyen 1823.40 -101.60 -5.28 Nikon 1307.00 -58.00 -4.25
London Stock Exchange 6620.00 -5.9 -3.5 Micro Focus Int 408.20 -10.1 -2.7 Luceco 252.00 -8.7 - Software & Computer Services 1827.11 -5.6 -5.1
Intel 44.82 -2.76 -5.79 Future 2558.00 -156.00 -5.75 Neste 35.27 -1.65 -4.47 Trend Micro orporated 5780.00 -220.00 -3.67
Intermediate Capital 1735.00 -5.8 - Mitchells & Butlers 240.00 -9.8 -4.2 Aptitude Software 484.00 -8.3 - Industrial Engineering 14780.23 -4.8 -8.4
General Electric 92.84 -5.62 -5.71 Trustpilot 143.50 -8.60 -5.65 Ericsson, Telefonab. L M Ser. B 8.86 -0.38 -4.15 Inpex 1131.00 -39.00 -3.33
Itv 116.95 -5.4 4.9 Baillie Gifford Us Growth Trust 218.00 -9.0 - Made.com 81.00 -8.0 - Equity Investment Instruments 12550.22 -0.9 -1.7
Albemarle 187.19 -9.83 -4.99 Tui Ag 271.50 -15.30 -5.33 Hermes Intl 1203.00 -52.00 -4.14 Nitto Denko 8350.00 -260.00 -3.02
Royal Mail 419.10 -5.4 - Osb 527.00 -8.4 -4.5 Nb Private Equity Partners 1575.00 -7.9 - Electronic & Electrical Equip. 9843.91 -0.2 -5.2
Based on the constituents of the S&P500 Based on the constituents of the FTSE 350 index Based on the constituents of the FTSEurofirst 300 Eurozone index Based on the constituents of the Nikkei 225 index
Based on last week's performance. †Price at suspension.

CURRENCIES
DOLLAR EURO POUND DOLLAR EURO POUND DOLLAR EURO POUND DOLLAR EURO POUND
Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's Closing Day's
Feb 18 Currency Mid Change Mid Change Mid Change Feb 18 Currency Mid Change Mid Change Mid Change Feb 18 Currency Mid Change Mid Change Mid Change Feb 18 Currency Mid Change Mid Change Mid Change
Argentina Argentine Peso 106.7855 0.1085 121.1104 -0.1658 145.0516 -0.2434 Indonesia Indonesian Rupiah 14328.0000 10.5000 16250.0691 -26.8469 19462.3715 -38.1804 Poland Polish Zloty 3.9988 0.0172 4.5352 0.0087 5.4317 0.0087 ..Three Month 0.7361 0.0020 0.8347 0.0003 - -
Australia Australian Dollar 1.3933 0.0042 1.5803 0.0010 1.8926 0.0006 Israel Israeli Shekel 3.2020 -0.0082 3.6315 -0.0180 4.3494 -0.0230 Romania Romanian Leu 4.3601 0.0127 4.9450 0.0026 5.9225 0.0013 ..One Year 0.7359 0.0020 0.8334 0.0003 - -
Bahrain Bahrainin Dinar 0.3770 - 0.4276 -0.0010 0.5121 -0.0014 Japan Japanese Yen 115.1450 0.1800 130.5913 -0.1071 156.4066 -0.1766 Russia Russian Ruble 76.9588 0.5913 87.2825 0.4638 104.5365 0.5234 United States United States Dollar - - 1.1341 -0.0027 1.3583 -0.0037
Bolivia Bolivian Boliviano 6.9100 - 7.8370 -0.0187 9.3862 -0.0253 ..One Month 115.1450 0.1799 130.5914 -0.1070 156.4066 -0.1768 Saudi Arabia Saudi Riyal 3.7523 -0.0001 4.2557 -0.0103 5.0969 -0.0139 ..One Month - - 1.1341 -0.2279 1.3583 -0.0037
Brazil Brazilian Real 5.1256 -0.0413 5.8131 -0.0608 6.9623 -0.0750 ..Three Month 115.1448 0.1796 130.5915 -0.1069 156.4063 -0.1774 Singapore Singapore Dollar 1.3452 0.0022 1.5257 -0.0011 1.8272 -0.0019 ..Three Month - - 1.1338 -0.2279 1.3583 -0.0037
Canada Canadian Dollar 1.2738 0.0040 1.4446 0.0012 1.7302 0.0009 ..One Year 115.1434 0.1768 130.5917 -0.1065 156.4066 -0.1793 South Africa South African Rand 15.1250 0.1763 17.1540 0.1594 20.5450 0.1846 ..One Year - - 1.1322 -0.2279 1.3580 -0.0036
Chile Chilean Peso 794.0500 -3.2000 900.5694 -5.7879 1078.5939 -7.2672 Kenya Kenyan Shilling 113.7000 0.1000 128.9525 -0.1942 154.4438 -0.2803 South Korea South Korean Won 1195.8500 -1.3000 1356.2697 -4.7158 1624.3771 -6.1511 Vietnam Vietnamese Dong 22830.0000 40.0000 25892.5820 -16.3687 31011.0213 -29.1664
China Chinese Yuan 6.3264 -0.0106 7.1751 -0.0291 8.5934 -0.0375 Kuwait Kuwaiti Dinar 0.3025 0.0001 0.3431 -0.0007 0.4109 -0.0010 Sweden Swedish Krona 9.3623 0.0251 10.6182 0.0032 12.7172 -0.0001 European Union Euro 0.8817 0.0021 - - 1.1977 -0.0004
Colombia Colombian Peso 3920.3050 -30.6950 4446.2032 -45.5101 5325.1284 -56.1659 Malaysia Malaysian Ringgit 4.1860 -0.0015 4.7475 -0.0130 5.6860 -0.0174 Switzerland Swiss Franc 0.9207 0.0006 1.0442 -0.0018 1.2506 -0.0026 ..One Month 0.8816 0.0021 - - 1.1976 -0.0004
Costa Rica Costa Rican Colon 639.7850 -0.1000 725.6102 -1.8460 869.0488 -2.4798 Mexico Mexican Peso 20.3095 0.0065 23.0340 -0.0476 27.5873 -0.0655 Taiwan New Taiwan Dollar 27.8735 0.0020 31.6126 -0.0732 37.8618 -0.0994 ..Three Month 0.8814 0.0021 - - 1.1974 -0.0004
Czech Republic Czech Koruna 21.4549 0.0078 24.3330 -0.0492 29.1431 -0.0679 New Zealand New Zealand Dollar 1.4933 0.0011 1.6936 -0.0028 2.0284 -0.0039 Thailand Thai Baht 32.1700 -0.0075 36.4855 -0.0956 43.6980 -0.1281 ..One Year 0.8798 0.0021 - - 1.1961 -0.0003
Denmark Danish Krone 6.5580 0.0155 7.4378 -0.0001 8.9081 -0.0029 Nigeria Nigerian Naira 416.0000 -0.5000 471.8051 -1.6948 565.0715 -2.2049 Tunisia Tunisian Dinar 2.8762 0.0038 3.2620 -0.0035 3.9069 -0.0054
Egypt Egyptian Pound 15.7284 0.0204 17.8383 -0.0194 21.3646 -0.0298 Norway Norwegian Krone 8.9882 0.0710 10.1939 0.0563 12.2090 0.0637 Turkey Turkish Lira 13.6465 0.0614 15.4771 0.0328 18.5367 0.0336
Hong Kong Hong Kong Dollar 7.7997 0.0001 8.8459 -0.0210 10.5946 -0.0284 Pakistan Pakistani Rupee 175.7000 0.3000 199.2696 -0.1347 238.6612 -0.2350 United Arab Emirates UAE Dirham 3.6731 - 4.1658 -0.0099 4.9893 -0.0135
Hungary Hungarian Forint 315.2405 1.0477 357.5290 0.3376 428.2054 0.2723 Peru Peruvian Nuevo Sol 3.7086 -0.0399 4.2060 -0.0555 5.0375 -0.0680 United Kingdom Pound Sterling 0.7362 0.0020 0.8349 0.0003 - -
India Indian Rupee 74.6525 -0.4550 84.6669 -0.7194 101.4039 -0.8932 Philippines Philippine Peso 51.3550 0.0150 58.2441 -0.1220 69.7578 -0.1677 ..One Month 0.7362 0.0020 0.8349 0.0003 - -
Rates are derived from WM Reuters Spot Rates and MorningStar (latest rates at time of production). Some values are rounded. Currency redenominated by 1000. The exchange rates printed in this table are also available at www.FT.com/marketsdata
UK SERIES
FTSE ACTUARIES SHARE INDICES www.ft.com/equities FT 30 INDEX FTSE SECTORS: LEADERS & LAGGARDS FTSE 100 SUMMARY
Produced in conjunction with the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries Jan 18 Jan 17 Jan 14 Jan 13 Jan 12 Yr Ago High Low Year to date percentage changes Closing Day's Closing Day's
£ Strlg Day's Euro £ Strlg £ Strlg Year Div P/E X/D Total FT 30 2858.70 2871.90 2832.90 2844.10 2840.90 0.00 2880.10 2808.10 Tobacco 21.84 Beverages 31.66 Beverages -8.96 FTSE 100 Price Change FTSE 100 Price Change
Feb 18 chge% Index Feb 17 Feb 16 ago yield% Cover ratio adj Return FT 30 Div Yield - - - - - 0.00 3.93 2.74 Mobile Telecomms 20.83 NON FINANCIALS Index -0.18 Household Goods & Ho -9.01 3I Group PLC 1313 -7.50 Itv PLC 116.95 -1.00
FTSE 100 (100) 7513.62 -0.32 7019.71 7537.37 7603.78 6617.15 3.19 1.95 16.08 12.97 7454.13 P/E Ratio net - - - - - 0.00 19.44 14.26 Oil Equipment & Serv 20.44 FTSE All{HY-}Share Index -0.30 FTSE 250 Index -9.02 Abrdn PLC 233.40 1.70 Jd Sports Fashion PLC 165.70 0.70
FTSE 250 (250) 21362.60 -0.90 19958.33 21557.59 21828.94 20933.87 2.14 2.90 16.11 43.07 17329.23 FT 30 hourly changes Oil & Gas 19.51 Consumer Goods -0.71 Equity Invest Instr -9.75 Admiral Group PLC 2963 -30.00 Kingfisher PLC 323.00 4.10
FTSE 250 ex Inv Co (181) 22140.95 -0.75 20685.52 22308.76 22631.84 21451.11 2.11 0.85 56.00 39.41 18305.23 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 High Low Oil & Gas Producers 19.50 Pharmace & Biotech -1.53 Industrial Transport -10.87 Airtel Africa PLC 153.90 2.50 Land Securities Group PLC 803.40 10.40
FTSE 350 (350) 4222.78 -0.41 3945.20 4240.22 4280.19 3785.69 3.02 2.06 16.09 7.48 8325.31 2871.9 2850.8 2849.7 2857 2858.6 2860.9 2862.8 2860.5 2860.4 2871.9 2843.1 Telecommunications 19.04 Financials -1.61 Industrials -10.91 Anglo American PLC 3526 3.00 Legal & General Group PLC 272.40 -0.20
FTSE 350 ex Investment Trusts (279) 4143.29 -0.34 3870.93 4157.49 4197.03 3680.68 3.07 1.75 18.62 7.21 4218.74 FT30 constituents and recent additions/deletions can be found at www.ft.com/ft30 Fixed Line Telecomms 14.69 Electricity -1.73 Automobiles & Parts -13.00 Antofagasta PLC 1404 31.00 Lloyds Banking Group PLC 51.22 -0.07
FTSE 350 Higher Yield (112) 3528.56 -0.10 3296.61 3532.26 3561.33 3014.64 4.22 1.59 14.91 9.44 7762.19 Banks 14.10 Health Care -1.91 Real Est Invest & Se -14.30 Ashtead Group PLC 4778 -141.00 London Stock Exchange Group PLC 6620 -134.00
FTSE 350 Lower Yield (238) 4559.73 -0.77 4259.99 4594.90 4644.57 4319.55 1.61 3.50 17.71 3.28 5500.83 FT WILSHIRE 5000 INDEX SERIES Mining 13.59 Personal Goods -2.23 General Retailers -14.58 Associated British Foods PLC 1907.5 8.50 M&G PLC 213.40 -
FTSE SmallCap (249) 7084.19 -0.49 6618.51 7119.03 7152.68 6501.72 2.70 4.36 8.48 27.77 11593.19 Basic Materials 8.64 Media -4.22 Support Services -15.42 Astrazeneca PLC 8801 -117.00 Meggitt PLC 745.00 -0.20
FTSE SmallCap ex Inv Co (130) 5977.26 -0.63 5584.35 6015.02 6046.45 5183.06 2.20 1.66 27.27 12.34 10170.59 Feb 17 Feb 17 FTSE 100 Index 1.75 Consumer Services -4.50 Industrial Metals & -16.30 Auto Trader Group PLC 633.00 -1.00 Melrose Industries PLC 154.45 -1.10
FTSE All-Share (599) 4195.45 -0.41 3919.66 4212.87 4251.96 3763.78 3.01 2.12 15.65 7.71 8353.98 Aerospace & Defense 1.71 FTSE SmallCap Index -5.03 Software & Comp Serv -16.42
FT Wilshire 5000 44804.84 FT Wilshire Mid Cap 5798.12 Avast PLC 623.00 4.40 Mondi PLC 1924 15.00
FTSE All-Share ex Inv Co (409) 4078.32 -0.35 3810.24 4092.50 4131.12 3621.00 3.06 1.75 18.72 7.12 4216.60 Travel & Leisure 1.31 Life Insurance -5.13 Technology -16.71
FT Wilshire 2500 5734.84 FT Wilshire Small Cap 5451.77 Aveva Group PLC 2519 -171.00 National Grid PLC 1089.6 11.00
FTSE All-Share ex Multinationals (530) 1267.76 -0.69 981.85 1276.58 1291.11 1225.28 2.71 2.75 13.42 2.06 2611.62 Gas Water & Multi 1.23 Food & Drug Retailer -5.80 Industrial Eng -16.73
FT Wilshire Mega Cap 5765.79 FT Wilshire Micro Cap 5537.94 Aviva PLC 432.20 -0.10 Natwest Group PLC 234.50 -5.80
FTSE Fledgling (82) 13085.48 0.28 12225.31 13049.20 13082.77 11344.95 2.30 6.65 6.54 35.28 27614.04 Food Producers 0.95 Real Est Invest & Tr -6.88 Tech Hardware & Eq -19.57
FT Wilshire Large Cap 5771.30 B&M European Value Retail S.A. 583.60 7.80 Next PLC 6850 -68.00
FTSE Fledgling ex Inv Co (34) 18029.39 1.09 16844.23 17834.20 17890.13 126.91 1.91 -2.90 -18.06 57.28 37013.22 Nonlife Insurance 0.93 Health Care Eq & Srv -7.17 Electronic & Elec Eq -21.65
Source: Wilshire. Wilshire Advisors LLC (Wilshire) is an investment advisor registered with the SEC. Further Bae Systems PLC 597.40 3.00 Ocado Group PLC 1300 -60.50
FTSE All-Small (331) 4938.22 -0.45 4613.61 4960.39 4983.25 4517.88 2.68 4.47 8.34 19.02 10365.65 Utilities 0.49 Construct & Material -8.14 Leisure Goods -21.70
information is available at https://www.wilshire.com/solutions/indexes . Wilshire® is a registered service Barclays PLC 191.16 -1.48 Pearson PLC 621.00 -2.20
FTSE All-Small ex Inv Co (164) 4497.18 -0.56 4201.56 4522.56 4545.83 116.73 2.19 1.51 30.26 9.48 9692.15 Financial Services -8.62 Chemicals -23.56
mark. Copyright ©2022 Wilshire. All rights reserved. Barratt Developments PLC 603.00 0.40 Pershing Square Holdings LTD 2660 -55.00
FTSE AIM All-Share (764) 1060.02 -1.14 990.34 1072.23 1079.17 1205.88 1.06 1.56 60.26 1.60 1230.09
Berkeley Group Holdings (The) PLC 3949 -27.00 Persimmon PLC 2414 6.00
FTSE All-Share Technology (22) 1967.95 -1.48 1842.02 1997.46 2018.09 2175.46 1.80 0.66 84.97 9.64 2805.70
BP PLC 391.40 -6.50 Phoenix Group Holdings PLC 647.00 -5.00
FTSE All-Share Telecommunications (7) 2189.34 0.08 2049.24 2187.60 2220.38 1878.63 4.09 0.30 81.58 0.00 3166.61 FTSE GLOBAL EQUITY INDEX SERIES British American Tobacco PLC 3409 -26.50 Polymetal International PLC 1169.5 -12.50
FTSE All-Share Health Care (13) 12940.15 -1.17 12112.09 13092.89 13087.29 11125.47 3.12 0.72 44.48 0.00 11661.39
Feb 17 No of US $ Day Mth YTD YTD Gr Div Feb 17
Total No of US $ Day Mth YTD Total YTD Gr Div British Land Company PLC 542.60 3.40 Prudential PLC 1159.5 -24.00
FTSE All-Share Financials (254) 4885.50 -0.53 4572.87 4911.76 4978.14 4610.42 2.72 4.48 8.20 6.44 5252.35
Regions & countries stocks indices % % % % Yield Sectors
retn stocks indices % % % retn % Yield Bt Group PLC 197.35 2.20 Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC 6273 121.00
FTSE All-Share Real Estate (53) 1142.46 -0.79 1118.67 1151.54 1161.34 986.27 2.60 2.11 18.17 1.86 1167.19
FTSE Global All Cap 9331 796.09 -1.5 -4.7 -6.0-5.9 1251.73
1.9 Oil Equipment & Services 25 266.45 -0.7 -0.7 13.9 478.34 14.7 4.2 Bunzl PLC 2736 -4.00 Relx PLC 2233 -8.00
FTSE All-Share Consumer Discretionary (90) 5222.37 -1.08 4888.19 5279.27 5350.95 5028.76 1.67 0.19 311.01 5.22 5416.21
FTSE Global All Cap 9332 808.02 0.4 -3.2 -4.6-4.5 1270.35
1.8 Basic Materials 368 680.66 -0.5 -0.5 1.2 1203.36 1.3 3.9 Burberry Group PLC 2033 39.00 Rentokil Initial PLC 490.90 -8.80
FTSE All-Share Consumer Staples (25)19911.90 0.70 18637.71 19773.75 19711.41 18062.31 3.76 1.60 16.63 24.13 17641.20
FTSE Global Large Cap 1799 714.06 -1.5 -4.9 -6.0-5.8 1157.06
1.9 Chemicals 172 911.23 -1.2 -1.2 -5.9 1568.84 -5.9 2.3 Coca-Cola Hbc AG 2425 -6.00 Rightmove PLC 614.20 -9.20
FTSE All-Share Industrials (88) 6614.64 -0.62 6191.36 6655.60 6706.82 6049.00 1.81 2.54 21.76 4.67 7495.55
FTSE Global Mid Cap 2282 1014.84 -1.4 -3.7 -5.4-5.3 1500.93
1.9 Forestry & Paper 22 313.39 -0.9 -0.9 2.7 615.09 3.1 2.9 Compass Group PLC 1748 -3.00 Rio Tinto PLC 5657 69.00
FTSE All-Share Basic Materials (24) 8931.33 0.34 8359.80 8900.78 9038.23 8146.65 5.25 2.22 8.60 3.70 11446.45
FTSE Global Small Cap 5250 1060.53 -1.8 -4.9 -7.3-7.2 1502.50
1.6 Industrial Metals & Mining 96 575.96 -1.9 -1.9 4.1 1050.95 4.4 6.0 Crh PLC 3608 -40.00 Rolls-Royce Holdings PLC 117.06 -0.96
FTSE All-Share Energy (13) 7088.34 -0.95 6634.74 7156.10 7321.15 4990.80 3.25 1.45 21.16 64.63 8376.60
FTSE All-World 4081 467.78 -1.4 -4.7 -5.9-5.7 778.77
1.9 Mining 78 1045.11 1.4 1.4 12.3 1920.04 12.3 5.1 Croda International PLC 7060 -194.00 Royal Mail PLC 419.10 -2.60
FTSE All-Share Utilities (10) 8739.11 0.80 8179.88 8669.70 8651.51 7007.59 4.13 1.62 15.00 32.24 12828.90
FTSE World 2656 841.26 -1.5 -5.0 -6.3-6.2 1879.87
1.9 Industrials 756 544.92 -1.3 -1.3 -9.3 853.48 -9.2 1.6 Dcc PLC 6184 -16.00 Sage Group PLC 668.60 -16.60
FTSE All-Share Software and Computer Services (20) 2114.03 -1.50 1978.75 2146.18 2168.04 2350.96 1.79 0.65 86.13 10.73 3189.07
FTSE Global All Cap ex UNITED KINGDOM In 9036 840.18 -1.5 -4.8 -6.3-6.2 1296.42
1.8 Construction & Materials 143 669.83 -0.7 -0.7 -9.4 1104.39 -9.4 2.0 Dechra Pharmaceuticals PLC 3784 -126.00 Sainsbury (J) PLC 277.90 -0.30
FTSE All-Share Technology Hardware and Equipment (2) 5651.87 -0.90 5290.20 5703.13 5784.63 4829.36 1.81 0.89 61.89 0.00 7185.39
FTSE Global All Cap ex USA 7514 586.37 -0.4 -2.8 -2.3-2.1 1012.95
2.6 Aerospace & Defense 35 846.18 -0.7 -0.7 5.4 1302.41 5.4 1.4 Diageo PLC 3658.5 42.50 Schroders PLC 3228 12.00
FTSE All-Share Telecommunications Equipment (2) 522.02 -2.32 488.62 534.44 535.99 607.83 1.89 2.46 21.57 0.00 731.61
FTSE Global All Cap ex JAPAN 7940 829.42 -1.6 -4.8 -6.2-6.1 1316.13
1.8 General Industrials 71 262.78 -1.6 -1.6 -5.3 455.32 -4.9 2.2 Electrocomponents PLC 1016 4.00 Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust PLC 1015 -44.00
FTSE All-Share Telecommunications Service Providers (5) 3420.94 0.15 3202.03 3415.86 3468.24 2904.45 4.15 0.27 88.47 0.00 4503.12
FTSE Global All Cap ex Eurozone 8667 839.80 -1.6 -4.7 -6.1-6.0 1292.71
1.8 Electronic & Electrical Equipment 143 696.80 -1.1 -1.1 -13.3 986.61 -13.3 1.3 Entain PLC 1650 -49.00 Segro PLC 1265.5 -12.00
FTSE All-Share Health Care Providers (3) 8522.51 -1.02 7977.14 8610.30 8756.82 6139.57 0.12 53.19 15.46 0.00 7867.95
FTSE Developed 2205 769.30 -1.6 -5.2 -6.8-6.6 1219.32
1.8 Industrial Engineering 149 1052.72 -1.7 -1.7 -9.0 1643.70 -8.9 1.7 Evraz PLC 283.20 -22.10 Severn Trent PLC 2851 22.00
FTSE All-Share Medical Equipment and Services (2) 5497.76 -0.93 5145.95 5549.22 5575.54 6657.74 2.31 1.30 33.24 0.00 5175.13
FTSE Developed All Cap 5827 802.34 -1.6 -5.2 -6.9-6.7 1253.15
1.8 Industrial Transportation 125 1063.95 -0.8 -0.8 -4.2 1679.01 -4.2 1.7 Experian PLC 2828 -63.00 Shell PLC 1957 -12.40
FTSE All-Share Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology (8)18419.47 -1.18 17240.78 18639.79 18623.12 15495.49 3.20 0.68 46.21 0.00 14941.08
FTSE Developed Large Cap 885 721.39 -1.6 -5.5 -6.9-6.8 1163.88
1.8 Support Services 90 582.77 -2.0 -2.0 -18.0 856.44 -17.9 1.2 Ferguson PLC 11175 70.00 Smith & Nephew PLC 1196 -12.50
FTSE All-Share Banks (11) 3434.11 0.38 3214.36 3421.23 3466.77 2637.20 2.32 3.74 11.50 0.20 2917.90
FTSE Developed Europe Large Cap 237 433.16 -0.6 -3.9 -3.6-3.5 833.51
2.6 Consumer Goods 544 652.40 -0.6 -0.6 -5.3 1076.08 -5.2 1.9 Flutter Entertainment PLC 10530 -485.00 Smith (Ds) PLC 367.60 1.20
FTSE All-Share Finance and Credit Services (7) 9529.71 -1.64 8919.89 9688.83 9890.80 12979.67 1.54 1.64 39.57 16.06 12584.48
FTSE Developed Europe Mid Cap 351 720.51 -0.9 -5.2 -6.6-6.5 1206.01
2.4 Automobiles & Parts 129 704.02 -2.4 -2.4 -8.9 1121.46 -8.9 1.1 Fresnillo PLC 685.80 -9.20 Smiths Group PLC 1514.5 3.00
FTSE All-Share Investment Banking and Brokerage Services (33) 9650.28 -0.32 9032.74 9681.04 9816.68 9760.41 4.10 2.77 8.81 13.39 12984.31
FTSE Dev Europe Small Cap 730 1013.44 -1.3 -6.3 -8.2-8.2 1630.19
2.1 Beverages 68 787.74 0.5 0.5 -2.3 1312.92 -2.2 2.1 Glaxosmithkline PLC 1567 -12.60 Smurfit Kappa Group PLC 4068 43.00
FTSE All-Share Closed End Investments (190)12855.50 -1.38 12032.86 13035.28 13126.28 13310.75 2.27 9.54 4.63 41.12 7882.42
FTSE North America Large Cap 255 953.03 -2.2 -6.4 -8.6-8.4 1413.88
1.4 Food Producers 133 769.53 0.2 0.2 -2.0 1299.22 -1.9 2.3 Glencore PLC 422.00 1.30 Spirax-Sarco Engineering PLC 11690 -190.00
FTSE All-Share Life Insurance (6) 7380.43 -1.03 6908.14 7457.07 7626.39 7558.19 3.66 2.23 12.28 0.00 8663.26
FTSE North America Mid Cap 411 1223.22 -1.9 -4.1 -6.4-6.3 1674.34
1.5 Household Goods & Home Construction 61 612.70 0.7 0.7 -6.4 1010.14 -6.0 2.4 Halma PLC 2286 -29.00 Sse PLC 1612 6.50
FTSE All-Share Nonlife Insurance (7) 3691.13 -0.88 3454.93 3723.89 3807.84 3684.00 4.24 1.59 14.87 14.04 7598.97
FTSE North America Small Cap 1329 1217.67 -2.4 -4.9 -7.7-7.6 1601.78
1.3 Leisure Goods 48 298.71 -1.0 -1.0 -6.2 417.24 -6.2 1.2 Hargreaves Lansdown PLC 1277.5 -10.50 St. James's Place PLC 1516.5 0.50
FTSE All-Share Real Estate Investment and Services (13) 2696.68 -1.11 2524.11 2727.05 2760.79 2527.31 1.80 3.12 17.76 1.71 7912.29
FTSE North America 666 621.84 -2.2 -6.0 -8.2-8.1 942.76
1.5 Personal Goods 90 1048.20 -0.4 -0.4 -9.2 1587.46 -9.2 1.5 Hikma Pharmaceuticals PLC 1968.5 -21.00 Standard Chartered PLC 579.20 21.20
FTSE All-Share Real Estate Investment Trusts (40) 2874.38 -0.72 2690.44 2895.24 2917.51 2435.22 2.77 1.98 18.26 5.27 4222.15
FTSE Developed ex North America 1539 304.42 -0.4 -3.5 -3.5-3.4 566.62
2.6 Tobacco 15 1094.62 0.2 0.2 13.9 2966.75 14.1 5.5 HSBC Holdings PLC 544.40 4.30 Taylor Wimpey PLC 148.45 -0.30
FTSE All-Share Automobiles and Parts (2) 3172.30 -1.72 2969.30 3227.67 3296.62 5008.69 1.61 -7.62 -8.18 0.00 3276.29
FTSE Japan Large Cap 172 439.67 -0.4 -4.0 -3.6-3.5 630.66
2.2 Health Care 337 719.32 -1.1 -1.1 -8.9 1129.33 -8.8 1.7 Imperial Brands PLC 1779 25.50 Tesco PLC 294.20 0.50
FTSE All-Share Consumer Services (3) 2890.48 -0.32 2705.51 2899.72 2946.23 2400.17 0.80 1.68 74.34 22.86 3647.17
FTSE Japan Mid Cap 337 607.36 -0.2 -1.2 -1.1-1.0 827.28
2.4 Health Care Equipment & Services 128 1466.48 -1.7 -1.7 -11.8 1784.16 -11.8 0.9 Informa PLC 601.00 -8.00 Unilever PLC 3857.5 58.00
FTSE All-Share Household Goods and Home Construction (13)12440.04 -0.18 11643.99 12462.00 12677.13 13635.84 5.98 1.71 9.80 0.57 10401.92
FTSE Global wi JAPAN Small Cap 882 672.28 -0.3 -1.8 -3.4-3.3 949.21
2.5 Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology 209 464.19 -0.6 -0.6 -6.6 779.84 -6.4 2.4 Intercontinental Hotels Group PLC 4974 -106.00 United Utilities Group PLC 1061.5 11.00
FTSE All-Share Leisure Goods (2) 19880.39 -1.76 18608.21 20235.78 20554.31 25442.02 2.02 2.46 20.17 157.98 21431.35
FTSE Japan 509 180.27 -0.4 -3.5 -3.1-3.0 289.52
2.2 Consumer Services 446 651.89 -1.3 -1.3 -7.5 921.95 -7.4 0.9 Intermediate Capital Group PLC 1735 -38.50 Vodafone Group PLC 137.58 -0.38
FTSE All-Share Personal Goods (5) 30260.57 0.42 28324.15 30135.01 29991.38 26312.85 1.73 1.78 32.41 16.03 23289.25
FTSE Asia Pacific Large Cap ex Japan 960 834.15 0.4 -1.4 0.1 0.2 2.4 Food & Drug Retailers
1479.07 68 338.98 -0.5 -0.5 -1.5 528.64 -1.3 2.3 International Consolidated Airlines Group S.A. 161.52 -4.78 Whitbread PLC 3111 -32.00
FTSE All-Share Media (11) 9757.37 -0.74 9132.98 9830.23 9951.15 8168.06 1.76 1.32 43.08 0.40 6706.52
FTSE Asia Pacific Mid Cap ex Japan 901 1100.05 0.3 -2.4 -2.9-2.8 1878.94
2.8 General Retailers 152 1162.66 -1.2 -1.2 -9.1 1576.68 -9.0 0.7 Intertek Group PLC 5160 -34.00 Wpp PLC 1184 -8.50
FTSE All-Share Retailers (21) 2444.03 -0.22 2287.63 2449.53 2470.27 2379.45 1.56 4.07 15.80 0.00 3100.42
FTSE All-Share Travel and Leisure (33) 7520.80 -2.76 7039.53 7734.41 7872.45 8081.40 0.11 -92.48 -9.87 0.00 7729.05 FTSE Asia Pacific Small Cap ex Japan 2005 674.46 -0.1 -5.1 -7.3-7.3 2.2 Media
1121.25 83 416.01 -2.2 -2.2 -11.4 591.85 -11.3 0.9
FTSE All-Share Beverages (5) 28416.26 1.08 26597.86 28113.36 28068.38 23859.29 1.99 1.56 32.16 0.00 22318.18 FTSE Asia Pacific Ex Japan 1861 659.38 0.4 -1.5 -0.2-0.1 2.4 Travel & Leisure
1242.47 143 507.31 -1.3 -1.3 -1.1 733.60 -1.0 0.9
FTSE All-Share Food Producers (10) 6979.41 0.21 6532.79 6964.75 6981.30 7392.99 2.17 2.32 19.90 0.00 6631.28 FTSE Emerging All Cap 3504 895.03 -0.1 -0.6 1.6 1.7 2.6 Telecommunication
1511.68 88 151.48 -0.6 -0.6 2.2 345.51 2.7 4.1 UK STOCK MARKET TRADING DATA
FTSE All-Share Tobacco (2) 35684.90 -0.38 33401.36 35822.50 36037.48 27397.13 6.59 1.52 9.98 172.32 31905.67 FTSE Emerging Large Cap 914 842.41 -0.2 -0.4 2.4 2.5 2.5 Fixed Line Telecommuniations
1431.06 34 113.94 -0.6 -0.6 1.1 297.00 1.9 5.8 Feb 18 Feb 17 Feb 16 Feb 15 Feb 14 Yr Ago
FTSE All-Share Construction and Materials (15) 8272.53 -0.91 7743.16 8348.54 8474.98 7275.58 2.26 0.57 77.58 0.00 9779.73 FTSE Emerging Mid Cap 962 1171.08 0.1 0.3 1.9 2.1 3.2 Mobile Telecommunications
1988.24 54 182.72 -0.5 -0.5 2.8 360.06 3.1 3.2 Order Book Turnover (m) 67.84 82.52 99.63 108.48 64.33 64.33
FTSE All-Share Aerospace and Defense (9) 4492.81 0.03 4205.31 4491.67 4533.70 3485.07 2.11 7.20 6.59 2.10 5368.11 FTSE Emerging Small Cap 1628 926.73 -0.1 -3.3 -4.3-4.3 2.4 Utilities
1498.40 195 325.82 0.3 0.3 -5.1 742.59 -4.7 3.4 Order Book Bargains 788316.00 782973.00 953126.00 1058513.00 826531.00 826531.00
FTSE All-Share Electronic and Electrical Equipment (10)11638.74 -0.64 10893.96 11714.27 11890.86 11992.13 1.48 2.17 31.03 0.00 11334.65 FTSE Emerging Europe 87 399.16 -4.2 -1.3 -3.7-3.3 5.8 Electricity
804.29 140 361.22 0.2 0.2 -6.3 811.77 -6.0 3.4 Order Book Shares Traded (m) 1469.00 1657.00 1382.00 1634.00 1418.00 1418.00
FTSE All-Share General Industrials (9) 5603.47 0.30 5244.90 5586.44 5611.53 5269.33 2.31 1.21 35.72 0.00 7183.83 FTSE Latin America All Cap 258 785.49 -1.6 7.9 10.811.0 5.9 Gas Water & Multiutilities
1434.65 55 337.53 0.3 0.3 -2.1 793.72 -1.9 3.3 Total Equity Turnover (£m) 4881.11 6326.19 5425.12 5190.12 5423.90 5423.90
FTSE All-Share Industrial Engineering (5)16190.28 -1.31 15154.24 16405.93 16684.90 16930.73 1.18 2.51 33.70 0.00 21392.57 FTSE Middle East and Africa All Cap 333 866.02 0.0 2.9 8.7 8.8 2.5 Financials
1542.59 865 303.81 -1.4 -1.4 1.3 568.49 1.4 2.6 Total Mkt Bargains 1052330.00 1035341.00 1239388.00 1407661.00 1077762.00 1077762.00
FTSE All-Share Industrial Support Services (32)10646.45 -0.61 9965.17 10711.57 10760.87 9943.90 1.55 1.91 33.83 15.05 12031.76 FTSE Global wi UNITED KINGDOM All Cap In 295 364.47 -0.6 -1.9 1.3 1.5 3.1 Banks
721.48 268 241.99 -1.5 -1.5 6.9 500.73 7.2 3.1 Total Shares Traded (m) 6980.00 5881.00 7231.00 7716.00 6612.00 6612.00
FTSE All-Share Industrial Transportation (8) 5679.64 -2.31 5316.20 5814.03 5823.16 5047.05 1.52 3.16 20.82 8.24 5846.12 FTSE Global wi USA All Cap 1817 1066.36 -2.2 -6.0 -8.5-8.4 1.4 Nonlife Insurance
1525.28 72 359.53 -1.1 -1.1 2.6 584.11 2.7 2.8 † Excluding intra-market and overseas turnover. *UK only total at 6pm. ‡ UK plus intra-market turnover. (u) Unavaliable.
FTSE All-Share Industrial Materials (1)18753.50 -0.27 666.86 18803.51 18753.50 21504.01 1.70 2.64 22.33 0.00 23206.15 FTSE Europe All Cap 1488 511.23 -0.8 -4.3 -4.5-4.4 2.6 Life Insurance
944.94 53 257.32 -0.8 -0.8 6.5 478.33 6.7 3.3 (c) Market closed.
FTSE All-Share Industrial Metals and Mining (10) 7767.73 0.57 7270.66 7723.88 7859.24 6807.60 5.57 2.24 8.01 0.50 11148.54 FTSE Eurozone All Cap 664 495.54 -0.6 -4.6 -4.4-4.3 2.3 Financial Services
909.27 213 488.64 -1.9 -1.9 -2.1 731.36 -2.0 1.6
FTSE All-Share Precious Metals and Mining (6)17884.33 0.42 16739.88 17809.59 17560.04 22663.68 4.93 1.51 13.49 63.66 12229.22 FTSE EDHEC-Risk Efficient All-World 4081 523.08 -1.2 -3.8 -4.2-4.0 2.2 Technology
806.36 348 595.32 -2.7 -2.7 -12.3 770.64 -12.2 0.8
FTSE All-Share Chemicals (7) 14065.23 -1.80 13165.17 14322.38 14515.69 16080.03 2.34 2.56 16.68 32.45 13803.47 FTSE EDHEC-Risk Efficient Developed Europe 588 390.72 -0.7 -4.8 -5.4-5.4 2.5 Software & Computer Services
667.98 189 905.93 -3.3 -3.3 -15.3 1090.77 -15.2 0.5 All data provided by Morningstar unless otherwise noted. All elements listed are indicative and believed
FTSE All-Share Oil. Gas and Coal (13) 6879.16 -0.95 6438.95 6944.92 7105.10 4843.52 3.25 1.45 21.16 62.72 8430.85 Oil & Gas 134 375.99 -0.6 3.0 14.715.4 3.8 Technology Hardware & Equipment
740.67 159 523.37 -2.1 -2.1 -8.7 726.24 -8.6 1.1 accurate at the time of publication. No offer is made by Morningstar or the FT. The FT does not warrant nor
Oil & Gas Producers 93 370.57 -0.5 3.5 16.617.4 3.9 Alternative Energy
747.42 16 181.83 -1.1 -1.1 -12.8 259.85 -12.8 0.6 guarantee that the information is reliable or complete. The FT does not accept responsibility and will not be
FTSE Sector Indices Real Estate Investment & Services 158 331.53 -0.9 -0.9 0.8 628.36 0.8 2.9
Non Financials (345) 5062.49 -0.38 4729.71 5081.68 5122.41 92.62 3.09 1.51 21.45 10.09 8874.14 liable for any loss arising from the reliance on or use of the listed information.
Real Estate Investment Trusts 101 527.96 -0.6 -0.6 -11.5 1201.59 -11.3 3.1
For all queries e-mail ft.reader.enquiries@morningstar.com
FTSE Global Large Cap 1799 724.58 0.3 0.3 -4.6 1173.97 -4.4 1.9
Hourly movements 8.00 9.00 10.00 11.00 12.00 13.00 14.00 15.00 16.00 High/day Low/day The FTSE Global Equity Series, launched in 2003, contains the FTSE Global Small Cap Indices and broader FTSE Global All Cap Indices (large/mid/small cap) as well as the enhanced FTSE All-World index Series (large/
FTSE 100 7556.68 7555.62 7555.20 7551.93 7562.59 7565.19 7539.24 7548.33 7526.92 7570.50 7509.71 mid cap) - please see https://research.ftserussell.com/Products/indices/Home/indexfiltergeis?indexName=GEISAC&currency=USD&rtn=CAP&segment=global-developed–emerging. The trade names Fundamental Index® Data provided by Morningstar | www.morningstar.co.uk
FTSE 250 21591.97 21548.36 21569.13 21563.31 21564.90 21561.19 21438.94 21485.78 21403.07 21592.39 21352.35 and RAFI® are registered trademarks and the patented and patent-pending proprietary intellectual property of Research Affiliates, LLC (US Patent Nos. 7,620,577; 7,747,502; 7,778,905; 7,792,719; Patent Pending Publ.
FTSE SmallCap 7113.01 7104.07 7100.10 7098.84 7102.20 7103.69 7086.92 7095.50 7078.17 7115.24 7071.99 Nos. US-2006-0149645-A1, US-2007-0055598-A1, US-2008-0288416-A1, US-2010- 0063942-A1, WO 2005/076812, WO 2007/078399 A2, WO 2008/118372, EPN 1733352, and HK1099110). ”EDHEC™” is a trade mark
FTSE All-Share 4222.57 4220.58 4220.96 4219.27 4224.21 4225.30 4209.46 4215.18 4202.61 4228.11 4193.32 of EDHEC Business School As of January 2nd 2006, FTSE is basing its sector indices on the Industrial Classification Benchmark - please see www.ftse.com/icb. For constituent changes and other information about FTSE,
Time of FTSE 100 Day's high:12:48:45 Day's Low16:11:15 FTSE 100 2010/11 High: 7672.40(10/02/2022) Low: 7297.15(24/01/2022) please see www.ftse.com. © FTSE International Limited. 2013. All Rights reserved. ”FTSE®” is a trade mark of the London Stock Exchange Group companies and is used by FTSE International Limited under licence.
Time of FTSE All-Share Day's high:12:42:00 Day's Low16:11:00 FTSE 100 2010/11 High: 4296.96(10/02/2022) Low: 4099.16(24/01/2022)
Further information is available on http://www.ftse.com © FTSE International Limited. 2013. All Rights reserved. ”FTSE®” is a trade mark of the
London Stock Exchange Group companies and is used by FTSE International Limited under licence. † Sector P/E ratios greater than 80 are not shown.
For changes to FTSE Fledgling Index constituents please refer to www.ftse.com/indexchanges. ‡ Values are negative.

UK RIGHTS OFFERS UK COMPANY RESULTS UK RECENT EQUITY ISSUES

Amount Latest Company Turnover Pre-tax EPS(p) Div(p) Pay day Total Issue Issue Stock Close Mkt
Issue paid renun. closing AssetCo Pre 0.408 0.000 16.129 3.361 180.570 27.520 0.00000 0.00000 - 0.000 0.000 date price(p) Sector code Stock price(p) +/- High Low Cap (£m)
price up date High Low Stock Price p +or- City of London Investment Group Int 31.445 23.734 13.575 8.817 21.500 17.700 11.00000 11.00000 Mar 25 33.000 30.890 02/16 45.00 AIM CPH2 Clean Power Hydrogen PLC 61.00 -2.51 69.00 45.00 16190.6
There are currently no rights offers by any companies listed on the LSE. City of London Investment Trust (The) Int 117.933 95.479 26.340 22.810 4.80000 4.75000 Nov 30 9.600 9.474 02/16 185.00 AIM STG Strip Tinning Holdings PLC 185.00 -2.30 200.00 170.00 2800.4
NatWest Group Pre 10512.000 10508.000 4032.000 481.000L 25.400 6.200L 7.50000 3.00000 May 4 10.500 3.000 02/09 76.00 AIM IX/ i(x) Net Zero PLC 77.00 0.00 78.00 76.00 6087.4
Pod Point Group Holdings Pre 61.415 - 14.322L - 13.000L - 0.00000 - - 0.000 - 02/07 3.75 AIM ARV Artemis Resources Ltd 4.00 0.14 5.00 3.50 5553.3
Segro Pre 546.000 432.000 4355.000 1464.000 339.000 124.100 16.90000 15.20000 May 4 24.300 22.100 02/04 50.50 AIM HERC Hercules Site Services PLC 50.00 1.70 55.00 48.04 2932.5
TBC Bank Group Pre 1481.503 1173.589 921.360 319.106 0.00000 0.00000 - 151.600 0.000 02/02 1000.00 HMA1 HIRO Metaverse Acquisitions I SA 1002.00 0.00 1010.00 996.00 11868.7
01/17 8.00 GENF Genflow Biosciences PLC 12.50 -1.00 13.50 11.50 3656.3
01/11 3.00 ELEG Electric Guitar PLC 3.35 0.00 3.50 3.22 193.8

Figures in £m. Earnings shown basic. Figures in light text are for corresponding period year earlier. §Placing price. *Intoduction. ‡When issued. Annual report/prospectus available at www.ft.com/ir
For more information on dividend payments visit www.ft.com/marketsdata For a full explanation of all the other symbols please refer to London Share Service notes.
16 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

MARKET DATA

FT500: THE WORLD'S LARGEST COMPANIES

52 Week 52 Week 52 Week 52 Week 52 Week 52 Week
Stock Price Day Chg High Low Yld P/E MCap m Stock Price Day Chg High Low Yld P/E MCap m Stock Price Day Chg High Low Yld P/E MCap m Stock Price Day Chg High Low Yld P/E MCap m Stock Price Day Chg High Low Yld P/E MCap m Stock Price Day Chg High Low Yld P/E MCap m
Australia (A$) Finland (€) CntJpRwy 16350 - 18455 14660 0.83 -23.36 29250.95 Nordea Bk 109.32 1.62 114.64 74.29 7.90 11.50 45898.86 BlackRock 753.59 -8.92 973.16 670.28 2.14 19.89 114482.51 MondelezInt 65.81 -0.25 69.47 52.91 1.98 20.80 91803.12
ANZ 28.15 -0.07 29.64 25.64 3.78 13.52 56812.78 Nokia 5.03 -0.07 5.71 3.20 - -15.75 32222.01 Denso 8516 -7.00 9575 6388 1.71 20.54 58275.56 SEB 118.45 -0.75 141.85 95.56 3.73 9.84 27454.67 Boeing 209.17 -4.41 278.57 183.77 - -13.95 121946.06 Monsanto 9.77 -0.01 10.00 9.51 - - 244.25
BHPBilltn 47.96 -0.01 54.55 35.56 4.47 15.70 174249.67 SampoA 43.36 -0.26 47.33 35.80 4.04 32.40 27251.31 EastJpRwy 7269 -9.00 8626 6442 1.43 -5.75 23858.53 SvnskaHn 95.26 -0.32 108.15 86.00 4.64 9.37 19787.82 Booking Holdings 2592.8 -31.15 2715.66 2053.58 - 279.14 106469.4 MorganStly 94.83 -1.32 109.73 74.17 1.86 11.97 170164.09
CmwBkAu 97.75 -1.06 110.19 81.56 2.61 20.19 119712.19 France (€) Fanuc 21460-1320.00 28790 21150 2.19 27.39 37630.6 Swedbank 166.20 -1.34 196.70 144.14 4.70 8.54 20095.42 BrisMySq 67.37 -0.02 69.75 53.22 2.93 -28.10 146847.25 Netflix 389.66 2.99 700.99 351.46 - 34.88 172994.66
CSL 265.57 -11.43 319.78 240.10 1.08 37.21 91813.01 Airbus Grpe 115.00 -1.32 121.00 89.58 - 20.96 102526.45 FastRetail 64340 640.00 110500 61860 0.78 32.75 59271.17 Telia Co 37.21 -0.20 39.97 33.75 5.51 -10.15 16251.87 CapOne 153.97 -0.39 177.95 115.31 0.98 5.69 65533.03 NextEraE 74.18 -1.20 93.47 68.33 2.04 61.88 145551.33
NatAusBk 30.58 -0.27 30.98 24.41 2.98 16.03 71108.77 AirLiquide 150.74 0.42 157.40 124.25 1.88 26.80 81261.68 Fuji Hvy Ind 1968.5 9.00 2413 1937 2.96 14.88 13149.71 Volvo 205.45 -3.90 240.80 182.00 3.15 11.40 34857.88 CardinalHlth 54.28 -0.23 62.96 45.85 3.63 13.89 15038.89 Nike 142.52 -0.28 179.10 125.44 0.81 36.43 225366.2
Telstra 3.91 0.01 4.20 3.04 2.63 24.37 32968.33 AXA 26.92 -0.27 29.09 19.42 5.46 11.29 73942.63 Hitachi 6123 -27.00 7460 4755 1.95 9.94 51487.27 Switzerland (SFr) Carnival 22.05 -0.37 31.52 16.32 - -2.69 21749.32 NorfolkS 271.72 -1.51 298.75 238.62 1.49 23.21 65152.33
Wesfarmers 50.41 -0.40 67.20 49.01 3.37 23.32 41021.49 BNP Parib 61.92 -0.10 68.07 46.84 4.42 9.01 86682.64 HondaMtr 3687 6.00 3724 2911.5 4.37 6.91 58002.84 ABB 31.69 -0.31 35.30 25.79 2.49 33.83 70672.09 Caterpillar 192.44 -2.30 246.69 186.98 2.20 20.43 103126.3 Northrop 392.72 -5.39 408.75 291.60 1.55 13.66 61304.35
Westpc 23.53 0.04 27.12 20.00 3.84 16.84 59125.22 ChristianDior 652.50 -0.50 733.50 453.80 0.95 29.44 133581.13 JapanTob 2344 -6.00 2417 1898 6.30 10.23 40713.88 CredSuisse 8.29 -0.08 13.50 8.16 2.87 277.81 23857.15 CharlesSch 85.67 -0.35 96.24 60.64 0.85 32.21 155174.61 NXP 186.03 -1.58 239.91 164.19 1.12 32.57 49471.56
Woolworths 34.01 -0.46 42.66 32.46 3.05 27.09 29583.08 Cred Agr 13.06 -0.09 14.27 10.96 6.30 9.31 46104.02 KDDI 3779 -1.00 3899 3200 3.30 12.89 75622 Nestle 118.20 0.82 128.90 95.00 2.28 27.68 361410.95 Charter Comms 595.89 -1.94 825.62 549.59 - 27.10 106837.76 Occid Pet 39.26 -0.60 43.16 21.62 0.10 -52.66 36668.09
Belgium (€) Danone 55.88 0.44 65.30 51.42 7.43 17.70 43582.65 Keyence 53970 -910.00 76210 47150 0.39 49.42 113994.69 Novartis 79.83 -0.15 86.92 73.01 3.85 19.88 211089.81 Chevron Corp 132.57 -1.04 139.44 92.86 4.00 25.40 255553.32 Oracle 74.94 -0.59 106.34 61.08 1.64 21.16 200123.3
AnBshInBv 55.82 -0.05 65.86 46.66 0.94 22.59 109977.66 EDF 8.14 -0.20 13.25 7.90 2.65 4.98 29899.33 MitsbCp 4090 -30.00 4122 2869 3.51 13.05 52773.53 Richemont 129.35 -1.05 146.10 85.94 1.53 28.93 73340.25 Chubb 203.84 0.21 211.78 155.08 1.56 10.29 87800.15 Pepsico 167.07 0.32 177.24 128.32 2.53 28.25 230999.83
KBC Grp 74.42 -0.48 86.50 56.68 0.61 12.35 35186.31 Engie SA 14.48 0.08 14.61 10.98 3.76 70.42 39993.35 MitsubEst 1807.5 18.00 2047.5 1546 1.67 16.62 21842.88 Roche 342.55 -2.45 384.20 293.05 2.60 21.52 261405.37 Cigna 228.94 1.83 272.81 191.74 1.32 9.62 75877.07 Perrigo 37.32 -0.47 50.90 35.34 2.55 -11.91 4992.44
EssilorLuxottica 166.98 0.74 195.00 128.95 1.37 53.07 83790.23 MitsubishiEle 1446 0.50 1817 1337.5 2.88 11.94 26964.73 Swiss Re 97.80 -0.32 102.20 77.26 6.01 24.84 33727.51 Cisco 56.61 0.84 64.29 44.15 2.57 21.23 238737.62 Pfizer♦ 48.57 -0.34 61.71 33.36 3.22 14.01 272588.87
Brazil (R$)
Hermes Intl 1203 -52.00 1678 872.80 0.39 55.19 144036.66 MitsuiFud 2602 17.00 2816.5 2211 1.76 11.66 21817.57 Swisscom 549.00 3.80 562.40 456.30 3.98 15.09 30890.42 Citigroup♦ 63.84 -0.87 80.29 57.59 3.22 6.00 129389.97 Phillips66 84.94 -1.19 94.34 63.19 4.27 -73.31 37210.05
Ambev 14.81 -0.04 19.86 13.35 3.14 15.64 45492.81
LOreal 360.75 4.15 433.65 302.20 1.14 48.06 219060.49 MitUFJFin 726.30 -12.50 770.30 547.20 3.72 7.78 83778.84 UBS 18.65 -0.09 19.90 13.23 3.66 9.49 75001.57 CME Grp 236.68 -2.17 256.94 185.79 1.51 34.65 85061.89 PhilMorris 111.77 -0.13 112.48 83.98 4.37 19.33 173224.26
Bradesco 17.87 0.04 24.57 16.06 2.89 11.72 16981.08
LVMH 686.30 2.20 741.60 518.70 0.90 35.56 392885.45 Mizuho Fin 1593.5 -17.00 1732.5 1397 5.06 6.06 35140.86 Zurich Fin 433.80 -1.00 454.00 352.80 4.59 14.84 70895.15 Coca-Cola 62.28 0.16 62.59 48.97 2.70 30.46 269027.31 PNCFin 201.87 0.57 224.52 164.46 2.35 15.32 85318.5
Cielo 2.87 0.35 4.45 2.01 3.85 8.84 1521.25
Orange 11.01 0.08 11.16 8.93 6.54 32.46 33222.06 Murata Mfg 7981 -135.00 10535 7861 1.56 16.10 46840.82 Cognizant 85.98 0.06 92.44 66.19 1.10 24.04 45099.5 PPG Inds♦ 149.13 0.08 182.97 132.10 1.49 24.88 35403.59
ItauHldFin 22.54 0.11 30.15 18.91 3.82 8.01 21804.48 Taiwan (NT$)
PernodRic 197.10 3.90 214.50 156.10 2.08 38.42 58539.98 Nippon T&T 3296 8.00 3391 2663 3.31 10.97 103679.32 ColgtPlm 79.15 - 85.18 74.01 2.27 25.02 66711.47 ProctGmbl 160.19 0.37 165.35 121.54 2.13 28.17 387639.34
Petrobras 35.60 -0.50 37.80 20.60 6.66 3.50 51692.31 Chunghwa Telecom 122.00 0.50 123.00 108.50 3.56 26.60 33953.72
Renault 36.33 -0.02 41.42 27.48 - -26.97 12183.13 NipponTT 3296 8.00 3391 2663 3.31 10.97 103679.32 Comcast 46.50 -0.27 61.80 45.47 2.12 14.84 210356.05 Prudntl 113.83 -0.42 124.22 81.11 4.03 6.15 43027.74
Vale 85.83 0.18 120.45 61.85 16.39 4.75 85945.68 Formosa PetChem 98.50 -0.30 117.50 90.30 0.60 17.90 33663.03
Safran 113.44 -0.92 127.74 96.17 0.39 35.25 54968 Nissan Mt 615.00 6.50 654.30 501.00 - 46.40 22543.22 ConocPhil 88.85 -2.31 94.93 47.51 1.95 26.17 117188.43 PublStor 345.20 -0.86 376.56 229.14 2.33 40.94 60532.39
Canada (C$) HonHaiPrc 105.50 0.50 134.50 96.50 3.82 10.40 52470.87
Sanofi 93.03 -0.60 95.16 74.92 3.54 19.66 133317.9 Nomura 544.00 -1.30 721.00 471.00 4.40-235.64 15276.9 Corning 41.42 0.06 46.82 34.25 2.29 40.71 35035.09 Qualcomm 164.89 -1.91 192.68 122.17 1.63 20.80 185514.69
Bausch Hlth 30.73 -0.65 43.97 28.47 - -7.32 8646.51 MediaTek 1120 5.00 1200 821.00 3.33 18.34 64245.57
Sant Gbn 61.85 0.04 64.93 41.91 2.21 14.71 36758.26 Nppn Stl 2041 27.00 2381 1501 4.08 3.95 16844.9 Costco 512.72 -2.29 571.49 307.00 0.61 42.94 227357.15 Raytheon 93.14 -1.23 96.96 71.99 2.04 56.05 139402.4
BCE 66.79 0.02 68.17 54.42 5.24 21.62 47664.39 TaiwanSem 637.00 -2.00 662.00 518.00 1.62 28.97 592593.47
Schneider 144.84 -1.56 173.78 121.40 1.85 27.08 93475.03 Panasonic 1233 5.50 1541 1163.5 2.11 10.28 26276.59 CrownCstl 162.78 -0.59 209.49 146.15 3.29 53.33 70354.04 Regen Pharm 622.93 -3.79 686.62 441.00 - 9.90 65855.99
BkMontrl♦ 146.81 -0.14 152.87 98.61 2.94 12.45 74725.01 Seven & I 5698 -11.00 6083 4035 1.81 21.66 43865.96 Thailand (THB) CSX 34.78 -0.33 37.76 29.05 1.06 21.71 76275.12 S&P Global 376.92 -4.57 484.21 322.37 0.80 32.25 90837.72
SocGen 32.37 -0.62 37.68 18.84 1.75 7.18 30732.79
BkNvaS 92.02 - 95.00 70.57 3.98 11.74 87009.51 ShnEtsuCh 18025 -220.00 21480 16965 1.67 19.26 65225.12 PTT Explor 39.50 -0.50 42.50 34.00 4.90 12.57 35071.07 CVS 101.63 -0.67 111.25 68.02 1.98 17.61 133390.3 Salesforce 197.49 -2.54 311.75 196.57 - 81.51 194527.65
Total 50.66 0.01 52.50 33.91 5.50 14.05 149946.28
Brookfield 68.30 -1.03 79.04 51.17 0.96 24.99 87965.31 Softbank 5184 67.00 10695 4584 0.88 2.91 77569.94 United Arab Emirates (Dhs) Danaher 266.11 -3.16 333.96 211.22 0.31 34.00 190156.05 Schlmbrg 39.73 -1.38 42.64 24.52 1.27 33.71 55726.59
UnibailR 71.26 -0.58 85.65 53.86 - -2.34 11201.11
CanadPcR 92.66 -0.58 100.00 82.12 0.83 19.70 67628.57 Sony 12075 -85.00 14745 9989 0.46 12.45 132246.85 Emirtestele 33.36 -0.12 36.90 19.76 2.42 30.95 78987.14 Deere 369.29 -11.24 400.34 298.54 0.97 19.62 113813.92 Sempra Energy 135.18 -0.21 144.93 114.66 3.24 38.12 43166.8
Vinci 100.98 -1.20 103.74 82.94 2.08 25.05 67900.38
CanImp 160.66 -0.12 167.50 113.20 3.70 11.33 56854.26 SumitomoF 4266 -55.00 4461 3641 4.87 10.09 50918.66 Delta 42.83 -0.49 52.28 33.40 - -354.24 27404.99 Shrwin-Will 268.45 1.23 354.15 218.06 0.79 36.45 70386.57
Vivendi 11.45 -0.07 12.09 5.57 5.39 10.61 14395.75 United Kingdom (p)
CanNatRs 66.74 -1.75 69.48 34.23 2.78 13.31 61164.73 Takeda Ph 3536 -7.00 4365 2993 5.29 11.33 48589.57 Devon Energy 53.85 -1.40 56.42 19.61 2.32 30.54 35767.17 SimonProp 140.62 -3.05 171.12 104.12 4.87 22.70 46209.3
Germany (€) AscBrFd 1907.5 8.50 2528 1719 0.33 31.53 20512.62
CanNatRy 160.02 -0.31 168.66 125.00 1.53 23.83 88121.22 TokioMarine 7038 -23.00 7196 4907 2.90 21.55 42633.24 DiscFinServ♦ 123.74 0.66 135.69 88.66 1.48 7.33 36265.19 SouthCpr 66.86 -0.41 83.29 54.92 4.07 16.27 51688.21
Allianz 214.10 -8.40 232.50 182.52 4.61 10.01 99182.09 AstraZen 8801 -117.00 9523 6499.8 2.36 106.91 151401.35
Enbridge♦ 52.59 -0.16 55.60 42.98 6.38 18.28 83655.77 Toyota 2184 23.50 2375.5 1557.2 2.43 9.40 309452.73 Disney 150.41 -2.54 203.02 129.26 - 246.72 273841.47 Starbucks♦ 92.75 -0.30 126.32 92.42 1.96 26.01 106690.33
BASF 67.26 -0.59 72.88 57.06 5.05 11.17 70064.05 Aviva 432.20 -0.10 448.80 360.48 6.25 14.41 23560.81
GtWesLif 39.02 -0.26 41.50 31.08 4.55 10.93 28512.03 DominRes 79.29 0.15 81.67 67.85 3.20 24.83 64104.96 StateSt 93.09 -0.56 103.76 71.37 2.31 13.61 34036.42
Bayer 54.00 -0.08 57.73 43.91 3.81 -6.82 60167.51 Mexico (Mex$) Barclays 191.16 -1.48 217.63 111.83 1.57 5.23 44307.94
ImpOil 55.48 -0.60 57.72 25.99 1.79 73.03 29534.74 DukeEner♦ 99.26 0.53 108.38 85.56 3.94 25.53 76364.45 Stryker 248.27 -3.31 281.16 227.84 1.02 49.59 93733.02
BMW 95.38 -0.59 97.60 68.87 2.05 5.17 65120.79 AmerMvl 18.60 -0.15 21.89 13.25 2.05 12.14 39774.18 BP 391.40 -6.50 419.15 263.90 3.97 16.26 105962.53
Manulife 26.89 -0.09 28.09 22.76 4.22 7.81 41012.26 DuPont 79.26 -0.47 86.28 66.37 1.53 29.36 40653.05 Sychrony Fin 43.40 -0.26 52.49 36.45 2.04 6.09 22623.2
Continental 87.51 -2.72 132.68 82.36 - 17.78 19850.43 FEMSA UBD 157.25 -0.52 180.66 141.15 2.27 818.98 16733.31 BrAmTob 3409 -26.50 3456.5 2478 6.21 12.64 86335.2
Nutrien 96.13 -1.90 99.96 66.05 2.44 18.87 41606.05 Eaton 151.81 -0.59 175.72 124.11 2.00 29.26 60510.55 T-MobileUS 122.88 -1.67 150.20 101.51 - 45.86 153512.75
Daimler 70.16 0.23 76.80 48.69 1.99 6.29 84434.57 WalMrtMex 72.65 -0.60 79.99 58.72 0.83 30.37 62461.88 BT 197.35 2.20 206.70 122.65 - 19.16 26597.54
RylBkC♦ 141.03 -0.43 148.26 106.82 3.12 12.52 157349.74 eBay 54.38 -1.38 81.19 51.51 1.30 18.87 35350.03 Target♦ 204.43 0.43 268.98 166.83 1.43 15.17 97947.3
Deut Bank 13.56 -0.13 14.64 9.19 - 15.49 31794.35 Netherlands (€) Compass♦ 1748 -3.00 1823 1391.5 - 87.40 39048.93
SHOP 860.00 22.91 2228.73 815.28 - 24.97 76965.66 Ecolab 177.64 -0.74 238.93 177.01 1.09 44.98 50905.82 TE Connect♦ 143.08 -1.22 166.44 123.31 1.38 20.98 46688.91
Deut Tlkm 17.08 -0.16 18.92 14.60 3.62 14.55 96571.2 ASML Hld 570.40 -7.80 777.50 422.25 0.50 41.98 262955.4 Diageo 3658.5 42.50 4364.1 2805.28 1.93 32.26 125104.57
Suncor En 37.06 -0.62 38.53 21.90 2.30 22.87 41789.4 Emerson 92.58 -0.61 105.99 83.65 2.20 24.06 55075.84 Tesla Mtrs 846.47 -29.88 1243.49 539.49 - 272.81 850082.38
DeutsPost 49.15 -0.81 61.38 40.68 2.83 12.37 69069.29 Heineken 98.30 -0.16 103.80 80.84 0.73 48.78 64216.6 GlaxoSmh 1567 -12.60 1696.9 1190.8 5.11 18.40 104677.89
ThmReut 127.54 -0.42 156.62 101.02 1.60 7.66 48672.25 EOG Res 111.00 -1.60 116.89 60.46 1.43 21.27 64944.99 TexasInstr 164.39 -0.26 202.26 161.04 2.50 20.95 151821.9
E.ON 12.13 -0.01 12.54 8.27 3.99 7.80 36325.19 ING 12.61 -0.12 14.00 8.57 0.98 12.28 55834.34 Glencore 422.00 1.30 442.35 263.50 1.03 36.44 82685.79
TntoDom 106.50 -0.09 109.08 75.02 3.02 13.55 152563.4 EquityResTP 84.89 -0.04 92.54 65.37 2.86 30.84 31835.13 TheTrvelers 170.68 0.09 174.55 144.44 2.04 11.87 41988.76
Fresenius Med 59.36 0.16 71.14 52.06 2.32 18.36 19725.92 Unilever 46.28 0.86 51.05 43.00 2.35 26.17 160993.13 HSBC 544.40 4.30 567.20 329.55 2.98 13.11 148267.32
TrnCan 66.71 0.11 68.20 53.20 5.19 34.48 51364.34 Exelon 41.50 -0.26 44.02 27.36 3.71 24.09 40575.17 ThrmoFshr 536.99 -3.56 668.94 433.52 0.19 24.75 211597.91
Fresenius SE 37.08 - 47.60 32.91 2.44 11.66 19016.52 Imperial Brands♦ 1779 25.50 1822 1330 7.76 5.95 23047.02
China (HK$) Norway (Kr) ExxonMb 77.05 -1.18 83.08 51.86 4.55 -55.02 326196.32 TJX Cos♦ 65.43 0.26 76.94 61.15 1.18 30.15 78050.03
HenkelKgaA 71.50 0.20 86.50 65.25 2.63 19.21 21067.24 LlydsBkg 51.22 -0.07 54.50 36.91 1.11 7.88 50142.12
AgricBkCh 3.07 -0.01 3.30 2.54 7.40 3.95 12099.11 DNB 209.00 0.20 220.50 166.25 4.17 13.35 36050.39 Facebook 205.93 -1.78 384.33 205.51 - 14.62 475508.85 Truist Financial Corp 62.31 -0.25 66.10 51.87 2.96 14.59 83170.42
Linde 265.35 0.15 306.00 201.80 1.39 44.00 154251.23 Natl Grid 1089.6 11.00 1105.6 805.40 4.51 25.40 49678.99
Bk China 3.15 0.02 3.20 2.67 7.53 3.81 33771.69 Equinor♦ 268.30 1.05 285.40 150.80 1.59 34.86 97243.31 Fedex 221.65 -2.72 319.90 216.34 1.30 11.89 58730.45 UnionPac 250.76 -0.23 256.11 195.68 1.64 26.65 159708.78
MuenchRkv 261.60 -1.90 282.25 215.25 3.86 15.68 41566.35 Natwest Group 234.50 -5.80 258.10 167.55 2.56 11.44 38115.51
BkofComm 5.51 0.02 5.56 4.33 6.99 3.97 24733.78 Telenor 136.50 -0.25 159.95 131.80 10.11 11.71 21253.09 FordMtr♦ 17.95 0.41 24.91 11.13 - 25.45 70604.45 UPS B 208.45 -0.74 232.31 156.59 1.97 28.31 151993.02
SAP 102.26 -3.00 129.74 100.46 1.86 20.57 142479.29 Prudential 1159.5 -24.00 1598.5 1155.25 1.01 16.11 40749.75
BOE Tech 0.74 -0.01 1.21 0.65 - -62.37 18.88 Qatar (QR) ReckittB 6273 121.00 6709 4905.16 2.78 -27.14 60004.58 Franklin 30.06 -0.05 38.27 24.91 3.75 8.36 15093.86 USBancorp 57.15 0.02 63.01 48.35 3.03 11.39 84744.56
Siemens 136.34 -3.16 156.98 124.96 2.64 21.09 131435.15
Ch Coms Cons 4.98 0.02 5.17 3.57 4.35 3.38 2821.15 QatarNtBk 20.85 -0.14 21.95 16.35 2.17 15.71 52891.95 RELX 2233 -8.00 2634.82 1484.9 2.10 32.27 58681.96 GenDyn 214.35 -0.05 218.60 162.46 2.71 18.28 59524.56 UtdHlthcre 468.71 -1.63 509.23 320.35 1.16 28.86 441008.84
Volkswgn 242.20 -7.80 357.40 180.40 2.04 6.62 81058.33
Ch Evrbrght 3.01 0.03 3.54 2.63 8.48 3.81 4892.85 Russia (RUB) RioTinto 5657 69.00 6876.26 4354 5.95 6.78 103061.25 GenElectric 92.84 -5.62 116.17 88.05 0.35 69.82 102061.04 ValeroEngy♦ 86.20 -0.84 93.77 58.85 4.58 -79.23 35242.65
Ch Rail Cons 5.66 0.05 5.99 4.57 4.94 2.84 1506.71 Hong Kong (HK$) GenMills 67.74 -0.05 69.85 54.31 3.09 18.18 40861.22 Verizon 53.40 -0.19 59.85 49.69 4.62 11.24 224142.79
Gzprm neft 325.60 3.11 24450.71 186.00 - - 100158.85 RollsRoyce 117.06 -0.96 161.91 86.69 - 2.56 2957.3
Ch Rail Gp 5.04 0.05 5.20 3.53 4.35 4.13 2718.73 AIA 88.00 -1.30 105.80 77.40 1.52 20.13 136488.96 GenMotors 48.05 -0.77 65.18 47.07 - 6.38 69817.68 VertexPharm 230.11 -2.66 254.93 176.36 - 27.39 58580.64
Lukoil 6541.61 -197.33 7554.91 7.45 - - 58894.61 RylDShlA 1895.2 -24.00 1930.8 16.51 2.92 43.31 118189.98
ChConstBk 6.01 0.01 6.74 5.03 6.58 4.22 185253.57 BOC Hold 31.35 -0.20 32.75 22.20 3.91 14.07 42496.34 GileadSci 61.19 -0.10 74.12 60.82 4.63 10.35 76755.73 VF Cp 58.94 -0.21 90.79 58.89 3.35 22.77 22921.86
MmcNrlskNckl 21290.61 -446.291681283.31 343.80 - - 42508.5 StandCh 579.20 21.20 581.80 406.20 1.54 14.10 25937.53
China Vanke 20.75 0.85 35.00 16.84 7.31 5.15 5057.88 Ch OSLnd&Inv 24.95 0.70 25.50 15.42 4.78 5.23 35010.93 GoldmSchs 344.34 -4.72 426.16 307.58 1.68 5.63 115282.61 ViacomCBS 29.58 -6.41 101.97 27.84 3.27 6.02 17946.37
Novatek 1474.91 -39.07 1984.96 1280.4 - - 58190.62 Tesco 294.20 0.50 304.10 2.74 3.40 22.46 32720.17
ChinaCitic 3.85 0.05 4.29 3.28 8.03 3.37 7345.98 ChngKng 53.05 - 56.05 41.35 3.35 10.85 24782.16 Halliburton 32.01 -0.97 34.32 17.82 0.57 70.60 28758.78 Visa Inc 223.10 -1.51 252.67 190.10 0.58 39.34 369994.31
Rosneft 527.02 -26.20 39143.78 116.00 - - 72577.59 Vodafone 137.58 -0.38 142.74 106.30 5.62-307.79 49848.27
ChinaLife 13.76 0.04 17.28 12.22 5.52 5.39 13127.57 Citic Ltd 9.05 0.09 10.24 6.27 5.33 3.61 33753.72 HCA Hold 247.85 -2.95 263.92 170.13 0.59 12.57 77086.22 Walgreen 46.37 -0.45 57.05 43.62 4.19 6.56 40025.61
Sberbank 262.00 -2.77 568.52 221.04 - - 73491.04 WPP 1184 -8.50 1231.5 11.00 2.03 30.08 20362.61
ChinaMBank 69.05 -0.25 72.45 55.55 2.21 12.94 40643.06 Citic Secs 19.56 -0.12 21.52 14.89 2.48 10.51 5713.59 Hew-Pack 36.16 -0.26 39.07 25.96 2.12 6.85 39152.22 WalMartSto 137.88 -1.00 152.57 126.28 1.57 48.65 382462.36
Surgutneftegas 34.85 0.36 49.50 29.80 - - 16177.44 United States of America ($)
ChinaMob 54.80 0.30 59.20 45.90 6.26 8.34 143859.92 CK Hutchison 59.75 -0.40 65.80 48.80 3.82 6.77 29374.84 HiltonWwde 150.46 -2.58 160.96 108.50 - 1148.92 41999.27 WellsFargo 55.78 -0.38 60.30 35.93 0.90 13.15 229035.05
CNOOC 9.87 0.04 10.60 7.55 4.60 7.70 56498.68 Saudi Arabia (SR) 21stC Fox A 41.98 -0.93 44.95 31.67 1.13 13.94 13257.55
ChinaPcIns 24.10 -0.35 42.75 20.85 6.01 6.91 8575.34 HomeDep 345.16 -2.79 420.61 246.59 1.85 23.27 360424.37 Williams Cos 29.48 -0.22 31.02 22.18 5.57 35.68 35813
HangSeng 166.00 -0.60 169.50 131.00 3.27 20.60 40689.77 AlRajhiBnk 158.60 -0.80 160.80 83.00 1.53 28.33 105665.7 3M 147.79 -0.85 208.95 147.24 4.03 14.51 84402.87
ChMinsheng 3.18 0.03 5.01 2.56 8.24 3.90 3392.27 Honywell 181.75 -2.85 236.86 181.57 2.06 23.22 124644.13 Yum!Brnds 125.50 2.02 139.85 101.94 1.58 24.05 36788.2
HK Exc&Clr 434.20 -3.20 587.00 421.00 2.13 42.63 70579.42 Natnlcombnk 72.80 -0.20 75.00 45.10 2.01 21.63 58202.76 AbbottLb 115.98 -4.60 142.60 105.36 1.49 28.57 205085.92
ChMrchSecs 16.62 0.04 23.55 16.01 4.58 14.78 19498.28 HumanaInc 421.47 -3.24 475.44 365.34 0.65 20.20 54173.35 Venezuela (VEF)
MTR 42.80 - 49.00 40.50 2.84-144.48 33986.19 SaudiBasic 121.20 -1.20 136.60 102.00 2.71 17.69 96897.99 Abbvie 144.03 -0.94 147.22 102.05 3.55 34.53 254526.29
Chna Utd Coms 3.96 0.02 4.60 3.70 1.67 19.21 19251.5 IBM 124.02 -0.95 152.84 114.56 5.18 21.67 111161.62 Bco de Vnzla 0.40 0.02 594.00 0.09 244.82 - 331.74
SandsCh 24.05 0.05 40.55 14.64 - -21.36 24955.11 SaudiTelec 116.60 -2.00 139.80 103.20 3.47 20.42 62146.9 Accenture 321.86 -1.05 417.37 244.44 1.15 32.59 211890.99
ChShenEgy 22.45 0.35 22.70 14.22 9.73 7.91 9721.51 IllinoisTool 215.67 -1.49 248.11 196.53 2.17 24.89 67488.95 Bco Provncl 1.84 -0.05 798000 1.80 - 0.00 156.90
SHK Props 98.60 -0.60 126.00 92.35 4.96 10.84 36632.55 Singapore (S$) Adobe 447.13 -10.58 699.54 420.78 - 37.50 211200.84
ChShpbldng 4.08 0.02 5.08 3.78 - -294.89 14242.29 Illumina 311.02 -6.82 526.00 310.02 - 50.53 48612.43 Mrcntl Srvcs 5.44 0.44 601.00 2.7033245.35 0.00 75.31
Tencent 470.00 -9.00 749.50 412.20 0.34 19.89 578743.14 DBS 36.45 -0.08 37.49 25.40 2.38 14.86 69592.67 AEP♦ 85.43 -0.06 91.66 74.80 3.49 17.82 43026.96
ChStConEng 5.50 0.14 5.77 4.38 3.85 4.46 35501.04 Intcntl Exch 122.25 -1.00 139.79 109.04 1.06 22.39 68687.79
JardnMt US$ 60.12 -0.22 68.88 49.13 2.81 91.26 42941.04 Aetna - - - - - - -
ChUncHK 4.32 0.02 5.50 3.82 4.05 8.53 16947.38 India (Rs) Intel 44.82 -2.76 68.49 44.53 3.09 8.64 182486.68 Closing prices and highs & lows are in traded currency (with variations for that
OCBC 13.27 -0.14 13.54 10.45 3.08 12.02 44310.45 Aflac♦ 63.13 -0.08 66.97 46.75 2.03 10.14 41758.97
CNNC Intl 7.17 0.08 8.92 4.62 1.79 18.22 19351.89 Bhartiartl 712.55 -4.45 781.80 490.34 - -54.85 56165.14 Intuit 489.01 -7.17 716.86 365.15 0.50 64.68 138471.45 country indicated by stock), market capitalisation is in USD. Highs & lows are
SingTel 2.55 -0.01 2.63 2.21 4.08 76.55 31296.43 AirProd 240.84 0.23 316.39 239.50 2.44 26.21 53397.31
CSR 3.63 - 4.14 3.19 6.08 7.86 2034.34 HDFC Bk 1512.35 5.85 1725 1353 - 25.49 112302.1 John&John♦ 164.40 -0.73 179.92 151.47 2.54 24.39 432798.94 based on intraday trading over a rolling 52 week period.
UOB 32.57 -0.29 33.33 23.45 2.36 17.01 40482.25 Alexion 182.50 3.05 187.45 99.91 - 59.43 40336.01
Daqin 7.05 0.14 7.25 5.80 6.72 10.21 16567.38 Hind Unilevr 2312.55 5.00 2859.3 2120 1.36 63.86 72784.53 JohnsonCn 65.31 -0.51 81.69 54.81 1.65 30.87 45899.85 ♦ ex-dividend
Allstate 124.21 1.57 140.00 102.57 2.41 5.94 35608.03
GuosenSec 10.93 0.01 13.29 10.32 2.08 13.04 15250.44 HsngDevFin 2441.15 29.35 3021.1 2286.85 0.95 21.08 59236.8 South Africa (R) JPMrgnCh 151.80 0.37 172.96 139.57 2.46 9.53 448609.39
Alphabet 2628.31 -22.47 3030.93 1990.23 - 25.14 790477.12 ■ ex-capital redistribution
HaitongSecs 7.07 0.04 7.81 6.36 9.14 5.38 3090.6 ICICI Bk 748.90 -1.45 867.00 531.15 0.27 24.51 69680.21 Firstrand 66.41 -0.20 68.15 48.97 1.73 13.37 24629.8 Kimb-Clark 132.37 0.74 144.47 125.27 3.42 22.35 44607.8
Altria 51.81 0.44 52.59 42.53 6.77 34.51 95168.88 # price at time of suspension
Hngzh HikVDT 46.50 0.41 70.44 45.14 1.70 27.52 59851.68 Infosys 1706.95 -17.85 1909.8 1244.75 1.79 33.53 96163.09 MTN Grp 182.72 -0.50 196.39 70.31 - 42.68 22763.22 KinderM 16.55 -0.22 19.29 14.62 6.48 21.33 37515.53
Amazon 3031.09 -61.96 3773.08 2746.37 - 58.85 1542353.2
Hunng Pwr 4.09 -0.13 5.74 2.53 5.20 -49.24 2464.79 ITC 221.90 -0.75 265.30 199.10 4.91 18.88 36628.6 Naspers N 2236.95 -27.91 3835.39 1262.66 0.25 12.48 64411.01 Kraft Heinz 38.17 0.38 44.95 32.79 4.22 20.26 46721.7
AmerAir 17.88 -0.35 26.09 14.91 - -3.38 11574.32
IM Baotou Stl 2.61 - 4.14 1.17 - 30.22 13068.75 L&T 1883.1 14.40 2008 1306 0.97 30.13 35437.59 South Korea (KRW) Kroger 45.07 -0.16 48.89 32.00 1.65 33.69 33137.97
AmerExpr 194.65 -1.06 199.55 126.08 0.87 23.02 147808.53
In&CmBkCh 4.79 - 5.75 4.08 6.76 4.33 53302.83 OilNatGas 167.90 -3.85 176.35 97.45 2.17 5.80 28294.18 HyundMobis 228500 - 330000 220000 2.23 8.78 18070.79 L Brands 79.92 -0.15 - - - - -
AmerIntGrp 61.02 -0.36 63.54 41.49 2.11 9.51 50664.76
IndstrlBk 22.89 0.59 27.99 17.08 3.46 6.34 70971.31 RelianceIn 2424.4 -19.10 2751.35 1876.7 0.29 30.14 219731.07 KoreaElePwr 22600 450.00 27450 20050 5.47 -13.08 12132.28 LasVegasSd 46.75 -0.31 66.77 33.75 - -25.50 35716.52
AmerTower 229.78 1.11 303.72 197.50 2.21 41.47 104644.96
Kweichow 1907 20.01 2496.66 1525.5 1.00 48.45 378662.37 SBI NewA 515.30 2.35 549.00 321.30 0.79 15.84 61603.47 SK Hynix 131500-1500.00 150500 90500 0.91 11.00 80053.78 LibertyGbl 27.08 -1.06 30.58 23.19 - 1.31 4789.93
Amgen♦ 221.38 -0.31 261.00 198.64 3.13 22.65 124692.99
Midea 0.51 - 0.85 0.46 - 46.74 19.69 SunPhrmInds 862.90 0.35 902.85 562.10 0.88 32.88 27733.66 SmsungEl 74300 -700.00 86200 68300 4.13 14.15 370911.78 Lilly (E)♦ 239.76 -1.21 283.91 178.58 1.38 36.34 229352.59
Anthem 448.43 -2.91 472.01 288.93 0.97 19.94 108840.54
New Ch Life Ins 23.60 - 33.20 20.55 7.15 4.00 3128.98 Tata Cons 3793.9 9.70 3989.9 2880 0.93 37.04 187988.75 Spain (€) Linde 300.02 1.05 346.50 241.88 1.39 43.86 153777.34
Aon Cp 281.16 0.12 326.25 221.82 0.70 69.95 61948.66
PetroChina 4.09 -0.03 4.29 2.61 6.49 7.39 11063.84 Israel (ILS) BBVA 5.71 -0.04 6.29 4.22 1.06 10.09 43196.24 Lockheed 386.55 -2.22 398.85 324.23 2.71 17.68 105267.97
Apple 167.29 -1.59 182.13 116.21 0.51 29.602730079.28
PingAnIns 66.70 0.10 99.80 48.80 4.14 8.02 63689.22 TevaPha 26.81 -0.32 38.81 24.96 - 12.53 9214.31 BcoSantdr 3.32 -0.02 3.51 2.65 0.85 10.02 65333.29 Lowes 221.03 -2.76 263.31 150.84 1.15 23.30 148918.34
Aptiv 141.06 -2.07 180.81 127.63 - 47.95 38158.72
PngAnBnk 16.77 0.35 25.16 15.82 1.06 10.06 51440.78 CaixaBnk 3.24 0.00 3.43 2.22 0.85 4.11 29583.38 Lyondell 99.74 -1.21 118.02 84.17 4.40 5.77 33191.87
Italy (€) ArcherDan 76.23 -0.43 78.03 54.94 1.94 16.34 42643.41
Pwr Cons Corp 9.08 0.13 9.96 3.77 1.01 18.35 15995.11 Iberdrola 9.29 -0.12 11.74 8.59 4.68 17.80 67827.58 Marathon Ptl 76.61 -0.35 81.39 50.19 3.05 104.17 47160.3
Enel 6.44 -0.05 8.77 6.20 5.73 29.77 74198.87 AT&T 23.61 -0.15 33.88 22.02 8.88 180.29 168643.7
SaicMtr 18.90 0.03 23.45 18.03 3.24 9.20 34904.11 Inditex 25.35 -0.11 32.85 24.71 0.88 26.59 89605.68 Marsh&M 151.40 0.25 175.12 112.98 1.64 28.41 76118.72
ENI 13.47 0.14 13.80 8.89 5.12 32.71 55082.53 AutomData 199.97 -0.49 248.96 166.26 1.87 31.41 83996.45
ShenwanHong 0.08 - 0.11 0.05 - -14.08 88.73 Repsol 11.73 -0.14 12.04 8.69 5.16 14.43 20326.71 MasterCard 370.34 -3.36 401.50 306.00 0.59 45.22 359129.61
Generali 18.54 -0.07 19.35 15.36 5.60 11.49 33245.27 Avago Tech 574.96 -4.04 677.76 419.14 2.48 38.68 237386.02
ShgPdgBk 8.67 0.11 11.24 8.41 5.46 5.39 40225.68 Telefonica 4.37 0.01 4.45 3.52 9.24 2.37 28635.7 McDonald's 250.80 -0.13 270.17 202.73 2.07 25.67 187409.15
IntSPaolo 2.72 -0.02 2.92 2.06 1.35 83.90 59984.75 BakerHu 28.73 -0.70 30.11 18.75 2.52 44.56 27389.49
Sinopec Corp 4.07 -0.02 4.69 3.40 3.81 4.40 13313.42 McKesson 272.18 -1.17 282.73 169.34 0.64 -9.10 40772.12
Unicred 14.63 -0.05 15.93 7.98 0.84 24.93 37127 Sweden (SKr) BankAm 45.87 -0.21 50.11 34.02 1.65 13.63 375363.01
Sinopec Oil 2.17 0.01 2.90 1.94 - 245.17 4654.43 Medtronic 100.56 -1.14 135.89 98.38 2.38 29.24 135208.73
Japan (¥) AtlasCpcoB 435.30 -8.60 534.40 404.90 1.77 29.89 18143.23 Baxter 81.29 -1.51 89.70 73.12 1.30 33.90 40701.37
Denmark (kr) Merck 76.05 -0.32 91.40 68.38 3.44 22.67 192085.41
AstellasPh 1991.5 -26.50 2052 1590 2.40 29.77 32200.69 Ericsson 94.13 -4.08 121.80 91.00 2.29 14.43 30890.33 BectonDick 263.87 -2.28 280.62 235.13 1.27 38.24 75142.54
DanskeBk 125.40 -1.05 133.25 100.70 1.64 10.23 16486.3 Metlife♦ 69.80 -0.02 72.55 54.37 2.71 11.45 58708.78
Bridgestne 5134 -129.00 5467 4104 2.94 16.61 31821.85 H&M 173.90 -2.68 229.50 157.90 - 30.33 27131.25 BerkshHat 470410.74 -244.26488399.85362860.01 - 8.41 291625.49
MollerMrsk 22940 -430.00 24070 12475 1.50 5.07 31159.41 Microsoft♦ 289.32 -1.41 349.67 224.26 0.78 32.122168993.39
Canon 2832.5 5.00 2938 2182 3.12 13.68 32809.81 Investor 194.26 -2.28 228.75 154.50 1.39 2.26 37803.68 Biogen 208.29 -2.32 468.55 207.62 - 19.78 30610.15
NovoB 661.80 -11.10 773.70 420.15 1.45 32.15 178876.77 Mnstr Bvrg 80.54 -1.61 99.89 80.45 - 27.95 42614.22
BkNYMeln 56.08 -1.27 64.63 41.90 2.28 14.16 46312.05

FT 500: TOP 20 FT 500: BOTTOM 20 BONDS: HIGH YIELD & EMERGING MARKET BONDS: GLOBAL INVESTMENT GRADE
Close Prev Day Week Month Close Prev Day Week Month Day's Mth's Spread Day's Mth's Spread
price price change change % change change % change % price price change change % change change % change % Red Ratings Bid Bid chge chge vs Red Ratings Bid Bid chge chge vs
ShenwanHong 0.08 0.08 0.00 0.00 0.02 25.4 40.35 SHOP 860.00 837.09 22.91 2.74 -229.55 -21.1 -23.05 Feb 18 date Coupon S* M* F* price yield yield yield US Feb 18 date Coupon S* M* F* price yield yield yield US
Cielo 2.87 2.52 0.35 13.89 0.55 23.7 23.61 Ericsson 94.13 98.21 -4.08 -4.15 -22.65 -19.4 -18.06 High Yield US$ US$
Kraft Heinz 38.17 37.79 0.38 1.01 3.44 9.9 4.86 ViacomCBS 29.58 35.99 -6.41 -17.81 -6.20 -17.3 -11.57 HCA Inc. 04/24 8.36 BB- Ba2 BB 113.75 4.24 0.00 0.12 - FleetBoston Financial Corp. 01/28 6.88 BBB+ Baa1 A- 129.00 2.54 -0.01 -0.05 -
ReckittB 6273.00 6152.00 121.00 1.97 379.00 6.4 4.55 Novatek 1474.91 1513.98 -39.07 -2.58 -186.35 -11.2 -10.40 High Yield Euro The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. 02/28 5.00 BBB+ A3 A 117.21 2.47 0.00 0.32 -
MitsubEst 1807.50 1789.50 18.00 1.01 96.50 5.6 10.58 Keyence 53970.00 54880.00 -910.00 -1.66 -6390.00 -10.6 -9.16 Aldesa Financial Services S.A. 04/21 7.25 - - B 71.10 28.23 0.00 0.64 25.98 NationsBank Corp. 03/28 6.80 BBB+ Baa1 A- 127.69 2.72 -0.01 0.06 -
Aptiv 141.06 143.13 -2.07 -1.45 7.06 5.3 0.80 BkNYMeln 56.08 57.35 -1.27 -2.21 -6.25 -10.0 -8.17 GTE LLC 04/28 6.94 BBB+ Baa2 A- 128.27 2.80 0.00 -0.11 -
SandsCh 24.05 24.00 0.05 0.21 1.15 5.0 11.89 SocGen 32.37 32.99 -0.62 -1.88 -3.60 -10.0 -2.88 Emerging US$ United Utilities PLC 08/28 6.88 BBB Baa1 A- 130.43 2.62 -0.07 -0.22 -
Cisco 56.61 55.77 0.84 1.50 2.71 5.0 0.80 MorganStly 94.83 96.15 -1.32 -1.37 -9.74 -9.3 -8.80 Peru 03/19 7.13 BBB+ A3 BBB+ 104.40 2.60 - - 0.34 Barclays Bank plc 01/29 4.50 A A1 A+ 96.46 5.02 0.00 0.02 -
UnionPac 250.76 250.99 -0.23 -0.09 11.95 5.0 -0.25 Phillips66 84.94 86.12 -1.19 -1.38 -8.27 -8.9 -3.18 Colombia 01/26 4.50 - Baa2 BBB- 109.50 2.33 0.16 0.52 1.28
Brazil 04/26 6.00 - Ba2 BB- 115.15 2.78 -0.01 0.65 1.73 Euro
AirLiquide 150.74 150.32 0.42 0.28 7.06 4.9 -0.87 Intuit 489.01 496.18 -7.17 -1.45 -46.80 -8.7 -13.10 Electricite de France (EDF) 04/30 4.63 A- A3 A- 137.45 0.82 -0.01 0.10 -
CSL 265.57 277.00 -11.43 -4.13 11.86 4.7 1.54 Occid Pet 39.26 39.86 -0.60 -1.51 -3.72 -8.7 -0.86 Poland 04/26 3.25 - A2 A- 111.22 0.98 0.03 0.16 -0.07
Mexico 05/26 11.50 - Baa1 BBB- 149.00 1.61 0.00 -0.12 0.56 The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. 02/31 3.00 BBB+ A3 A 124.42 0.68 0.00 -0.11 -
HCA Hold 247.85 250.80 -2.95 -1.18 10.28 4.3 2.98 Hunng Pwr 4.09 4.22 -0.13 -3.08 -0.37 -8.3 -0.49 The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. 02/31 3.00 BBB+ A3 A 121.70 0.93 0.00 0.02 -
CSX 34.78 35.10 -0.33 -0.93 1.41 4.2 -1.24 Rosneft 527.02 553.23 -26.20 -4.74 -45.98 -8.0 -9.41 Turkey 03/27 6.00 - Ba2 BB+ 101.26 5.82 0.00 0.17 3.07
Turkey 03/27 6.00 - B2 BB- 102.88 5.43 0.14 0.83 4.38 Finland 04/31 0.75 AA+ Aa1 AA+ 111.08 -0.27 0.00 -0.05 -0.87
Westpc 23.53 23.49 0.04 0.17 0.91 4.0 15.34 Brookfield 68.30 69.33 -1.03 -1.49 -5.74 -7.8 -3.45
Peru 08/27 4.13 BBB+ A3 BBB+ 103.50 3.66 0.01 -0.02 0.80 Yen
Heineken 98.30 98.46 -0.16 -0.16 3.80 4.0 2.82 AbbottLb 115.98 120.58 -4.60 -3.81 -9.51 -7.6 -10.87
Russia 06/28 12.75 - Baa3 BBB 168.12 2.48 0.07 0.05 - Mexico 06/26 1.09 - Baa1 BBB- 98.73 1.34 -0.02 -0.14 0.27
StandCh 579.20 558.00 21.20 3.80 21.20 3.8 4.78 CNNC Intl 7.17 7.09 0.08 1.13 -0.58 -7.5 1.70
CntJpRwy 16350.00 16350.00 0.00 0.00 570.00 3.6 5.55 3M 147.79 148.64 -0.85 -0.57 -11.75 -7.4 -11.38 Brazil 02/47 5.63 - Ba2 BB- 101.48 5.52 0.08 0.80 - £ Sterling
PhilMorris 111.77 111.90 -0.13 -0.12 3.81 3.5 7.54 Natwest Group 234.50 240.30 -5.80 -2.41 -18.50 -7.3 -7.13 Emerging Euro innogy Fin B.V. 06/30 6.25 BBB Baa2 A- 137.45 2.19 -0.03 0.02 -
LasVegasSd 46.75 47.06 -0.31 -0.66 1.59 3.5 4.31 Barclays 191.16 192.64 -1.48 -0.77 -14.94 -7.2 -5.86 Brazil 04/21 2.88 BB- Ba2 BB- 103.09 0.05 0.01 -0.09 -1.19 innogy Fin B.V. 06/30 6.25 BBB Baa2 A- 128.68 3.20 0.00 -0.01 0.40
AstraZen 8801.00 8918.00 -117.00 -1.31 291.00 3.4 2.55 Cred Agr 13.06 13.14 -0.09 -0.67 -1.00 -7.1 -3.40 Mexico 04/23 2.75 BBB+ A3 BBB+ 107.76 0.76 0.00 -0.07 -1.56 Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data LLC, an ICE Data Services company. US $ denominated bonds NY close; all other London
Mexico 04/23 2.75 - Baa1 BBB- 106.48 -0.26 - - -0.36 close. *S - Standard & Poor’s, M - Moody’s, F - Fitch.
Based on the FT Global 500 companies in local currency Based on the FT Global 500 companies in local currency
Bulgaria 03/28 3.00 BBB- Baa2 BBB 117.04 1.00 0.02 -0.15 -1.42
Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data LLC, an ICE Data Services company. US $ denominated bonds NY close; all
other London close. *S - Standard & Poor’s, M - Moody’s, F - Fitch.

INTEREST RATES: OFFICIAL BOND INDICES VOLATILITY INDICES GILTS: UK CASH MARKET
Feb 18 Rate Current Since Last Mnth Ago Year Ago Day's Month's Year Return Return Feb 18 Day Chng Prev 52 wk high 52 wk low Red Change in Yield 52 Week Amnt
US Fed Funds 0.00-0.25 15-03-2020 1.00-1.25 1.50-1.75 1.25-1.50 Index change change change 1 month 1 year VIX 28.99 0.88 28.11 38.94 14.10 Feb 18 Price £ Yield Day Week Month Year High Low £m
US Prime 4.75 30-10-2019 5.25 5.25 4.25 Markit IBoxx VXD 27.02 0.92 26.10 39.58 2.67 - - - - - - - - -
US Discount 2.65 30-09-2019 2.75 2.75 1.75 ABF Pan-Asia unhedged 218.67 0.04 0.23 -0.51 -0.07 -2.81 VXN 34.43 1.22 33.21 44.05 18.01 Tr 1.75pc '22 100.58 0.68 -1.45 -10.53 23.64 -1460.00 104.18 100.51 29.68
Euro Repo 0.00 16-03-2016 0.00 0.00 0.00 Corporates( £) 375.19 0.30 -2.14 -5.21 -4.07 -6.14 VDAX 30.77 2.94 27.83 93.30 - Tr 0.75pc '23 99.43 1.15 -4.96 -10.85 51.32 5650.00 101.08 99.08 33.73
UK Repo 0.50 03-02-2022 0.25 0.25 0.25 Corporates($) - - - - - - † CBOE. VIX: S&P 500 index Options Volatility, VXD: DJIA Index Options Volatility, VXN: NASDAQ Index Options Volatility. Tr 0.125pc '24 97.82 1.26 -5.26 -10.00 41.57 1300.00 100.04 97.31 34.12
Japan O'night Call 0.00-0.10 01-02-2016 0.00 0.00--0.10 0.00--0.10 Corporates(€) 233.31 0.16 -2.07 -3.41 -2.67 -4.12 ‡ Deutsche Borse. VDAX: DAX Index Options Volatility. Tr 2pc '25 102.61 1.24 -5.34 -10.79 31.91 933.33 119.47 99.56 38.33
Switzerland Libor Target -1.25-0.25 15-01-2015 -0.75--0.25 -1.25--0.25 -1.25--0.25 Eurozone Sov(€) 245.60 0.34 -2.40 -3.47 -2.77 -5.25 Tr 0.125pc '26 95.80 1.22 -5.43 -10.29 27.08 480.95 99.56 94.88 33.89
Gilts( £) 340.07 0.50 -1.60 -5.40 -3.22 -5.82 BONDS: BENCHMARK GOVERNMENT Tr 1.25pc '27 100.16 1.22 -5.43 -10.95 20.79 269.70 105.60 98.96 39.34
INTEREST RATES: MARKET Global Inflation-Lkd - - - - - - Red Bid Bid Day chg Wk chg Month Year Tr 0.875pc '29 97.10 1.27 -5.93 -10.56 13.39 130.91 103.32 95.65 41.87
Over Change One Three Six One Markit iBoxx £ Non-Gilts - - - - - - Date Coupon Price Yield yield yield chg yld chg yld Tr 4.25pc '32 127.04 1.42 -4.70 -8.97 13.60 91.89 138.01 125.04 38.71
Feb 18 (Libor: Feb 17) night Day Week Month month month month year Overall ($) - - - - - - Australia 04/24 2.75 103.33 1.19 -0.04 0.12 0.40 1.07 Tr 4.25pc '36 134.59 1.51 -5.03 -7.93 13.53 60.64 147.98 132.25 30.41
US$ Libor 0.07629 0.003 -0.001 0.025 0.16171 0.48100 0.77357 1.28886 Overall( £) 343.10 0.45 -1.69 -5.22 -3.31 -5.76 05/32 1.25 91.18 2.22 -0.02 0.10 0.29 0.72 Tr 4.5pc '42 152.72 1.53 -4.97 -8.38 9.29 36.61 169.96 148.84 27.21
Euro Libor -0.64957 -0.064 0.000 0.001 -0.61943 -0.58057 -0.55600 -0.48571 Overall(€) 238.24 0.27 -2.30 -3.42 -2.73 -4.97 Austria 05/34 2.40 120.31 0.67 -0.04 0.00 0.36 0.68 Tr 3.75pc '52 155.49 1.48 -5.13 -8.64 8.82 26.50 180.27 150.30 24.10
£ Libor 0.18063 -0.005 0.000 -0.001 0.48000 0.85900 1.32230 0.81363 Treasuries ($) - - - - - - 02/47 1.50 113.25 0.91 -0.04 0.03 0.29 0.55 Tr 4pc '60 177.91 1.36 -5.56 -9.93 9.68 20.35 213.01 170.76 24.12
Swiss Fr Libor -0.002 -0.77540 -0.75300 -0.70280 -0.55320 FTSE Belgium 10/23 0.20 101.05 -0.43 -0.04 -0.09 0.17 0.22 Gilts benchmarks & non-rump undated stocks. Closing mid-price in pounds per £100 nominal of stock.
Yen Libor 0.000 -0.06375 -0.02063 0.04021 0.04867 Sterling Corporate (£) - - - - - - Canada - - - - - - -
Euro Euribor
Sterling CDs
-0.004
0.000
-0.56200
0.50000
-0.52900
0.63000
-0.47800
0.78500
-0.31300 Euro Corporate (€) 104.47 -0.05 - - 0.54 -1.73 03/24 2.25 101.46 1.52 -0.03 0.05 0.23 1.20 GILTS: UK FTSE ACTUARIES INDICES
Euro Emerging Mkts (€) 751.61 -9.81 - - -5.97 6.62 Denmark - - - - - - -
US$ CDs 0.020 0.16000 0.37000 0.58000 Eurozone Govt Bond 110.04 -0.19 - - -0.34 -0.64 11/23 1.50 103.21 -0.34 -0.08 -0.07 0.20 0.22 Price Indices Day's Total Return Return
Euro CDs 0.000 -0.53000 -0.53000 -0.49000 Fixed Coupon Feb 18 chg % Return 1 month 1 year Yield
CREDIT INDICES Day's Week's Month's Series Series Finland 04/23 1.50 102.34 -0.53 -0.03 -0.08 0.07 0.14
04/31 0.75 102.20 0.50 -0.04 -0.02 0.36 0.68 1 Up to 5 Years 85.39 0.15 2423.77 -0.68 -2.27 1.22
Short 7 Days One Three Six One Index change change change high low 2 5 - 10 Years 170.99 0.54 3567.33 -1.14 -4.53 1.29
Feb 18 term notice month month month year Markit iTraxx France 05/23 1.75 102.91 -0.55 -0.04 -0.08 0.05 0.10
3 10 - 15 Years 200.00 0.83 4472.00 -1.80 -5.32 1.49
Euro -0.67 -0.37 -0.72 -0.42 -0.68 -0.38 -0.68 -0.38 -0.64 -0.34 -0.48 -0.18 Crossover 5Y 339.39 8.58 15.54 76.58 343.01 238.24 05/27 1.00 104.23 0.19 -0.05 -0.11 0.34 0.61
4 5 - 15 Years 177.34 0.64 3790.13 -1.37 -4.73 1.37
Sterling 0.45 0.55 0.58 0.68 0.71 0.86 0.90 1.05 Europe 5Y 69.72 2.06 3.12 16.10 69.82 47.15 Germany - - - - - - -
5 Over 15 Years 339.92 1.63 5728.21 -3.00 -5.17 1.45
US Dollar 0.18 0.38 0.01 0.21 0.06 0.26 0.27 0.47 0.48 0.68 0.81 1.01 Japan 5Y 56.73 1.06 3.78 7.31 57.13 45.63 08/23 2.00 103.90 -0.61 -0.05 -0.11 0.04 0.11
7 All stocks 173.04 0.91 3792.65 -1.86 -4.23 1.42
Japanese Yen -0.20 0.00 -0.20 0.00 -0.15 0.15 -0.15 0.15 -0.15 0.15 -0.15 0.15 Senior Financials 5Y 78.42 2.20 3.10 16.59 79.46 54.29 08/27 0.50 102.80 -0.01 -0.05 -0.09 0.29 0.59
Libor rates come from ICE (see www.theice.com) and are fixed at 11am UK time. Other data sources: US $, Euro & CDs: 08/50 0.00 87.48 0.47 -0.04 0.03 0.23 0.34 Day's Month Year's Total Return Return
Markit CDX Greece 01/28 3.75 111.30 1.73 -0.01 0.08 0.87 1.27
Tullett Prebon; SDR, US Discount: IMF; EONIA: ECB; Swiss Libor: SNB; EURONIA, RONIA & SONIA: WMBA. Index Linked Feb 18 chg % chg % chg % Return 1 month 1 year
Emerging Markets 5Y 220.86 7.66 4.59 8.22 229.97 168.20
Ireland - - - - - - - 1 Up to 5 Years 316.30 0.22 0.89 4.67 2651.82 0.89 5.83
Nth Amer High Yld 5Y 366.54 10.15 6.19 43.13 370.46 287.02
- - - - - - - 2 Over 5 years 859.14 1.93 -0.21 10.18 6522.54 -0.21 10.57
Nth Amer Inv Grade 5Y 67.85 2.50 2.35 10.51 67.99 48.82
03/24 3.40 107.63 -0.27 -0.05 -0.07 0.24 0.28 3 5-15 years 527.95 0.89 0.12 5.42 4245.28 0.12 6.22
Websites: markit.com, ftse.com. All indices shown are unhedged. Currencies are shown in brackets after the index names.
Italy 07/24 1.75 103.26 0.36 -0.07 -0.12 0.32 0.55 4 Over 15 years 1133.21 2.35 -0.35 11.73 8360.27 -0.34 11.96
08/27 2.05 104.93 1.11 -0.07 -0.07 0.47 0.93 5 All stocks 763.45 1.74 -0.10 9.57 5909.27 -0.09 10.05
05/31 6.00 137.28 1.62 -0.07 -0.03 0.50 1.03
COMMODITIES www.ft.com/commodities BONDS: INDEX-LINKED 03/48 3.45 120.35 2.39 -0.04 -0.01 0.38 0.98 Yield Indices Feb 18 Feb 17 Yr ago Feb 18 Feb 17 Yr ago
Japan 04/23 0.05 99.96 0.08 0.01 0.01 -0.02 0.00 5 Yrs 1.21 1.28 0.20 20 Yrs 1.56 1.64 1.16
Energy Price* Change Agricultural & Cattle Futures Price* Change Price Yield Month Value No of
02/28 0.07 98.87 0.36 0.00 0.02 0.09 - 10 Yrs 1.40 1.48 0.68 45 Yrs 1.27 1.35 1.10
Crude Oil† Mar 90.12 -1.48 Corn♦ Mar 650.50 2.00 Feb 17 Feb 17 Prev return stock Market stocks
12/34 1.20 109.86 0.41 0.01 0.02 0.13 0.13 15 Yrs 1.53 1.61 1.00
Brent Crude Oil‡ 92.90 0.03 Wheat♦ Mar 800.25 3.50 Can 4.25%' 26 123.55 -0.600 -0.558 -0.01 5.25 77478.98 8
12/49 0.40 86.33 0.96 0.06 0.11 0.26 0.28
RBOB Gasoline† Mar 2.61 -0.04 Soybeans♦ Mar 1596.50 6.00 Fr 2.10%' 23 107.96 -3.241 -3.241 0.08 18.05 266650.56 17
Netherlands 07/23 1.75 103.28 -0.59 -0.05 -0.09 0.05 0.09 inflation 0% inflation 5%
Heating Oil† - - Soybeans Meal♦ Mar 449.50 0.40 Swe 1.00%' 25 122.09 -1.762 -1.780 -0.44 35.88 212240.71 6
07/27 0.75 103.58 0.08 -0.05 -0.10 0.32 0.59 Real yield Feb 18 Dur yrs Previous Yr ago Feb 18 Dur yrs Previous Yr ago
Natural Gas† Mar 4.56 0.05 Cocoa (ICE Liffe)X Mar 1689.00 -5.00 UK 0.125%' 24 108.20 -3.621 -3.400 -0.36 15.24 818386.81 31
Ethanol♦ - - Cocoa (ICE US)♥ Mar 2603.00 11.00 New Zealand 04/27 4.50 108.89 2.64 -0.03 0.09 0.28 1.66 Up to 5 yrs -3.33 2.20 -3.22 -2.86 -3.84 2.20 -3.75 -3.36
UK 2.50%' 24 365.93 -3.107 -2.844 -0.45 6.82 818386.81 31
Uranium† - - Coffee(Robusta)X Mar 2273.00 -17.00 05/31 1.50 89.52 2.80 -0.02 0.08 0.26 1.27 Over 5 yrs -2.21 23.36 -2.13 -2.02 -2.24 23.43 -2.16 -2.05
UK 2.00%' 35 301.27 -2.398 -2.294 -1.48 9.08 818386.81 31
Carbon Emissions‡ - - Coffee (Arabica)♥ Mar 248.55 -3.20 05/31 1.50 89.52 2.80 -0.02 0.08 0.26 1.27 5-15 yrs -2.62 9.49 -2.53 -2.53 -2.73 9.50 -2.64 -2.64
US 0.625%' 23 104.34 -3.041 -2.993 0.68 47.03 1723257.41 45
White SugarX 485.50 1.40 Norway - - - - - - - Over 15 yrs -2.16 28.65 -2.07 -1.95 -2.17 28.66 -2.09 -1.97
Diesel† - - US 3.625%' 28 127.84 -0.781 -0.731 -1.18 16.78 1723257.41 45
Sugar 11♥ 18.42 0.18 - - - - - - - All stocks -2.22 21.18 -2.14 -2.03 -2.25 21.27 -2.17 -2.06
Base Metals (♠ LME 3 Months) Representative stocks from each major market Source: Merill Lynch Global Bond Indices † Local currencies. ‡ Total market
Aluminium 3263.50 5.00 Cotton♥ Mar 122.64 0.72 Portugal 10/23 4.95 108.87 -0.32 -0.07 -0.17 0.22 0.24 See FTSE website for more details www.ftse.com/products/indices/gilts
value. In line with market convention, for UK Gilts inflation factor is applied to price, for other markets it is applied to par
Aluminium Alloy 2550.00 25.00 Orange Juice♥ Mar 134.20 0.85 04/27 4.13 118.73 0.43 -0.04 -0.05 0.50 0.61 ©2018 Tradeweb Markets LLC. All rights reserved. The Tradeweb FTSE
amount.
Copper 9942.50 20.00 Palm Oil♣ - - Spain - - - - - - - Gilt Closing Prices information contained herein is proprietary to
Lead 2335.00 0.00 Live Cattle♣ Feb 143.50 -0.05 BONDS: TEN YEAR GOVT SPREADS 10/23 4.40 107.90 -0.26 -0.06 -0.17 0.22 0.21 Tradeweb; may not be copied or re-distributed; is not warranted to be
Nickel 24180.00 250.00 Feeder Cattle♣ May 134.88 - Sweden 11/23 1.50 102.67 -0.04 -0.02 -0.06 0.09 0.25 accurate, complete or timely; and does not constitute investment advice.
Tin 43850.00 -100.00 Lean Hogs♣ Apr 107.73 1.90 Spread Spread Spread Spread 12/27 0.13 121.97 -1.60 0.01 -0.04 0.45 0.12 Tradeweb is not responsible for any loss or damage that might result from the use of this information.
Zinc 3575.00 -43.50 Bid vs vs Bid vs vs 06/30 0.13 120.17 -1.58 0.00 -0.07 0.39 0.03
% Chg % Chg Yield Bund T-Bonds Yield Bund T-Bonds Switzerland - - - - - - - All data provided by Morningstar unless otherwise noted. All elements listed are indicative and believed accurate
Precious Metals (PM London Fix)
Gold 1893.45 30.85 Feb 17 Month Year 06/24 1.25 103.66 -0.33 -0.04 -0.09 0.15 0.40 at the time of publication. No offer is made by Morningstar, its suppliers, or the FT. Neither the FT, nor
Australia 2.22 - - Netherlands 0.08 - -
Silver (US cents) 2358.50 8.50 S&P GSCI Spt 639.52 1.70 35.28 United Kingdom - - - - - - - Morningstar’s suppliers, warrant or guarantee that the information is reliable or complete. Neither the FT nor
Austria 0.67 - - New Zealand 2.80 - -
Platinum 1079.00 36.00 DJ UBS Spot 111.53 1.16 30.86 Canada - - - Norway - - - 07/23 0.75 99.34 1.22 -0.06 -0.01 0.51 1.23 Morningstar’s suppliers accept responsibility and will not be liable for any loss arising from the reliance on the
Palladium 2372.00 92.00 TR/CC CRB TR 280.37 3.37 39.83 Denmark - - - Portugal 0.43 - - 07/27 1.25 99.78 1.29 -0.07 -0.06 0.33 1.01 use of the listed information. For all queries e-mail ft.reader.enquiries@morningstar.com
Bulk Commodities LEBA EUA Carbon 58.91 -1.98 129.94 Finland 0.50 - - Spain - - - 07/47 1.50 97.93 1.60 -0.03 -0.06 0.25 0.46
Iron Ore 143.88 1.65 LEBA UK Power 1048.00 -37.43 -39.60 Germany - - - Sweden -1.58 - - United States 03/23 0.50 99.32 1.14 -0.04 -0.06 0.53 1.01 Data provided by Morningstar | www.morningstar.co.uk
GlobalCOAL RB Index 232.50 6.00 Ireland - - - Switzerland - - - 03/27 0.63 94.01 1.86 -0.07 -0.09 0.29 1.07
Baltic Dry Index 1964.00 78.00 Italy 1.62 - - United Kingdom - - - 04/32 3.38 141.33 - - - - -
Sources: † NYMEX, ‡ ECX/ICE, ♦ CBOT, X ICE Liffe, ♥ ICE Futures, ♣ CME, ♠ LME/London Metal Exchange.* Latest prices, $ Japan 0.41 - - United States - - - 02/50 0.25 101.16 0.21 0.01 0.08 - -
unless otherwise stated. Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data LLC, an ICE Data Services company. Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data LLC, an ICE Data Services company.
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 17

FINANCIAL TIMES SHARE SERVICE

Main Market
52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol
Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s
Aerospace & Defence CtyLonInv 526.00 8.00 579.91 450.60 5.89 13.56 83.3 Philips € 29.95 0.13 50.98 27.94 2.92 26.24 2622.9 Hyve Group 113.00 - 158.20 80.95 - -2.49 592.3 Civitas SH 86.70 - 121.00 85.20 6.27 14.80 1530.2 Essentra PLC 313.50 -1.50 348.50 250.00 1.05 53.14 147.3
Avon Rubber♦ 1080 -31.00 3660 860.00 2.71 -18.23 206.0 CloseBrs 1229 13.00 1702 1210 4.72 9.20 293.6 PZCusns 207.00 2.50 279.50 184.20 2.80 24.73 424.5 Informa 601.00 -8.00 628.00 459.80 - -26.59 2372.3 DrwntLdn 3194 -50.00 3850 3098 2.33 69.30 187.0 Experian 2828 -63.00 3689 36.74 1.24 36.28 1191.3
BAE Sys 597.40 3.00 613.20 408.29 6.28 10.86 8745.2 CoinShares Int Ltd SKr 71.40 -1.40 129.00 58.00 - -0.12 37.8 ReckittBX 6273 121.00 6709 4905.16 2.78 -27.14 1908.6 ITV 116.95 -1.00 134.15 101.90 - 12.99 5278.7 Great Portland 735.50 -15.00 810.50 636.00 1.71 -9.22 515.5 Ferguson 11175 70.00 13360 8344 2.93 18.37 532.3
Chemring 259.00 -1.50 346.00 244.40 1.62 17.99 979.9 Hargr Lans 1277.5 -10.50 1778 1276 2.99 20.44 814.8 Redrow 603.20 3.20 743.60 540.00 0.99 8.20 637.8 Pearson 621.00 -2.20 883.60 571.00 3.14 16.83 1369.5 Hammersn 37.06 -0.36 44.60 20.34 1.08 -2.08 3811.6 Hays 145.70 1.10 181.10 135.40 - 40.03 2723.4
Meggitt 745.00 -0.20 846.00 391.90 - 99.33 5029.0 Indvardn SKr 276.30 -6.50 339.30 262.50 2.44 5.65 350.5 Superdry Plc 194.60 -4.00 493.00 180.00 - -4.42 417.6 Hibernia € 1.18 -0.03 1.37 1.06 4.72 25.43 559.2 Homesve 742.50 5.00 1218 728.50 3.50 66.89 501.0
ICG 1735 -38.50 2493 1714 3.23 9.95 462.5 TedBaker 86.30 -1.55 217.60 79.60 - -39.23 500.0
MEDIA LandSecs 803.40 10.40 807.40 604.40 4.23 -20.98 1836.2 HowdenJny 742.40 -7.80 985.80 687.00 1.23 17.31 989.0
RollsRoyceX 117.06 -0.96 161.91 86.69 - 2.56 25457.8
Investec 423.00 -3.10 467.00 194.30 3.07 10.63 1487.6 Vistry Group 1009 -2.50 1351 831.43 1.98 10.67 303.3 Reach PLC 233.50 -3.00 430.00 195.40 1.82 -12.29 881.9 LondonMtrc 258.00 -2.00 285.20 204.80 3.39 5.50 1735.5 Intertek 5160 -34.00 6306 65.61 2.05 31.33 189.6
Automobiles & Parts Jupiter 219.40 - 309.40 217.40 7.79 9.58 1277.6 Media McKaySec 227.00 5.00 246.00 193.00 3.66 14.98 5.0 Kin and Carta 240.00 5.00 359.00 133.28 - -80.00 117.6
FordMtr $X♦ 17.95 0.41 24.91 11.13 - 25.45 61932.5 Liontrust 1532 12.00 2560.05 25.56 3.07 19.16 315.3
Industrial Engineering Palace Cap 242.50 -11.00 290.00 190.00 4.54 11.60 26.2 MearsGp 211.00 -1.00 228.00 147.50 - 48.73 106.1
Bodycote 767.00 14.50 1007 684.45 4.26 42.85 170.0 RELX PLCX 2233 -8.00 2634.82 1484.9 2.10 32.27 2461.6
LSE Gp 6620 -134.00 9388 5995.57 1.13 61.07 530.0 614.20 -9.20 803.16 551.80 0.73 34.76 1356.6 PrimyHth♦ 132.70 -1.50 170.20 132.50 3.45 12.52 5055.6 MenziesJ 583.00 -1.00 599.00 202.50 - -13.37 2176.4
Banks Castings 346.00 -4.00 420.00 330.00 4.41 16.72 1.7 Rightmove PLC
M&G Plc 213.40 - 254.30 131.00 8.54 88.92 6346.9 STV Grp 353.00 7.00 385.00 310.00 1.70 8.50 2.3 SEGRO 1265.5 -12.00 1437.5 14.24 1.75 5.91 4998.7 Mitie 59.50 -0.70 79.00 50.00 - 29.75 1091.7
ANZ A$X 28.15 -0.07 29.64 25.64 3.78 13.52 5198.8 Goodwin 3100 -50.00 4000 2720 3.30 17.13 0.5
Providnt 315.80 1.20 383.80 3.24 - -7.29 324.1 ThmReut C$X 127.60 -0.36 156.62 101.02 1.60 7.66 32.7 Shaftbry 588.50 -4.00 674.50 558.50 0.41 -11.32 265.4 Renewi 626.00 -9.00 855.00 377.50 - 13.24 81.6
BcoSant 274.35 -6.15 302.14 223.35 0.86 9.91 397.8 Hill&Sm 1472 -20.00 1922 1240 1.81 58.18 66.5
RathbnGrp 1784 -10.00 2085 1522 4.04 22.33 71.1 WPPX 1184 -8.50 1231.5 11.00 2.03 30.08 1837.0 Town Ctr 155.00 0.25 170.50 107.00 2.26 -140.91 2.1 Rentokil 490.90 -8.80 662.00 6.28 1.10 35.44 2900.1
BnkGeorgia 1506 -48.00 1696 945.00 - 4.66 42.8 IMI 1588 - 1878 1150.09 3.07 23.88 698.5
Record 78.00 2.20 108.15 60.00 2.95 21.43 82.6 TritaxBBOX 228.00 -0.60 288.00 121.80 2.82 5.40 9261.0 Ricardo 455.00 -1.00 510.00 352.68 0.38 156.90 46.6
BankIre Grp € 6.43 0.10 7.03 3.26 - 22.91 358.7 MelroseInd 154.45 -1.10 205.28 139.87 0.54 -77.23 5323.6 Mining
S&U 2600 -115.00 2950 2140 3.46 12.28 0.3 Wkspace 754.50 -24.00 979.00 713.50 2.35 -11.21 119.3 RbrtWlts 688.00 4.00 850.00 510.00 2.25 29.40 50.5
BkNvaS C$X 92.14 0.12 95.00 70.57 3.98 11.75 118.6 Renold 27.00 -0.40 34.94 14.70 - 9.64 54.9
Schroder 3228 12.00 3913 3203 3.53 16.32 173.3 AngloAmer 3526 3.00 3626 2350 2.05 8.99 2237.8 Real Estate Inv & Services SIG 38.60 -1.02 65.00 32.22 - -10.72 1023.3
BarclaysX 191.16 -1.48 217.63 111.83 1.57 5.23 37618.6 RHIM 3194 -100.00 4762 2872 4.03 25.14 22.1
..N/V 1990 -4.00 2770 1967.41 5.73 10.06 40.2 AngloPacif 143.00 -3.00 162.00 119.41 2.45 105.93 219.1 Cap&Count 167.90 -0.50 188.20 154.00 - -3.89 1541.8 Vp 920.00 - 1070 770.00 2.72 22.67 12.5
CanImp C$X 160.52 -0.26 167.50 113.20 3.70 11.32 54.2 Rotork 312.20 0.40 381.40 254.71 3.27 28.38 792.3
Shires Income 269.00 2.00 294.00 229.43 4.98 3.75 11.6 AnGoldA R 335.50 4.20 377.00 213.56 2.09 10.25 1925.8 CLS 209.50 -1.50 269.21 199.40 3.60 13.18 194.8
HSBCX 544.40 4.30 567.20 329.55 2.98 13.11 23819.6
TP ICAP 124.70 -2.60 263.05 123.42 5.61 18.47 1271.9 Severfd 71.00 -0.40 84.84 63.00 4.08 12.68 37.8 Antofagasta 1404 31.00 1972 1147.5 2.83 18.58 902.7
Tech - Hardware
LlydsBkgX 51.22 -0.07 54.50 36.91 1.11 7.88 148795.6 Trifast 143.00 4.50 170.00 121.45 1.12 23.64 53.6 Grainger 284.20 -3.40 340.00 242.45 1.92 17.65 595.6 SpirentCM 234.60 -4.40 310.60 3.30 1.87 24.39 1156.3
BHP Group 2555 52.50 2613 1774.56 - - 3765.1 Harworth Grp 171.50 -3.50 193.30 113.00 1.05 6.35 285.0
NWGX 234.50 -5.80 258.10 167.55 2.56 11.44 38487.2 Food & Beverages Weir 1623 -16.00 2108 22.32 - 27.70 289.1 EVRAZ 283.20 -22.10 707.60 276.99 17.89 3.73 7384.2
PermTSB € 1.72 -0.01 1.85 0.92 - -5.77 4.2 AngloEst 721.00 - 776.00 553.58 0.10 6.61 4.7 Helical 394.00 - 513.00 355.00 2.56 9.52 229.7 Tech - Software & Services
Industrial General Fresnillo 685.80 -9.20 1003 610.60 2.69 11.42 979.2 Lon&Assc 14.50 - 20.97 7.90 - -1.97 1.3 Computcnt 2710 -16.00 3098 1645.22 1.87 17.02 262.9
RylBkC C$X♦ 141.48 0.02 148.26 106.82 3.11 12.56 113.2 AscBrFdX 1907.5 8.50 2528 1719 0.33 31.53 1438.3
Coats Group 62.10 -0.30 79.90 55.20 1.52 14.84 700.3 GlencoreX 422.00 1.30 442.35 263.50 1.03 36.44 47284.7 MacauPrp 45.20 -0.90 72.50 43.00 - -15.61 0.0 MicroFoc 408.20 -8.80 596.20 309.94 2.75 -0.88 630.5
StandChX 579.20 21.20 581.80 406.20 1.54 14.10 10711.2 Barr(AG) 505.00 4.00 590.00 462.50 - 17.93 29.6
Macfrlne 126.00 0.50 146.00 82.20 2.02 14.96 54.0 Harmony R 62.40 4.37 80.40 42.55 1.84 7.26 4709.9 Mntview♦■ 13750 -200.00 15200 10700 3.09 17.14 0.9 NCC Grp 184.20 -2.20 348.00 179.00 2.52 52.63 1523.4
..7.375%Pf 126.50 -4.25 141.54 122.00 5.83 - 2.8 Britvic 879.50 -1.00 1018 791.50 3.19 22.78 253.6
Smith DS 367.60 1.20 465.97 355.97 3.29 20.89 4044.3 Petropvlsk 15.98 -0.02 29.35 13.92 - 22.07 13853.1 Raven Property Group Ltd 28.50 0.05 36.90 25.00 - 2.58 33.3 Sage 668.60 -16.60 862.20 556.00 2.60 25.64 2904.3
..8.25%Pf 142.80 -5.95 156.79 136.20 5.78 - 2.7 CarrsGroup 147.75 -3.50 168.50 121.00 3.28 18.24 19.7
Smiths 1514.5 3.00 1738.57 1347.5 3.08 38.73 965.1 PolymtIntl 1169.5 -12.50 1737 18.18 8.03 6.87 2870.4 RavenR Prf 110.00 1.00 179.00 90.80 - 123.18 42.6 TriadGp 135.00 - 180.87 85.00 1.48 14.82 13.0
TntoDom C$X 106.29 -0.30 109.08 75.02 3.03 13.52 117.5 Coca-Cola HBC 2425 -6.00 2809.6 2226 - 19.62 608.9
SmurfKap 4068 43.00 4334 2823.76 4.14 20.74 220.3 Rio TintoX 5657 69.00 6876.26 4354 5.95 6.78 2239.0 Safestre 1237 -45.00 1425 728.58 1.50 10.66 255.6
Westpc A$X 23.53 0.04 27.12 20.00 3.84 16.84 12505.1 Cranswk 3694 6.00 4200 36.94 1.89 19.51 42.6 Telecommunications
Vesuvius 420.60 -1.40 595.00 408.80 4.14 18.53 212.6 Troy Res A$ 0.04 0.00 0.20 0.03 - -0.58 3131.9 Savills 1331 - 1472 1029.85 1.28 17.11 111.2
Devro 214.00 -3.50 240.00 170.93 7.15 13.13 81.3 BTX 197.35 2.20 206.70 122.65 - 19.16 18861.6
Basic Resource (Ex Mining) Oil & Gas SiriusRE 126.20 -0.20 145.20 88.70 2.59 9.84 1104.2
DiageoX 3658.5 42.50 4364.1 2805.28 1.93 32.26 3870.2 Industrial Transportation TelePlus 1474 12.00 1648 993.65 3.87 37.79 42.3
Ferrexpo 276.60 2.20 513.00 223.89 5.18 2.15 840.1 Smart(J) 161.50 - 164.50 120.00 1.99 6.17 4.0
Grncore 137.20 -0.10 174.30 116.50 - 27.44 544.2 Braemar 254.00 -1.00 323.00 196.00 1.97 8.43 24.6 BPX 391.40 -6.50 419.15 263.90 3.97 16.26 44226.3 Vodafone GpX 137.58 -0.38 142.74 106.30 5.62 -307.79 46207.4
HiltonFd 1064 -2.00 1298 986.00 2.11 22.21 34.2 CairnEng 210.00 - 213.44 122.00 - -11.92 1597.1 U+I 148.50 -0.50 151.50 58.51 - -2.12 98.8
Chemicals Fisher J 431.00 11.50 1292 280.00 1.86 -4.43 41.2
Elemntis 135.00 -0.30 165.78 117.50 - 93.23 716.9 Kerry € 110.25 0.45 130.00 98.65 0.81 33.49 19.8 OceanWil 935.00 - 1160 810.00 8.56 4.76 2.1 ExxonMb $X 77.05 -1.18 83.08 51.86 4.55 -55.02 9267.5 Retailers Tobacco
Johnsn Mtthey 1794 21.50 3363 18.81 3.90 22.62 803.2 PremFds 115.40 1.60 127.00 86.64 0.87 12.02 852.5 RoyalMail 419.10 -2.60 613.80 403.88 2.39 4.80 2856.7 Gazprom PJSC ADR $ 8.07 -0.51 10.97 4.95 4.25 3.63 11346.2 Caffyns 600.00 - 650.00 320.00 - 8.72 7.5 BrAmTobX 3409 -26.50 3456.5 2478 6.21 12.64 3674.4
Victrex 1914 -49.00 2720 1914 3.11 22.79 82.0 StckSpirit 377.00 1.00 487.00 230.50 2.18 42.71 14358.2 GeoPark $ 14.15 -0.27 18.50 9.50 0.73 -8.95 28.1 Dunelm 1295 12.00 1599 1219 0.93 20.59 431.6 Imperial BrX♦ 1779 25.50 1822 1330 7.76 5.95 1786.5
Tate&Lyl 764.40 -0.60 821.20 624.40 4.03 16.37 1403.4 Insurance Harbour Energy 351.00 -3.60 8204 16.75 - - 892.9 Halfords 293.00 -2.80 441.80 263.00 1.71 9.77 373.6
Construction & Materials Unilever 3857.5 58.00 4924 3620 3.76 21.81 5832.2 Admiral 2963 -30.00 3706 2574.3 4.00 13.26 315.4 HellenPet € 6.58 0.02 6.83 5.30 1.56 8.19 49.8
Travel & Leisure
Inchcape 833.00 -3.00 940.50 679.00 0.83 44.78 485.5 Carnival 1487.6 -46.80 1890.2 1073 - -2.46 670.0
Boot(H) 305.00 1.00 322.56 252.00 1.80 16.31 49.6 ..NV - - - - - - - AvivaX 432.20 -0.10 448.80 360.48 6.25 14.41 7676.0 ImpOil C$X 55.94 -0.14 57.72 25.99 1.77 73.64 31.0 JDSportsF 165.70 0.70 1178.5 164.25 0.17 20.02 10815.4
CRH 3608 -40.00 3949 41.78 2.31 26.19 674.6 Beazley 481.10 -2.10 516.20 291.50 - 39.09 1019.8 PJSC Lukoil ADR $ 86.35 -2.58 107.57 75.98 4.15 7.49 1.7 Dalata Hotel 339.50 20.75 414.50 270.50 - -12.97 19.8
Health Care Equip & Services Kingfisher 323.00 4.10 389.67 259.50 2.55 8.26 4622.8 easyJet 674.40 -15.60 1095 6.81 - -4.24 3731.5
GalfrdT 180.00 -2.70 213.00 118.30 0.67 19.78 73.2 Chesnar 292.00 -5.50 319.50 261.00 7.51 9.62 68.7 RylDShlAX 1895.2 -24.00 1930.8 16.51 2.92 43.31 31360.9 Marks&Sp 184.60 -1.40 249.99 129.75 - 142.00 4273.1
MorgSdl 2125 -45.00 2730 1410 2.87 13.26 26.8 ConvaTec 172.75 -0.90 265.00 165.40 2.37 35.10 3253.1 Direct Line 300.00 -2.40 330.50 2.70 7.37 11.36 4012.1 ..B 1894.6 -23.80 1930.8 1229.8 2.92 43.30 21317.0 FirstGrp 104.70 -1.50 110.70 72.05 - 24.93 1110.1
GNStre kr 334.30 -17.00 589.40 332.80 0.45 22.78 481.3 Morrison (Wm) 286.40 - 297.00 161.30 2.50 -236.69 5405.8
Flutter Entertainment 10530 -485.00 19680.8 9912 - -264.57 461.6
Tyman 348.50 -1.50 509.35 324.50 1.15 13.40 236.2 Eccles prf 144.00 - 172.00 140.00 5.99 - 31.1 TrnCan C$X 66.55 -0.05 68.20 53.20 5.21 34.40 60.2 Next 6850 -68.00 8484 6850 - 15.06 220.8
Mediclinic 337.80 -6.40 353.04 271.40 - 21.11 451.5 Hansard 51.50 - 66.83 22.05 8.64 14.31 3.7 Wood Group (John) PLC 234.10 -2.10 342.60 171.90 - -9.63 840.2 Fuller A 726.00 27.00 977.73 580.00 - -15.16 7.2
Electronic & Electrical Equip Smith & Nephew 1196 -12.50 1607.17 1184 2.24 26.18 2311.8 Ocado 1300 -60.50 2629 1140.5 - -65.33 2312.7 IntCon Htels Gp 4974 -106.00 5568 51.02 - -4910.17 394.7
Hiscox 925.60 -17.20 1002 763.60 - -182.67 580.1 Saga 300.00 -15.00 464.60 228.34 - -32.06 398.4
Dialight 341.50 8.50 380.00 240.00 - -23.13 0.4
Lancashire 509.00 -10.00 725.00 487.60 2.15 20.68 344.8 Pharmaceuticals & Biotech Intl Cons Air 161.52 -4.78 222.10 122.06 - -2.82 23768.4
Discoverie PLC 822.00 -13.00 1274 600.20 1.23 67.38 172.2 House, Leisure & Pers Goods AstraZenecaX 8801 -117.00 9523 6499.8 2.36 106.91 1682.4 Sainsbury (J) 277.90 -0.30 342.00 218.90 3.81 23.35 3243.2 Natl Exp 262.00 -5.00 413.50 206.70 - -5.65 870.8
BarrttDev 603.00 0.40 889.55 592.93 1.24 9.42 2951.9 Leg&Gen 272.40 -0.20 299.60 248.95 6.45 8.10 9785.2 Studio Retail Group# 115.00 -2.50 319.00 90.00 - 2.49 60.9
Halma 2286 -29.00 3232 2214 0.77 33.10 542.9 Dechra 3784 -126.00 5525 50.52 0.93 74.15 182.5 PPHE Htl 1370 - 1800 1269.6 - -6.09 0.9
Bellway 2936 11.00 3756 37.93 2.90 9.30 265.6 Old Mut 66.80 -1.65 84.80 54.75 2.59 16.64 209.9 TescoX 294.20 0.50 304.10 2.74 3.40 22.46 13949.7
Morgan Ad 310.50 -1.50 418.50 292.00 1.77 20.56 267.4 GlaxoSmhX 1567 -12.60 1696.9 1190.8 5.11 18.40 7840.6 Restaurt 99.00 -4.00 140.00 0.76 - 10.41 1027.4
Berkeley 3949 -27.00 5232 3939 0.23 10.28 173.8 PhoenixGrp 647.00 -5.00 764.37 558.80 7.34 -12.86 1577.1
OxfordIn 1942 -2.00 2830 1700 0.88 26.53 45.5 HikmaPhm 1968.5 -21.00 2703 30.00 1.84 13.54 268.7 Support Services TUI 271.50 -15.30 470.97 189.85 - -1.44 4939.3
Burberry Gp 2033 39.00 2267 1689.5 2.09 17.50 1020.8 PrudntlX 1159.5 -24.00 1598.5 1155.25 1.01 16.11 3842.5
Renishaw 4656 -58.00 7025 4226 0.30 30.39 44.2 Oxfd Bio 739.00 -19.00 1678 739.00 - 33.23 115.2 AshtdGp 4778 -141.00 7448.22 3830 0.88 25.48 1255.7 Whitbrd 3111 -32.00 3949.01 36.28 - -25.25 415.0
Cairn Homes 102.00 -4.00 109.80 77.60 - 49.71 217.0 StJmsPl 1516.5 0.50 1710 1165 3.28 40.12 780.6
Spectris 3213 -27.00 4167 2945 3.47 16.23 208.5 RichterG $ 25.40 -0.40 30.60 25.00 2.84 12.67 0.0 Bunzl 2736 -4.00 3000 2122 3.29 20.15 432.9
TT Elect 223.00 1.00 296.50 200.00 2.11 37.80 119.1 CtrySide 301.00 -10.00 579.50 292.60 - 21.97 1794.0 LEISURE Utilities
Crest Nicholson 315.00 -3.60 469.00 45.34 - 13.76 334.3 Real Estate Capita 29.68 0.02 55.98 29.30 - 1.96 3823.8 Drax 619.50 5.00 643.50 356.40 2.76 -19.73 1236.0
XP Power 4645 45.00 5800 4390 1.98 24.81 11.8 PhotoMe International Plc 74.60 0.50 79.70 48.70 11.31 8.40 142.5 DCC 6184 -16.00 6684 5476 2.58 20.44 196.8
GamesWk♦ 7615 -150.00 12310 7615 3.35 20.97 61.5 REITs Natl GridX 1089.6 11.00 1105.6 805.40 4.51 25.40 5562.8
Financial General Gleeson 700.00 2.00 910.00 682.02 0.71 12.05 19.5 Media DeLaRue 112.80 -2.20 214.94 104.00 - 14.84 389.5 Pennon♦ 1064 13.00 1751.7 671.50 3.07 77.10 680.4
Assura 60.50 -0.95 80.60 60.50 4.79 12.10 11357.3 Diploma 2586 -34.00 3504 2286 1.64 46.26 75.0
3i 1313 -7.50 1477 1069 2.93 4.55 1372.8 Headlam 425.00 1.00 538.00 390.00 0.47 25.00 7.3 4imprint 2700 40.00 3265 2152.65 - 186.31 11.9 BigYellw 1402 -19.00 1760 1040 2.40 9.24 186.1 Severn Trent 2851 22.00 3791.55 2148 3.56 -105.99 381.6
abrdn 233.40 1.70 333.40 226.10 6.26 3.57 4664.4 McBride 47.50 -1.50 97.80 46.10 2.32 6.09 55.4 Auto Trader Group PLC 633.00 -1.00 751.40 538.00 0.79 31.23 1798.6 DWF Group PLC♦ 113.50 -1.50 124.00 78.00 3.96 -22.25 61.7 SSE 1612 6.50 2166.93 1284.5 5.02 6.30 3907.9
BritLand 542.60 3.40 553.60 454.10 2.77 74.33 2734.2 Elctrcmp 1016 4.00 1276 12.05 2.50 25.79 515.4
Bridgepoint Grp Plc 363.00 -15.50 571.00 347.00 - - 377.4 Persimn 2414 6.00 3272 2321 9.73 9.76 807.6 DlyMailA 270.00 -2.50 1178 264.50 8.96 10.31 111.0 Cap&Reg 63.00 1.10 96.31 54.00 - -0.55 7.8 UtdUtils 1061.5 11.00 1138.5 851.80 4.07 97.39 1232.0

AIM
52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol 52 Week Vol
Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s Price +/-Chg High Low Yld P/E 000s
Aerospace & Defence LPA 74.50 - 86.50 52.60 - 17.49 0.0 Health Care Equip & Services Media Pharmaceuticals & Biotech LonSec 2950 200.00 2900 2151 2.71 16.27 0.2
Cohort 465.00 -4.00 682.00 450.00 2.39 41.33 16.9 ThorpeFW 465.00 5.00 525.00 312.00 1.22 34.39 14.7 AVO 26.50 - 42.75 26.00 - -3.15 83.7 Mission Group 61.50 - 91.75 54.00 2.49 66.13 3.0 Abcam 1210 -67.00 1780 1200 - 168.06 536.6 NWF 205.00 6.00 230.00 182.50 3.37 12.89 26.8
Velocity Composites PLC 23.50 -0.50 32.00 18.00 - -2.61 0.0 Zytronic 152.50 -2.50 205.00 130.00 - -27.73 163.6 CareTech 594.00 -16.00 701.00 507.95 2.15 13.39 81.7 YouGov 1350 -30.00 1600 930.00 0.37 131.07 124.9 Clinigen Group 920.50 1.00 948.05 541.50 0.83 31.52 1372.8 Petards 11.35 - 16.00 9.14 - 20.64 1.1
Tristel 417.50 - 810.00 400.00 1.55 66.06 115.9 Reneuron 38.50 - 153.78 29.00 - -2.42 20.8 Renew♦ 710.00 -8.50 889.00 482.00 1.85 17.55 52.9
Banks Financial General Mining Smart Metering Systems 729.00 11.00 1038 645.00 3.43 513.38 87.7
Sareum 4.70 0.30 10.00 1.50 - -94.00 17060.2
Caribbean Inv 26.50 - 45.40 24.03 - 3.05 138.6 Appreciate Grp 27.45 -0.40 42.60 21.30 3.64 11.93 387.6 House, Leisure & Pers Goods AMC 3.20 -0.05 4.00 1.22 - -74.30 7518.9
Arbuthnot 925.00 -15.00 1190 799.98 - 53.16 0.2 Airea 30.50 - 37.00 24.01 - 13.56 3.9 Arkle Resources 0.80 -0.05 1.28 0.52 - -2.67 446.8 Real Estate Tech - Hardware
Basic Resource (Ex Mining) BP Marsh 325.00 1.00 363.00 258.00 0.75 8.95 11.8 Churchll 1610 10.00 2050 1290 - 191.67 3.4 BotswanaD 1.13 0.08 1.70 0.70 - -18.75 620.5 Lok'nStor 1010 - 1049.6 580.00 1.32 90.99 19.7 Aferian plc 148.00 0.50 172.00 122.50 1.22 49.61 238.6
CropperJ 1350 - 1650 1010 - 41.16 0.5 Burford Capital Ltd 683.00 -15.00 969.50 574.00 1.33 -42.89 193.8 Frontier Developments PLC 1320 - 3290 1294 - 38.04 50.7 CentAsiaM 233.50 1.50 386.00 212.00 5.94 10.39 762.8 SIR 404.50 -1.50 447.50 283.00 3.61 20.23 477.6 IQE 39.80 -0.60 81.25 27.53 - -442.22 2812.1
MattioliWds 812.50 - 908.00 470.00 2.49 162.50 6.0 Portmern 645.00 -10.00 920.00 530.00 - 27.55 9.0 Gemfields 15.50 - 18.35 6.25 - -21.41 6.5
Chemicals Retailers Tech - Software & Services
Numis 278.00 7.00 419.86 266.00 4.32 5.66 49.9 Sanderson Design Grp 172.00 -3.50 235.00 93.00 - 14.74 55.7
Directa Plus PLC 139.00 2.00 178.00 97.55 - -32.39 9.7 Oil & Gas ASOS 1959.5 -43.50 5994.95 23.51 - 15.61 675.4 BoBlue Prism Group PLC 1260 - 1817.55 747.50 - -25.78 309.1
Premier Miton Group 175.50 0.50 200.00 135.00 4.67 19.59 58.6
Versarien PLC 26.38 0.40 48.90 22.00 - -7.55 71.1 Industrial Engineering BorSthnPet 0.96 -0.14 1.69 0.50 - -8.81 962.8 Boohoo Group PLC 90.84 -3.16 373.40 85.06 - 19.58 8113.3 Eckoh 49.50 - 85.40 40.00 1.23 48.53 96.8
Rockwood Realisation 1465 - 1840 1270 1.87 2.15 1.6
STM Group 30.70 -0.30 37.50 27.60 4.56 11.82 24.1 600 Grp 12.50 - 17.00 8.00 - 73.10 10.0 ClontarfEn 0.24 - 0.52 0.21 - -4.70 878.0 CVS Group PLC 1580 -294.00 2835 1512 - 58.30 1506.3 Ingenta 97.50 - 102.80 62.00 1.54 57.02 0.6
Construction & Materials
MS Intl 222.00 - 240.00 145.00 1.58 31.71 1.1 Egdon Res 2.24 -0.26 2.80 1.20 - -2.87 4251.2 Oxford Metrics♦ 111.00 -1.50 132.00 89.00 1.62 48.26 395.9
AccsysTch 156.25 -3.00 194.20 135.58 - -91.80 12.5 Food & Beverages Support Services
Pres Tech 71.50 - 107.03 65.00 - -0.75 3.9 Hurricane Energy 7.10 -0.50 8.99 0.59 - -0.71 58099.7 WANdisco 278.00 -6.00 514.00 231.04 - -5.12 25.2
Aukett 2.25 - 2.50 1.30 - -5.40 10.4 Begbies 118.60 -0.60 150.34 101.83 2.53 593.00 175.7
Camellia 6675 -25.00 7650 6200 2.16 122.93 0.0 PetrelRes 1.70 - 3.29 1.60 - -8.63 50.0
Fevertree Drinks 1980 -26.00 2786.54 1960.46 0.79 51.82 283.1 IT Christie 110.00 - 139.60 85.55 - 46.81 35.9 Travel & Leisure
Electronic & Electrical Equip Phoenix Global 4.83 - 7.45 3.07 - -1.21 11.0
FinsbryFd 88.50 - 103.00 31.00 - 9.52 53.2 Keywords Studios 2348 -38.00 3908 2065.6 - 69.34 57.5 Gattaca 89.00 1.50 288.00 80.60 - 16.18 13.1 gamingrealms 27.25 -0.05 49.85 26.00 - -681.25 95.1
CeresPow 563.50 -18.50 1426 501.00 - -122.50 856.1 UnJackOil 18.75 0.95 42.00 10.50 - -9.72 1307.0
Nichols 1470 - 1650 1050 2.50 53.55 21.2 Learning Technologies Group 171.40 -1.40 277.20 148.30 0.73 72.20 2524.1 Impellam 505.00 - 515.20 236.00 - 28.69 2.3 Jet2 1320 -22.00 1573.22 916.60 - -7.09 480.5
Checkit 46.50 0.50 67.00 42.00 - -5.67 111.9
JhnsnSrv 157.80 -2.80 182.80 122.00 - -32.20 1153.5 MinoanGp 1.08 - 1.57 0.85 - -7.62 542.2

Investment Companies
Conventional (Ex Private Equity)
Price +/-Chg
52 Week
High Low Yld NAV
Dis(-)
or Pm
BMO UK HIT B
BMO UK HIT UNIT
91.00
362.00
-
-
108.00 85.50 5.82 95.5
408.00 336.00 - 382.4
-4.7
-5.3
IP UKSmall
JPM Amer
552.00 4.00 664.00 512.75
707.00 -12.00 770.00 567.00
3.50
633.0
0.95
739.7
-12.8
-4.4
Ruffer Inv Pr
Schroder ToRt
316.00
487.00
3.00 318.00
-4.00 544.99
205.00
467.00
0.60
1.46
298.8
485.2
5.8
0.4
Conventional - Property ICs
Price +/-Chg
52 Week
High Low Yld NAV
Dis(-)
or Pm
Guide to FT Share Service
3i Infra 339.50 -1.50 357.00 287.03 2.89 286.0 18.7 Brunner 1060 -15.00 1135 848.00 1.89 1152.0 -8.0 JPM Asia 441.00 -0.50 548.00 404.77 4.29
442.6 -0.4 SchdrAsiaP 571.00 -9.00 684.00 554.03 1.40 634.4 -10.0 Direct Property
AbnAsianIn 229.00 - 237.00 213.00 4.06 260.2 -12.0 Caledonia Inv 3660 -5.00 4085 2118 1.72 4745.1 -22.9 JPM China♦ 443.00 1.50 852.00 423.50 5.15
457.1 -3.1 SchdrEurReE 107.50 -1.75 119.50 83.83 5.10 126.2 -14.8 For queries about the FT Share Service pages e-mail
AEW UK REIT♦ 115.40 -0.80 122.40 80.80 6.93 113.3 1.9
Abrdn Div I&G 102.50 0.75 104.50 91.00 5.37 120.4 -14.9 CanGen C$ 40.19 0.02 45.60 35.00 2.16 57.3 -29.9 JPMElct MC 101.75 -0.75 105.00 99.50 0.39
102.7 -0.9 Schdr Inc 309.00 2.50 323.00 277.00 4.08 305.1 1.3 ft.reader.enquiries@morningstar.com.
BMO ComPrp 108.60 -1.20 118.60 1.14 3.50 125.9 -13.7
abrdn CN 661.00 -11.00 775.00 658.00 3.37 738.7 -10.5 City Lon♦ 408.00 1.00 417.00 353.45 4.67 400.3 1.9 ..MG 1000.00 -10.00 1115.3 930.00 1.60
1053.9 -5.1 SchdrJap 210.00 -2.00 231.00 193.50 2.33 233.9 -10.2 All data is as of close of the previous business day. Company classifications
BMORealE 90.20 -2.40 96.20 68.20 3.52 121.5 -25.8
AbnJapInv 655.00 -2.50 1169 630.45 2.29 725.5 -9.7 CQSNatRs♦ 166.25 1.25 184.00 123.75 3.37 199.6 -16.7 ..MI 107.00 1.00 111.00 88.00 4.44
108.1 -1.0 SchdrOrient♦ 273.50 -1.50 294.50 254.00 3.77 287.0 -4.7 are based on the ICB system used by FTSE (see www.icbenchmark.com). FTSE
Longbow 70.00 -0.10 93.00 67.80 8.57 93.1 -24.8
AbnLatAmIn 54.00 -0.25 61.60 44.20 6.48 58.7 -8.0 Dun Inc♦ 300.00 -0.50 340.67 278.90 4.27 298.0 0.7 JPM Emrg 117.00 -2.60 152.90 116.40 1.21- - SchdrRealEst 54.00 -1.20 56.90 39.25 4.69 65.9 -18.1 100 constituent stocks are shown in bold.
SLIPropInc 80.00 -0.40 88.10 59.80 4.27 100.5 -20.4
AbnNewDn 304.00 -14.00 365.00 295.00 1.41 347.9 -12.6 EcofinGlobal 196.00 3.75 209.00 160.00 3.37 195.7 0.2 JPM EurGth 363.00 -2.00 394.15 300.60 1.57
403.0 -9.9 SchdrUKMd 598.00 -16.00 809.10 592.00 2.22 690.1 -13.3
TR Prop 466.00 -7.00 526.00 339.88 3.05 476.7 -2.2 Closing prices are shown in pence unless otherwise indicated. Highs & lows
AbnNewIndia 582.00 4.00 662.00 493.05 - 678.2 -14.2 Edin Inv 635.00 -1.00 653.60 546.00 3.78 687.0 -7.6 JPM EurInc 154.25 -1.75 168.00 128.34 4.34
173.0 -10.8 SchdrUKPubPriv 29.95 0.83 39.93 27.60 - 43.4 -31.0
Tritax EuroBEUR € 1.20 -0.03 1.46 1.18 4.14 1.3 -7.7 are based on intra-day trading over a rolling 52 week period. Price/earnings
AbnNewThai 398.00 -4.00 488.00 370.04 4.77 - - Edin WWd 223.50 -10.50 415.50 209.50 - 242.2 -7.7 JPM EuDisc 459.00 -6.00 588.00 444.00 1.46
530.7 -13.5 ScotAmer 488.00 -7.50 546.00 435.00 2.47 489.6 -0.3
Tritax EuroBGBP 101.20 -0.80 125.00 100.00 - - - ratios (PER) are based on latest annual reports and accounts and are updated
AbnSmlInCo 334.50 -1.50 406.05 300.00 2.52 374.7 -10.7 EuroAsset 119.50 - 152.00 116.90 6.28 120.5 -0.8 JPM Clavr 718.00 -7.00 952.03 628.00 4.18
731.5 -1.8 Scottish Inv 893.00 -1.00 927.00 678.00 2.63 938.5 -4.8
UKComPrp 78.90 -1.70 86.79 67.40 3.24 101.6 -22.3 with interim figures. PER is calculated using the company’s diluted earnings
AbnStdAsia 280.00 6.00 1515 268.00 5.18 - - Euro Opps 714.00 -6.00 891.00 594.00 0.49 806.0 -11.4 JPMGblCoreRa♦ 88.60 - 99.20 80.60 4.2394.9 -6.6 ScottMort 1015 -44.00 1568.5 947.25 0.34 1046.0 -3.0
from continuing operations. Yields are based on closing price and on dividends
AStd Eqt Inc 367.50 - 385.00 318.00 5.61 375.1 -2.0 F&C Inv Trust 848.00 -11.00 945.56 549.00 1.43 931.0 -8.9 JPM GEI 144.50 -0.75 156.00 137.71 3.53
160.2 -9.8 ScottOrtll 1120 5.00 1258.64 968.00 1.03 1229.7 -8.9 VCTs 52 Week Dis(-)
paid in the last financial year and updated with interim figures. Yields are
Abf Sml 1398 -8.00 1622.8 1207 2.38 1575.3 -11.3 FidAsian 471.00 -1.00 510.00 415.00 1.80 505.0 -6.7 JPM Gl Gr&Inc 453.00 -4.00 475.00 381.33 2.91
446.5 1.5 Smithson 1582 -36.00 2040 1270 - 1602.4 -1.3 Price +/-Chg High Low Yld NAV or Pm
shown in net terms; dividends on UK companies are net of 10% tax, non-UK
Abf Spl Inc 78.30 1.70 92.78 62.40 4.64 86.1 -9.1 FidChiSpS 295.50 -4.50 499.00 233.50 1.58 311.1 -5.0 JPM Ind 794.00 -5.00 865.00 670.00 - 947.2 -16.2 StrategicEq 316.00 2.00 324.65 234.38 0.40 351.7 -10.2 Baronsmead 2nd VT♦ 76.00 - 87.50 50.00 8.55 79.5 -4.4 companies are gross of tax. Highs & lows, yields and PER are adjusted to reflect
Alliance 968.00 -10.00 1084.9 868.00 1.50 1039.8 -6.9 FidelityEmrgMkt 792.00 -11.00 950.00 759.00 1.58 884.2 -10.4 JPM JpCapSm G&I 388.00 6.00 568.40 375.84 5.77
404.0 -4.0 Temp Bar 1250 -6.00 1279.28 955.00 2.98 1279.5 -2.3 BSC VCT 80.50 - 85.00 67.50 8.70 83.9 -4.1 capital changes where appropriate.
AllianzTech 276.50 -12.00 386.00 237.00 - - - Fid Euro 311.50 -3.00 343.00 263.50 2.09 327.2 -4.8 JPM Jap 517.00 -7.00 732.00 515.00 0.99
533.4 -3.1 TempEmerg 173.80 -2.80 215.59 169.40 2.19 195.5 -11.1 ..VCT2 57.50 - 68.00 49.00 5.22 63.3 -9.2
Fid Jap 185.00 0.50 268.48 154.50 - 190.3 -2.8 JPM Mid 1155 -30.00 1585.23 1080 2.55
1302.5 -11.3 Tetragon $ 9.50 - 10.36 8.30 4.14 29.9 -68.2 Inc&GthVCT 92.00 - 96.00 73.00 5.43 99.9 -7.9 Trading volumes are end of day aggregated totals, rounded to the nearest
Art Alpha 393.00 -1.00 478.00 380.00 1.35 419.5 -6.3
Fid Spec 301.00 -1.50 312.00 240.50 1.95 296.2 1.6 JPMRussian 682.00 -5.00 894.00 590.00 5.13
749.4 -9.0 EurSmlCom 168.50 0.50 1560 165.51 1.66 - - Nthn 2 VCT 65.00 - 92.50 55.50 5.38 67.6 -3.8 1,000 shares.
Asia Dragon 488.00 - 600.00 477.75 0.97 540.1 -9.6
Aurora Inv 248.50 0.50 254.00 196.44 0.22 260.2 -4.5 FinsG&I 847.00 -2.00 928.00 597.80 3.03 886.9 -4.5 JPM Smlr 341.00 -1.00 478.38 335.00 1.61
384.8 -11.4 TRIG 129.00 -1.00 137.80 118.80 5.22 113.5 13.7 Nthn 3 VCT 99.50 - 107.00 84.50 4.52 104.1 -4.4 Net asset value per share (NAV) and split analytics are provided only as a
AVI JapOpp 115.50 -0.25 127.00 101.00 1.13 112.6 2.6 FstPacfic HK HK$ 3.39 - 3.47 2.17 4.23 - - JPM US Sml 395.00 -1.50 473.00 384.00 0.63
418.6 -5.6 TroyInc&G 74.00 -0.90 83.00 68.20 3.59 75.7 -2.2 NthnVent 68.75 - 78.76 62.00 6.55 74.4 -7.6 guide. Discounts and premiums are calculated using the latest cum fair net
Axiom 97.50 - 100.67 83.00 6.15 103.2 -5.5 GRIT 11.25 - 11.20 1.05 - - - Law Deb 800.00 -3.00 829.00 692.00 3.48
784.0 2.0 Utilico Emerging Market 216.00 0.50 229.00 190.05 3.63 244.3 -11.6 ProVenGI 62.00 - 63.00 51.00 4.84 65.6 -5.5 asset value estimate and closing price. Discounts, premiums, gross redemption
BG Euro 114.40 -1.40 171.06 113.01 0.31 - - HAN♦ 208.00 - 248.00 193.92 1.54 310.4 -33.0 LinTrain £ 1200 7.50 1805 1140 3.92
1117.1 7.4 UIL Inv 245.00 - 286.80 220.00 3.27 366.9 -33.2 ProVenVCT 73.50 - 72.79 64.50 4.76 77.0 -4.5 yield (GRY), and hurdle rate (HR) to share price (SP) and HR to wipe out (WO)
BG Japan 834.00 -20.00 1120 815.00 0.54 860.5 -3.1 HANA♦ 208.00 - 238.00 192.00 1.54 312.2 -33.4 Lowland 136.00 2.50 1450 133.00 44.12- - VEIL 754.00 -2.00 783.00 574.00 - 903.0 -16.5 UnicornAIM 177.00 -1.00 227.00 174.00 3.67 201.4 -12.1 are displayed as a percentage, NAV and terminal asset value per share (TAV)
BG Shin 171.00 -2.60 269.18 167.88 - 175.8 -2.7 Hen Div Inc Tr 81.00 0.40 92.80 76.71 5.43 85.8 -5.6 Majedie 210.00 2.50 253.18 198.00 5.43
259.8 -19.2 Witan 234.00 -2.50 324.75 219.50 2.34 250.4 -6.5 in pence.
Zero Dividend Preference Shares 52 Week HR
Baillie Gifford UK 195.00 -3.00 257.00 194.43 1.24 210.3 -7.3 HenEuroF 157.50 2.75 1687.63 150.79 19.87 - - Marwyn Val 115.50 -1.00 130.00 99.00 3.92
180.1 -35.9 WwideHlth 3140 -35.00 3925 2965 0.70 3267.7 -3.9
HenEuro 136.25 -4.75 1572.71 134.47 1.83 - - MercantIT 235.50 -1.50 294.50 232.11 2.85
259.9 -9.4 Price +/-Chg High Low SP WO TAV 0% X FT Global 500 company
Bankers♦ 112.20 -1.60 150.60 104.00 1.92 - - Conventional - Private Equity 52 Week Dis(-)
HenFarEs♦ 296.00 -3.50 341.50 229.00 7.87 294.0 0.7 MrchTst♦ 572.00 -4.00 591.00 437.27 4.76
566.6 1.0 Abf Spl Inc 116.00 - 118.00 109.00 -42.2 -79.8 - ♦ trading ex-dividend
BB Healthcare Trust 171.40 -5.20 209.50 160.06 2.92 178.9 -4.2 Price +/-Chg High Low Yld NAV or Pm
HenHigh 176.00 1.50 189.50 148.32 5.63 178.3 -1.3 Mid Wynd 770.00 -3.00 870.00 680.00 0.81
762.1 1.0 UIL Finance 2024 ZDP 122.50 - 125.33 114.09 -46.6 -55.9 - ■ trading ex-capital distribution
BH Macro 3960 40.00 3960 3200 - 3567.0 11.0
HenInt Inc 170.25 -2.50 176.00 147.50 3.52 178.2 -4.5 Monks 1098 -28.00 1482 1088 0.18
1182.0 -7.1 BGUSGROWTH 218.00 -8.00 401.75 205.41 - 240.6 -9.4 UIL Finance 2028 ZDP 98.00 - 102.50 97.00 -24.0 -28.1 - # price at time of suspension from trading
..USD $ 39.60 0.30 43.60 33.20 - 37.1 6.7
Hen Opp 1352.5 -17.50 1650 1291.02 2.00 1521.0 -11.1 MontanSm 164.00 -2.60 2170 159.66 0.56
166.9 -1.7 BMO PvtEq 475.00 -6.00 500.00 280.00 3.64 584.3 -18.7 UIL Finance 2026 ZDP 117.00 - 120.00 108.10 -31.5 -37.5 -
BiotechGth 929.00 -12.00 1672.55 874.85 - 956.6 -2.9 The prices listed are indicative and believed accurate at the time of publication.
HenSmlr 1064 -16.00 1378 1062 2.21 1183.8 -10.1 Mur Inc 860.00 -11.00 959.50 818.00 3.98
920.5 -6.6 HVPE 2610 -65.00 2870 1926 - 3458.0 -24.5 UIL Finance 2022 ZDP 143.50 - 144.34 133.00 -88.9 -95.7 -
BlckRoEne 114.25 -0.75 118.00 85.00 3.50 114.3 0.0 No offer is made by Morningstar or the FT. The FT does not warrant nor
Herald 1960 -38.00 2670 1920.04 - 2355.6 -16.8 Mur Int 1192 -4.00 1240 1038 4.57
1272.9 -6.4 HgCapital 421.00 -5.00 445.02 308.00 1.19 416.9 1.0
BlckRFrnt
BlckRGtEur
133.00
574.00
1.50 140.00 112.75
-4.00 732.00 514.00
3.87
1.07
143.5
567.7
-7.3
1.1 HICL Infra 170.20 -3.20 177.60 158.72 4.85 156.4 8.8 CQSNewCityHY♦ 55.80 0.40 58.20 44.30 7.9952.7 5.9 ICG Ent Tr 1220 -22.00 1300 954.00 2.05 1630.2 -25.2 Investment Companies - AIM guarantee that the information is reliable or complete. The FT does not accept
Highbridge Tactical 259.00 -7.00 286.00 240.00 - - - New Star IT 143.00 -1.00 149.00 122.40 0.98
188.2 -24.0 Pantheon International Plc ORDs 317.00 4.00 3713 300.00 - - - responsibility and will not be liable for any loss arising from the reliance on
BlckR I&G♦ 187.50 0.50 200.00 158.00 3.84 203.5 -7.9 52 Week Dis(-) or use of the information.
Impax Env. 436.50 -7.50 584.50 414.50 0.53 433.2 0.8 NorthAmer 275.00 -2.00 294.00 226.85 3.67
312.6 -12.0 PrincssPE € 12.40 -0.10 14.85 11.05 5.18 15.3 -19.0
BlckRckLat 372.00 -6.00 410.00 310.00 4.97 405.9 -8.4 Price +/-Chg High Low Yld NAV or Pm
Ind IT 524.00 6.00 608.77 500.00 1.53 590.1 -11.2 NthAtSml 4240 -110.00 5120 3814.4 0.71
6142.9 -31.0 StdLfPv 546.00 -4.00 590.00 393.00 2.44 652.1 -16.3
BlckRSmlr 1754 -38.00 2230.28 1637.36 1.90 1920.0 -8.6 BB Biotech AG SFr 62.95 -0.60 85.40 61.15 5.6 - - The FT Share Service is a paid-for-print listing service and may not be fully
IntBiotech 656.00 -4.00 826.00 590.00 4.33 658.7 -0.4 PacAsset 346.00 -2.00 376.00 307.30 0.69
367.2 -5.8 Unbound Group plc 59.60 1.60 674.00 57.40 - - -
BlckRckSusAm 202.00 -1.00 209.00 161.00 3.96 210.1 -3.9 CrysAmber 115.50 - 122.00 97.00 2.2 133.8 -13.7 representative of all LSE-listed companies. This service is available to all listed
BlckRThrmt 782.00 -17.00 1046 758.00 1.30 786.2 -0.5 Intl PP 162.80 -2.20 175.20 160.20 4.52 146.2 11.4 PacHorzn 775.00 - 954.00 631.31 0.03
745.3 4.0 Discretionary Unit Fund Mngrs 52 Week Dis(-) Gresham House Strategic 1395 15.00 1840 1270 2.0 1598.5 -12.7 companies, subject to the Editor’s discretion. For new sales enquiries please
BlckRWld 697.00 -2.00 711.00 492.00 2.98 690.6 0.9 Inv AsiaTr 350.00 -2.00 424.00 328.00 4.31 398.5 -12.2 PerAsset 48900 -150.00 51166 43840.82 1.15
48378. 1.1 (1000)F Infra India 0.58 - 2.20 0.46 - 10.6 -94.5 email daniel.fish@ft.com or call +44 (0)20 7873 4571.
BMO Cp&I 321.00 - 341.00 284.00 3.61 325.0 -1.2 Invesco Bond Inc ♦ - - - - - 186.3 - 9 Price +/-Chg High Low Yld NAV or Pm
BMOGblSmlr 157.00 -2.60 175.20 144.20 1.11 171.7 -8.6 IPST BalR 163.00 - 176.00 154.10 - 171.9 -5.2 PolarHealth♦ 278.00 -5.00 310.00 228.39 0.72 306.8 -9.4 Right &ISS 2490 -30.00 2770 2220 1.30 2772.8 -10.2
BMOMgdT 267.00 - 300.00 262.00 - 267.7 -0.3 IPST Gbl Eq♦ 241.00 -1.00 250.00 206.00 2.95 245.3 -1.8 PolarFins♦ 174.00 -1.00 184.00 120.15 2.05 172.2 1.0 Data provided by Morningstar
BMOMgdT 140.00 - 150.00 130.04 4.36 137.0 2.2 IPST Mngd 102.00 - 104.97 101.00 - 106.9 -4.6 PolarTech 2226 -64.00 2760.93 2015 - 2487.7 -10.5
BMO UK HIT A 91.50 - 101.00 82.00 5.79 95.6 -4.3 IPST UK Eq♦ 192.00 -1.50 199.98 160.00 3.46 198.3 -3.2 RIT Cap 2540 -35.00 3635.25 2075.26 1.38 2696.0 -5.8

www.morningstar.co.uk
18 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

MANAGED FUNDS SERVICE

SUMMARY FT.COM/FUNDS

Winners - US Fund Foreign Large Growth Losers - US Fund Foreign Large Growth Morningstar Star Ratings Global Broad Category Group - Convertibles

1yr Return 3yr Return 5yr Return 3yr 3yr 1yr Return 3yr Return 5yr Return 3yr 3yr Morningstar Morningstar Morningstar Total Ret 1Yr Total Ret 3Yr Total Ret 5Yr
Fund Name Fund Name Fund Name Base Currency Morningstar Category Base Currency
GBP GBP GBP Sharpe Ratio Std Dev GBP GBP GBP Sharpe Ratio Std Dev Rating 3 Yr Rating 5 Yr Rating 10 Yr GBP GBP GBP

Bail ie Gifford International Concentrated Growth Equities Fund -21.03 20.26 - 1.23 24.33 Janus Henderson International Managed Volatility Fund -2.88 2.65 3.95 0.30 13.36 Asia Pacific Leaders A Shares Pound Sterling QQQQ QQQQ QQQQ Convertible Bond - Global US Dollar -14.79 7.78 3.70
PGIM Jennison International Opportunities Fund -13.54 15.28 14.12 1.08 20.58 Invesco International Select Equity Fund -21.94 3.12 3.95 0.34 19.23 Europe (ex-UK) Fund ACC-GBP Pound Sterling QQQQ QQQQ QQQQ Convertible Bond - Global US Dollar -11.17 7.66 5.68
Calamos International Growth Fund -8.07 13.81 10.08 1.02 18.28 Polen International Growth Fund -9.53 3.82 6.01 0.49 15.81 MFM Techinvest Technology Acc Pound Sterling QQQ QQQ QQ World Convertible Bond Yen -1.78 7.34 5.01
Vanguard International Growth Fund -16.37 13.35 11.59 0.96 20.73 Aberdeen International Sustainable Leaders Fund -8.33 4.68 4.77 0.48 19.80 Charifund Inc Pound Sterling QQQ QQQQ QQQQ Convertible Bond - Global, USD Hedged US Dollar -8.33 6.96 4.02
WCM Focused International Growth Fund -5.79 13.16 11.02 1.10 17.63 Brown Capital Management International Equity Fund -11.03 5.37 5.17 0.54 16.99 Global Emerging Mkts Leaders A Shares Pound Sterling Q Q QQQ Convertible Bond - Global, GBP Hedged Pound Sterling -9.87 6.59 3.80

Advertising Feature Performance Weightings - As of 31/12/2021 Top 10 Holdings - As of 31/12/2021

Sector Weighting Cat Avg. Holding Sector Weighting
Basic Materials 2.55% 3.56%
Feb 2019 - May 2021 Microsoft Corp Technology 5.90%
Trojan Fund O Inc Communication Services 6.39% 3.81%
Consumer Cyclical - 6.14%
Alphabet Inc Class A Communication Services 5.84%
Consumer Defensive 14.48% 4.80%
Energy - 3.04%
Visa Inc Class A Financial Services 4.09%
Financial Services 7.85% 9.37%
Healthcare 6.72% 6.08%
Nestle SA Consumer Defensive 3.71%
Industrials 0.96% 6.40%
Real Estate - 2.52%
Diageo PLC Consumer Defensive 3.49%
Technology 6.46% 7.67%
Utilities - 2.00%
Unilever PLC Consumer Defensive 3.44%
Please remember that past performance is not necessarily a guide to future performance Cash & Equivalents 26.07% 5.94%
Firm Name Corporate - 10.92%
American Express Co Financial Services 2.45%
Troy Asset Management Limited Derivative 0.08% 10.67%
Fund Name Government 28.44% 16.20%
Medtronic PLC Healthcare 2.41%
Trojan Fund O Inc Municipal - 0.01%
Morningstar Category Securitized - 0.86%
Franco-Nevada Corp Basic Materials 2.33%
GBP Flexible Allocation
Max Annual Charge
Agilent Technologies Inc Healthcare 2.07%
- Risk Measures - As of 31/01/2022
3Yr Rating 1Yr 1Yr Cat Ave 3Yr 3Yr Cat Ave 5Yr 5Yr Cat Ave
QQQQQ Alpha 2.82 -1.88 4.33 -2.81 1.89 -2.44
Morningstar Sustainability Rating Beta 1.10 1.04 0.59 1.13 0.61 1.10
- Fund Category Information Ratio 1.14 -0.43 0.40 -0.45 -0.01 -0.46
Bid Price - KIID Ongoing Charge 1.01 R Squared 76.60% 62.74% 59.83% 70.16% 60.52% 68.93%
Offer Price - Day-End One Year Return 9.67 Day 0.22% Month 0.27% Year 9.25% Sharpe Ratio 1.47 0.09 1.44 0.36 0.98 0.42
+/- 0.70 Total Ret 3Yr 8.73 Std Dev 6.38 8.16 5.71 9.94 5.14 8.85
Information reproduced courtesy of Morningstar. While the Financial Times takes every care to ensure that the information is faithfully reproduced, the information is not verified by the Financial Times and therefore it accepts no liability for any loss which may arise relating to the Morningstar information.
© 2022 Morningstar. All Rights Reserved. The information contained herein: (1) is proprietary to Morningstar and/or its content providers; (2) may not be copied or distributed; and (3) is not warranted to be accurate, complete or timely. Neither Morningstar nor its content providers are responsible for any damages or losses arising from any use of this information. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr

Asia Pacific Ops W-Acc £ 3.05 - -0.01 - -1.99 16.01 American Fund GBP Hedged £ 87.79 - -2.08 0.00 6.53 12.59
Asian Dividend Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.34 - 0.00 2.64 7.88 7.49 American Fund GBP Unhedged £ 128.54 - -3.46 - 8.75 11.96
China Consumer Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 3.04 - -0.05 - -36.23 3.20
Emerging Asia Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.00 - -0.03 - -13.71 10.45
Enhanced Income Fund W-INC-GBP £ 0.88 - 0.00 5.53 19.25 4.80
European Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 21.99 - -0.09 0.91 11.12 11.00
Extra Income Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 1.41 - 0.00 3.36 -1.81 3.62
abrdn Capital (CI) Limited ( JER ) Atlantas Sicav ( LUX )
PO Box 189, St Helier, Jersey, JE4 9RU 01534 709130 Regulated FID INST - Emerging Markets Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.07 - -0.03 - -11.34 12.21
FCA Recognised American Dynamic $ 7388.13 7388.13 -14.14 - 2.12 16.80 Fidelity American Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 54.15 - -1.26 - -2.20 8.72
Aberdeen Standard Capital Offshore Strategy Fund Limited American One $ 7305.33 7305.33 -142.30 - 8.76 18.72 Fidelity Asia Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 17.12 - -0.18 - -18.55 8.89
Bridge Fund £ 2.2837 - -0.0261 1.62 2.50 9.36 Bond Global € 1534.81 1534.81 0.19 - 1.48 1.52 Fidelity Cash Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 1.02 - 0.00 - -0.09 0.23
Global Equity Fund £ 3.3626 - -0.0543 0.95 3.10 12.93 Eurocroissance € 1395.62 - -34.86 - 8.32 13.10 FID Emerg Europe, Middle East and Africa Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.77 - -0.07 1.70 9.26 10.02
Global Fixed Interest Fund £ 0.8896 - 0.0002 4.78 -5.08 2.29 Far East $ 1190.28 - 0.53 0.00 -13.17 11.83 Fidelity European Opportunities W Acc £ 5.27 - -0.06 - 1.87 5.95
Income Fund £ 0.6718 - -0.0041 2.72 5.16 8.90 Fidelity Global Enhanced Income Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.20 - 0.00 - 8.49 7.59
Sterling Fixed Interest Fund £ 0.8268 - 0.0021 2.99 -5.72 2.22 Fidelity Sustainable Global Equity W-Accumulation £ 31.36 - -0.41 - -14.41 11.57
UK Equity Fund £ 2.0682 - -0.0095 3.09 4.82 1.75 Fidelity Global High Yield Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 15.17 - -0.01 - -4.11 2.30
Fidelity Japan Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 5.49 - -0.04 - 3.31 14.65
Candriam Investors Group ( LUX ) Dodge & Cox Worldwide Funds ( IRL ) Fidelity Japan Smaller Companies Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 3.80 - -0.03 - -11.45 6.40
FCA Recognised 48-49 Pall Mall, London SW1Y 5JG.
www.dodgeandcox.worldwide.com 020 3713 7664 Fidelity Select 50 Balanced Fund PI-ACC-GBP £ 1.19 - 0.00 - 2.14 5.29
Candriam Eqts L Australia CapA$ 1806.74 - -29.08 0.00 10.20 12.94
FCA Recognised Fidelity Special Situations Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 42.15 - -0.20 - 20.36 5.77 Foord Asset Management
Website: www.foord.com - Email: info@foord.com
Dodge & Cox Worldwide Funds plc - Global Bond Fund Fidelity Sustainable Water & Waste W Acc £ 1.21 - -0.01 - 10.29 - FCA Recognised - Luxembourg UCITS
EUR Accumulating Class € 15.58 - 0.02 - 2.57 5.26 Short Dated Corporate Bond Fund Y ACC GBP £ 10.95 - 0.01 4.06 -1.48 1.69 Foord International Fund | R $ 50.73 - 0.03 - 4.65 8.44
EUR Accumulating Class (H) € 11.23 - -0.01 - -4.18 3.53 Fidelity UK Growth Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 3.34 - -0.05 - -7.27 5.14 Foord Global Equity Fund (Lux) | R $ 18.11 - -0.19 - -7.98 -
EUR Distributing Class € 11.77 - 0.02 - 1.67 4.95 Fidelity UK Select Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 3.65 - 0.00 - 11.94 6.83 Regulated
EUR Distributing Class (H) € 8.42 - -0.01 - -5.10 3.19 Global Dividend Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.84 - 0.00 - 9.02 9.49 Foord Global Equity Fund (Sing) | B $ 21.58 - -0.24 - -7.70 12.17
GBP Distributing Class £ 12.00 - -0.04 - -2.43 3.18 Global Property Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.13 - -0.01 - 14.75 4.12 Foord International Trust (Gsy) $ 49.42 - 0.03 - 4.67 8.33
Candriam Investors Group GBP Distributing Class (H) £ 8.96 - 0.00 - -4.32 4.00 Global Special Sits W-ACC-GBP £ 55.27 - -0.73 - 6.04 12.88
Other International Funds USD Accumulating Class $ 12.77 - -0.01 - -3.26 5.45 Index Emerging Markets P-Acc £ 1.83 - -0.02 - -10.10 6.27
Candriam Eqts L Emerging Mkts Cap € 1094.19 - -13.68 - -13.41 12.01 Dodge & Cox Worldwide Funds plc-Global Stock Fund Index Europe ex UK P-Acc £ 1.85 - -0.01 - 9.29 10.08
Candriam Bonds Credit Opportunities € 200.40 - 0.04 0.00 -1.46 0.48 USD Accumulating Share Class $ 30.75 - -0.51 - 12.72 13.56 Index Japan P-Acc £ 1.88 - -0.01 - -5.57 6.07
Candriam Bds Euro High Yield Cap € 1232.50 - 0.10 - -2.75 3.01
Blue Whales Investment Funds ICAV ( IRE ) GBP Accumulating Share Class £ 37.15 - -0.68 - 14.77 11.50 Index Pacific ex Japan P-Acc £ 1.82 - -0.02 - 0.92 4.43
www.bluewhale.co.uk, info@bluewhale.co.uk Candriam Bds Euro Sh.Term Cap € 2053.94 - 1.60 - -1.20 -0.43 GBP Distributing Share class £ 25.29 - -0.46 - 14.27 11.22
FCA Recognised - Ireland UCITS Index UK P-Acc £ 1.56 - 0.00 - 15.79 5.99
EUR Accumulating Share Class € 40.65 - -0.60 - 19.49 13.34 Index US P-Acc £ 3.32 - -0.04 - 15.83 16.20
Algebris Investments ( IRL ) Blue Whale Growth USD T $ 10.91 - -0.38 - -5.36 - Franklin Templeton International Services Sarl ( IRL )
GBP Distributing Class (H) £ 14.69 - -0.24 0.53 11.65 11.13 Index World P-Acc £ 2.62 - -0.03 - 11.35 13.33
Regulated JPMorgan House - International Financial Services Centre,Dublin 1, Ireland
Dodge & Cox Worldwide Funds plc-U.S. Stock Fund
Algebris Financial Credit I EUR € 187.50 - -0.05 0.00 -1.92 7.45 MoneyBuilder Balanced Y-ACC-GBP £ 0.63 - 0.00 - 10.61 4.23 Other International Funds
USD Accumulating Share Class $ 40.51 - -0.95 - 19.89 15.55 Franklin Emerging Market Debt Opportunities Fund Plc
Algebris Financial Credit R EUR € 162.22 - -0.05 0.00 -2.41 6.86 MoneyBuilder Dividend Y-INC-GBP £ 1.30 - 0.01 2.99 20.02 5.75
GBP Accumulating Share Class £ 46.28 - -1.16 - 22.08 13.47 Franklin Emg Mkts Debt Opp CHFSFr 14.00 - -0.03 5.71 2.00 0.35
Algebris Financial Credit Rd EUR € 103.55 - -0.03 4.43 -2.33 6.92 MoneyBuilder Income Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 14.09 - 0.03 - -3.89 2.88
GBP Distributing Share Class £ 27.92 - -0.71 - 21.78 13.38 Franklin Emg Mkts Debt Opp GBP £ 9.13 - -0.02 5.61 1.93 1.30
Algebris Financial Income I EUR € 191.90 - -1.19 0.00 17.40 14.07 Multi Asset Allocator Adventurous Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 2.14 - -0.02 - 5.94 9.40
Chartered Asset Management Pte Ltd EUR Accumulating Share Class € 46.24 - -0.99 - 27.10 15.33 Franklin Emg Mkts Debt Opp USD $ 16.01 - -0.04 5.65 1.65 2.83
Algebris Financial Income R EUR € 175.87 - -1.11 0.00 16.34 13.04 Multi Asset Allocator Defensive Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 1.41 - 0.00 - -1.95 3.72
Other International Funds GBP Distributing Class (H) £ 16.49 - -0.39 0.41 18.89 13.55
Algebris Financial Income Rd EUR € 111.41 - -0.69 3.30 16.35 13.05 Multi Asset Allocator Growth Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 1.90 - -0.01 - 3.15 7.45
CAM-GTF VCC $ 328355.75 328355.75 8925.13 0.00 -8.69 4.80
Algebris Financial Equity B EUR € 164.20 - -2.17 0.00 35.48 16.63 Multi Asset Income Fund W-INC-GBP £ 1.03 - 0.00 - 0.31 3.41
CAM GTi VCC $ 780.49 - -32.39 - 12.31 4.69
Algebris IG Financial Credit I EUR € 106.51 - 0.13 0.00 -4.38 - Multi Asset Allocator Strategic Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 1.67 - 0.00 - 0.48 5.52
RAIC VCC $ 1.64 1.64 0.03 2.06 5.74 -1.66
Algebris IG Financial Credit R EUR € 105.28 - 0.13 0.00 -4.86 - Multi Asset Open Advent W-ACC-GBP £ 1.74 - -0.01 - 5.34 7.63
Algebris Global Credit Opportunities I EUR € 126.63 - -0.69 0.00 -3.90 8.77 Multi Asset Open Defen W-ACC-GBP £ 1.40 - -0.01 - 0.72 4.26
Algebris Global Credit Opportunities R EUR € 124.20 - -0.68 0.00 -4.26 8.44 Multi Asset Open Growth Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 1.66 - -0.01 - 5.41 7.28
Algebris Global Credit Opportunities Rd EUR € 124.20 - -0.68 0.00 -4.26 8.44 Multi Asset Open Strategic Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 1.55 - 0.00 - 3.07 5.65
Algebris Core Italy I EUR € 159.33 - -1.78 0.00 19.58 - Open World Fund W-ACC-GBP £ 2.21 - -0.03 - 8.22 9.84
Algebris Core Italy R EUR € 152.15 - -1.70 0.00 22.71 19.39 Strategic Bond Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 1.32 - 0.00 - -4.54 3.27
Algebris Financial Equity R EUR € 139.19 - -1.85 0.00 34.29 15.51 UK Opportunities Fund W-ACC-GBP 294.70 - -1.20 1.26 7.59 11.75
Consistent Unit Tst Mgt Co Ltd (1200)F ( UK ) UK Smaller Companies W-ACC-GBP £ 3.68 - -0.04 - 24.58 15.07
Brooks Macdonald International Fund Managers Limited( JER ) Stuart House, St John's Street, Peterborough, PE1 5DD Institutional OEIC Funds
5 Anley Street, St Helier, Jersey, JE2 3QE Dealing & Client Services 0345 850 8818
Authorised Inv Funds America £ 8.81 - -0.12 - 15.42 13.05
+44 (0) 1534 700 104 (Int.) +44 (0) 800 735 8000 (UK) Emerging Markets £ 6.25 - -0.08 - -11.47 12.03
Brooks Macdonald International Investment Funds Limited Consistent UT Inc 70.38xd 72.41 -0.23 0.51 15.36 16.08
Consistent UT Acc 188.50xd 194.00 -0.60 0.51 15.36 16.08 Europe (ex-UK) Fund ACC-GBP £ 7.21 - -0.07 0.61 1.71 11.44
Euro High Income € 1.4155 - 0.0029 2.50 -5.80 0.14
Practical Investment Inc 253.80 271.50 -2.10 3.18 9.77 8.28 Fidelity Pre-Retirement Bond Fund £ 153.60 - 0.70 1.69 -5.07 2.89
High Income £ 0.7829 - 0.0019 3.77 -5.70 1.73
Practical Investment Acc 1530.00 1637.00 -13.00 3.18 7.90 7.52 Global Focus £ 7.11 - -0.04 - 9.24 16.71
The Antares European Fund Limited Sterling Bond £ 1.4717 - 0.0033 2.06 -6.23 1.60 Fundsmith LLP (1200)F ( UK )
Index Linked Bond Gross £ 4.79 - 0.06 0.29 8.54 5.52
Other International Brooks Macdonald International Multi Strategy Fund Limited Dragon Capital PO Box 10846, Chelmsford, Essex, CM99 2BW 0330 123 1815
AEF Ltd Usd $ 592.10 - 14.14 0.00 7.67 1.48 Cautious Balanced Strategy £ 1.3411 - -0.0062 0.00 -1.90 2.90 www.dragoncapital.com Japan £ 3.91 - -0.03 - -6.33 10.77 www.fundsmith.co.uk, enquiries@fundsmith.co.uk
AEF Ltd Eur € 551.41 - 12.93 0.00 7.33 0.53 Cautious Balanced Strategy A £ 0.9579 - -0.0044 - - - Fund information:info@dragoncapital.com Long Bond Gross £ 1.10 - 0.01 1.29 -6.48 2.42 Authorised Inv Funds
Other International Funds Select Emerging Markets Equities £ 2.28 - -0.03 - -15.97 7.53 Fundsmith Equity T Acc 574.61 - -10.56 - 2.42 11.92
Balanced Strategy £ 0.9409 - -0.0062 - - -
Vietnam Equity (UCITS) Fund A USD $ 39.41 - -0.05 - 38.96 20.15 Select Global Equities £ 5.04 - 0.07 0.78 8.25 6.65 Fundsmith Equity T Inc 524.61 - -9.64 - 2.41 11.92
Balanced Strategy A £ 0.9426 - -0.0062 - - -
Growth Strategy £ 2.0018 - -0.0161 0.00 -0.93 3.99 South East Asia £ 6.79 - -0.08 - -12.34 5.93
Growth Strategy A £ 0.9576 - -0.0077 - - - UK £ 5.08 - 0.00 - 15.65 6.94
High Growth Strategy £ 2.7925 - -0.0241 0.00 -0.47 5.13 UK Aggreg Bond Gr Accum £ 2.28 - 0.01 1.63 -4.80 2.45
High Growth Strategy A £ 0.9496 - -0.0082 - - - Sterling Corporate Bond - Gross £ 2.90 - 0.01 - -3.94 3.31
US$ Growth Strategy $ 1.9406 - -0.0217 0.00 -3.66 6.98 UK Gilt Gross £ 2.44 - 0.02 - -4.77 1.67
Dealing Daily. Initial Charge Nil for A classes and up to 2% for other classes Sterling Long Corp Bond - Gross £ 3.40 - 0.01 - -7.15 3.53
EdenTree Investment Management Ltd ( UK ) Asset Management
PO Box 3733, Swindon, SN4 4BG, 0800 358 3010
Authorised Inv Funds
GAM
funds@gam.com, www.funds.gam.com
Regulated
Ass
Amity Balanced For Charities A Inc 113.60 - 0.00 - 10.55 6.79 LAPIS GBL TOP 50 DIV.YLD-Na-D £ 115.91 - -1.15 - 18.76 5.94
Amity Global Equity Inc for Charities A Inc 157.40 - -1.50 - 6.92 9.82 LAPIS GBL F OWD 50 DIV.YLD-Na-D £ 106.79 - -0.88 - 6.97 -
EdenTree European Equity Cls A Inc 318.30 - -1.30 - 15.33 10.11
EdenTree European Equity Cls B Inc 321.40 - -1.30 - 16.01 10.87
CP Global Asset Management Pte. Ltd.
www.cpglobal.com.sg, Email: customer_support@cpglobal.com.sg EdenTree Global Equity Cls A Inc 336.90 - -6.10 - 0.81 9.22
International Mutual Funds EdenTree Global Equity Cls B Inc 339.80 - -6.10 - 1.35 9.94
CP Multi-Strategy Fund $ 277.09 - -1.08 - 17.60 14.36 EdenTree Responsible and Sust S Dtd Bd B 97.40 - 0.02 0.77 -2.54 0.58
Artemis Fund Managers Ltd (1200)F ( UK )
57 St. James's Street, London SW1A 1LD 0800 092 2051 EdenTree Sterling Bond Cls A Inc 98.72 - 0.11 - -4.31 2.32
Authorised Inv Funds EdenTree Sterling Bond Cls B Inc 110.90 - 0.10 - -3.71 2.98
Artemis SmartGARP UK Eq I Acc 2317.33 - -15.67 - 28.97 12.61
Genesis Investment Management LLP
EdenTree UK Equity Cls A Inc 242.10 - -2.10 - -0.05 3.81 Other International Funds
Artemis Corporate Bond I Acc 109.22 - 0.47 - -3.23 - EdenTree UK Equity Cls B Inc 241.40 - -2.00 - 0.52 4.54 Emerging Mkts NAV £ 7.21 - -0.16 1.54 -13.19 5.56
Artemis SmartGARP Eur Eq I Acc 436.63 - -5.11 - 21.66 9.88 EdenTree UK Equity Opps Cls A Inc 317.60 - -2.60 - 4.69 7.09
Artemis European Opps I Acc 118.95 - -1.40 - 0.52 3.31 EdenTree UK Equity Opps Cls B Inc 324.30 - -2.60 - 5.25 7.83
Artemis SmartGARP GloEmr Eq I Acc 172.44 - -0.73 - 7.78 7.82 Edentree Global Impact Bond B 97.23 - 0.14 - - -
CP Capital Asset Management Limited
Artemis SmartGARP Glo Eq I Acc 387.82 - -4.15 - 15.78 10.82 www.cpgbl.com, email: fundservices@cpgbl.com Edentree Green Future B Net Inc 99.19 - -1.41 - - - FSSA Investment Managers ( UK )
Brown Advisory Funds plc ( IRL )
Artemis Global Income I Inc 113.56 - -1.25 - 18.57 9.38 http://www.brownadvisory.com Tel: 020 3301 8130 International Mutual Funds EdenTree Managed Income Cls A Inc 133.80 - -0.10 - 11.90 5.18 Finsbury Circus House, 15 Finsbury Circus, London, EC2M 7EB
Artemis Global Select I Acc 168.31 - -2.50 - 6.11 13.63 FCA Recognised CPS Master Private Fund $ 380.12 - 0.04 - 16.35 14.31 EdenTree Managed Income Cls B Inc 142.20 - -0.10 - 12.46 5.74 infouk@fssaim.com
US Small Cap Blend Fund USD B $ 22.63 - -0.51 0.00 -0.22 10.46 CP Global Alpha Fund $ 310.96 - -0.47 - 16.30 14.18 Client Services: 0800 587 4141 Dealing Line: 0800 587 3388
Artemis High Income I Q Inc 77.29 - 0.02 - 1.78 4.13
Authorised Funds
Artemis Income I Inc 258.48 - -0.25 3.64 14.94 7.55 US Flexible Equity Fund USD B $ 25.67 - -0.68 0.00 9.09 18.67
Asia-All Cap Acc GBP £ 1.91 - -0.01 - -3.35 8.91
Artemis Monthly Dist I Inc 75.61 - -0.35 3.40 9.11 6.38 Global Leaders Fund USD C $ 22.86 - -0.54 0.00 4.15 17.39
Asia Focus Acc GBP £ 2.39 - -0.01 - -3.65 10.07
Artemis Positive Future Fund 78.08 - -1.33 - - - US Sustainable Growth Fund USD C $ 25.90 - -0.85 0.00 3.48 22.38
Greater China Growth A Shares 1217.54 - -7.42 - -7.81 13.89
Artemis Strategic Assets I Acc 84.19 - -1.03 - 1.37 -0.26 Global Leaders Sustainable Fund USD C $ 13.97 - -0.34 0.00 4.10 -
Japan Focus Acc GBP £ 2.32 - -0.01 0.00 -17.53 10.27
Artemis Strategic Bond I Q Acc 108.59 - 0.02 - -2.66 3.09 US Equity Growth Fund USD B $ 54.12 - -1.91 0.00 -6.17 16.36
Artemis Target Return Bond I Acc 107.85 - 0.14 - 0.17 - US Smaller Companies Fund USD B $ 37.06 - -0.98 0.00 -11.57 12.73
US Mid-Cap Growth Fund USD C $ 18.52 - -0.67 0.00 -14.77 11.86 Ennismore European Smlr Cos Hedge Fd
Artemis UK Select Fund Class I Acc 788.92 - -5.73 - 15.68 14.26 Other International Funds
Artemis UK Smaller Cos I Acc 2107.69 - -5.31 - 19.06 8.53 Global Sustainable Total Return Bond GBP B £ 9.92 - -0.01 - - -
NAV € 682.95 - 0.30 - 28.71 6.05
Artemis UK Special Sits I Acc 792.01 - -3.81 - 10.94 9.88
Artemis US Abs Return I Hdg Acc 113.20 - -0.15 0.00 -0.65 -0.44
Artemis US Extended Alpha I Acc 322.97 - -7.80 - 12.30 15.29 Guinness Global Investors
Artemis US Select I Acc 295.42 - -7.67 - 5.45 13.70 Guinness Global Equity Income Y GBP Dist £ 17.58 - -0.15 - 17.19 12.91
Artemis US Smlr Cos I Acc 330.16 - -9.25 0.00 -2.62 13.28 Guinness Global Innovators Y GBP Acc £ 26.77 - -0.64 - 1.89 18.44
Guinness Sustainable Global Equity Y GBP Acc £ 10.94 - -0.21 - 5.47 -
CG Asset Management Limited ( IRL ) Euronova Asset Management UK LLP ( CYM )
25 Moorgate, London, EC2R 6AY
Regulated
Dealing: Tel. +353 1434 5098 Fax. +353 1542 2859
FCA Recognised Smaller Cos Cls One Shares € 57.62 - -0.81 0.00 -0.19 10.03
DWS ( LUX )
CG Portfolio Fund Plc Tel: +44 (0) 20 7541 8999 www.dws.com Smaller Cos Cls Two Shares € 36.93 - -0.52 0.00 -1.47 8.30
Absolute Return Cls M Inc £ 137.88 137.88 -0.40 - 6.11 6.26 FCA Recognised Smaller Cos Cls Three Shares € 18.43 - -0.26 0.00 -2.44 7.71
Capital Gearing Portfolio GBP P £ 38312.73 38312.73 -74.76 - 6.71 6.53 DWS Invest Top Dividend £ 149.29 149.29 -1.23 - 12.06 5.88 Smaller Cos Cls Four Shares € 24.34 - -0.29 0.00 0.04 8.68
Capital Gearing Portfolio GBP V £ 186.33 186.33 -0.37 - 6.71 6.50 DWS Invest Top Euroland £ 160.21 160.21 -1.60 0.55 2.86 10.85 HPB Assurance Ltd
Dollar Fund Cls D Inc £ 166.20 166.20 -0.14 1.42 3.26 4.46 DWS Invest Multi Opportunities £ 116.57 116.57 -0.37 - 8.79 5.22 First Sentier Investors (UK) ( UK ) Anglo Intl House, Bank Hill, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 4LN 01638 563490
DWS Invest Global Bonds £ 101.08 101.08 0.05 0.00 -2.29 -0.09 Finsbury Circus House, 15 Finsbury Circus, London, EC2M 7EB International Insurances
Dollar Hedged GBP Inc £ 106.15 106.15 0.24 1.47 1.78 5.64 infoUK@firstsentier.com Holiday Property Bond Ser 1 £ 0.48 - 0.01 0.00 -1.64 -3.86
Real Return Cls A Inc £ 200.66 200.66 -0.21 1.45 1.73 3.20 Client Services: 0800 587 4141 Dealing Line: 0800 587 3388
Authorised Funds
Diversified Growth B Acc £ 1.27 - 0.00 0.93 7.30 6.25
Emerging Markets Bond A Accumulation £ 1.44 - 0.00 4.44 2.33 4.19
Emerging Markets Bond A Income £ 0.94 - 0.00 4.59 2.33 4.22
Global Listed Infrastructure Acc 299.45 - -0.94 - 10.68 4.04
Global Listed Infrastructure Inc 193.21 - -0.61 - 10.68 4.03
Ashmore Group Global Property Securities A Accumulation 264.92 - -1.22 - 14.88 6.89
61 Aldwych, London WC2B 4AE. Dealing team: +352 27 62 22 233 Hermes Property Unit Trust ( UK )
Authorised Inv Funds Global Property Securities A Income 178.97 - -0.83 - 14.81 6.90 Property & Other UK Unit Trusts
Emerging Markets Equity Fund $ 150.07 - -1.98 - -13.70 16.27 Property £ 6.97 7.50 0.10 0.69 10.01 1.21
Emerging Markets Equity ESG Fund $ 171.02 - -2.21 - -18.39 -
Emerging Markets Active Equity Fund $ 155.70 - -1.93 - -14.72 7.92
Emerging Markets Frontier Equity Fund $ 205.43 - -1.16 0.35 18.84 7.85
Emerging Markets Blended Debt Fund $ 68.15 - -0.23 - -11.68 -2.63
Emerging Markets Blended Debt ESG Fund $ 99.92 - -0.24 - -8.50 - FIL Investment Services (UK) Limited (1200)F ( UK )
Beech Gate, Millfield Lane, Lower Kingswood, Tadworth, KT20 6RP
Emerging Markets Debt Fund $ 75.47 - -0.35 - -11.98 -2.62 Callfree: Private Clients 0800 414161 Findlay Park Funds Plc ( IRL )
Emerging Markets Corporate Debt Fund $ 77.42 - -0.17 - -11.01 0.69 Broker Dealings: 0800 414 181 30 Herbert Street, Dublin 2, Ireland Tel: 020 7968 4900
Emerging Markets Local Currency Bond Fund $ 70.97 - -0.07 - -5.73 0.90 OEIC Funds FCA Recognised
Allocator World Fund Y-ACC-GBP £ 2.63 - -0.02 - 8.70 11.18 American EUR Unhedged Class € 154.02 - -3.73 - 13.15 -
American Special Sits W-ACC-GBP £ 21.21 - -0.15 - 24.76 9.92 American Fund USD Class $ 175.10 - -4.17 - 6.91 14.16
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 19

MANAGED FUNDS SERVICE

Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr Fund Bid Offer +/- Yield 1Yr 3Yr

Emerging Markets 363.34 363.34 -2.15 0.40 0.51 6.12 RAM Systematic European Eq € 568.18 568.18 -3.75 - 14.08 10.50 Trojan Fund O Inc 311.91 - 0.70 0.00 9.25 8.22
Conservative P Acc 97.13 - -0.02 - -2.87 - RAM Systematic Funds Global Sustainable Income Eq $ 160.26 160.26 -1.64 0.00 16.68 9.52 Trojan Global Equity O Acc 479.02 - 5.16 0.00 6.90 12.80
European Multi-Cap 746.88 746.88 -8.35 0.91 13.83 19.91 RAM Systematic Global Eq Sustainable Alpha $ 116.23 116.23 1.17 - 11.43 -0.44 Trojan Global Equity O Inc 395.23 - 4.26 0.00 6.90 12.80
Extra Income 91.43 91.43 -0.01 3.50 7.37 7.55 RAM Systematic Long/Short European Eq € 152.53 152.53 0.80 - 14.33 1.36 Trojan Global Income O Acc 150.64 - 0.52 - 15.24 9.35
Far East Growth A Inc 268.96 268.96 -1.66 0.79 -1.45 6.83 RAM Systematic US Sustainable Eq $ 397.01 397.01 -10.67 - 7.05 10.84 Trojan Global Income O Inc 128.93 - 0.44 - 15.24 9.34
Global 301.55 301.55 -2.12 0.00 -1.39 8.49 RAM Tactical Global Bond Total Return € 149.63 149.63 -0.05 - -3.89 1.58 Trojan Income O Acc 349.66 - -0.56 2.62 6.22 2.56
Global Bond Inc 147.42 147.42 0.00 2.23 -3.98 1.13 RAM Tactical II Asia Bond Total Return $ 152.78 152.78 0.08 - -2.68 2.99 Trojan Income O Inc 174.93 - -0.28 2.67 6.22 2.56
Janus Henderson Investors ( UK ) Orbis Investments (U.K.) Limited ( GBR )
PO Box 9023, Chelmsford, CM99 2WB Enquiries: 0800 832 832 High Yield Fixed Interest 69.75 69.75 -0.03 3.67 -0.14 4.02 28 Dorset Square, London, NW1 6QG
www.janushenderson.com Marlborough Nano Cap Growth A Acc 210.31 210.31 3.98 0.00 32.22 2.30 www.orbis.com 0800 358 2030
Authorised Inv Funds Marlborough Technology Fund A 945.54 945.54 -16.20 0.00 -11.70 18.76 Regulated
Janus Henderson Asia Pacific Capital Growth Fund A Acc 1274.00 - -6.00 - -18.96 5.56 Orbis OEIC Global Cautious Standard £ 11.35 - 0.02 - 7.81 3.54
Multi Cap Income A Inc 143.44 143.44 -0.30 4.18 10.73 3.75
Janus Henderson Asian Dividend Income Unit Trust Inc 88.05 - -0.50 - -1.65 2.45 Orbis OEIC Global Balanced Standard £ 17.96 - 0.00 - 11.46 8.77
Nano-Cap Growth A Acc 260.06 260.06 -0.21 0.00 -0.50 17.67
Janus Henderson Cautious Managed Fund A Acc 299.80 - 0.50 - 7.80 4.59 Orbis OEIC Global Equity Standard £ 21.39 - -0.30 - 5.36 12.16
Special Situations A Acc 2181.50 2181.50 -15.72 0.00 3.31 12.63
Janus Henderson Cautious Managed Fund A Inc 152.20 - 0.30 - 7.84 4.87 Orbis OEIC UK Equity Standard £ 10.90 - -0.06 - 25.76 10.27
UK Multi-Cap Growth A Inc 376.24 376.24 -7.58 0.00 -6.95 6.57
Janus Henderson China Opportunities Fund A Acc 1474.00 - -18.00 - -29.84 2.80 Royal London ( UK ) Unicorn Asset Management Ltd ( UK )
UK Micro Cap Growth A 1032.90 1032.90 -6.46 0.00 3.06 15.26 55 Gracechurch Street, London, EC3V rlam.co.uk PO Box 10602, Chelmsford, Essex, CM1 9PD 0845 026 4287
Janus Henderson Emerging Markets Opportunities Fund A Acc 225.70 - -1.90 - -15.05 4.50 Authorised Inv Funds Authorised Inv Funds
US Multi-Cap Income 696.65 696.65 -12.16 1.25 12.98 14.35
Janus Henderson European Growth Fund A Acc 280.00 - -1.40 - 7.24 7.91 MFM - Third Party Funds Royal London Sustainable Diversified A Inc £ 2.46 - -0.03 - 0.87 8.89 UK Growth A Inc 691.57 - -3.61 - 0.87 9.09
Janus Henderson European Selected Opportunities Fund A Acc 2178.00 - -13.00 - 9.89 10.97 Junior Gold C Acc 40.99 40.99 0.54 0.00 -23.61 11.31 Royal London Sustainable World A Inc 349.90 - -6.30 - 0.72 12.67 Stewart Investors ( UK ) Mastertrust A Inc X F 643.63 - -5.19 - 3.54 8.73
Janus Henderson Fixed Interest Monthly Income Fund Inc 21.42 - 0.02 - -3.08 4.54 Royal London Corporate Bond Mth Income 87.84 - 0.17 - -3.66 2.76 23 St Andrew Square, Edinburgh, EH2 1BB UK Growth B Inc 697.80 - -3.61 - 1.60 9.88
MFM Bowland 343.03 343.03 -6.61 0.48 2.48 12.45
Janus Henderson Global Equity Fund Acc 4375.00 - -78.00 - 0.67 11.62 enquiries@stewartinvestors.com
MFM Hathaway Inc 162.88 162.88 -2.69 0.57 3.26 7.09 Royal London European Growth Trust 200.20 - -1.40 - 10.02 10.59 Client Services: 0800 587 4141 Mastertrust B Inc X F 578.49 - -4.64 - 4.30 9.52
Janus Henderson Global Equity Income Fund A Inc 64.80 - -0.59 - 9.52 6.32 MFM UK Primary Opportunities A Inc 481.50 481.50 -1.45 0.64 7.21 7.10 Royal London Sustainable Leaders A Inc 768.10 - -5.10 - 9.01 10.52 Dealing Line: 0800 587 3388 Outstanding British Cos A Acc X F 296.12 - -1.18 - -3.40 -0.27
Janus Henderson Global Sustainable Equity Fund A Inc 475.70 - -9.40 - 0.85 16.46 Royal London UK Growth Trust 635.90 - -4.30 - 9.91 6.46 Authorised Funds Outstanding British Cos B Acc X F 323.76 - -1.28 - -2.68 0.49
Janus Henderson Global Technology Fund A Acc 3059.00 - -101.00 - -4.23 18.85 Royal London UK Income With Growth Trust 221.10 - 0.30 - 13.24 5.91 SI Asia Pacific A Acc 1528.86 - -3.77 0.00 -3.70 5.39 UK Smaller Cos A Inc X F 681.33 - -0.45 - 6.03 10.83
Janus Henderson Instl UK Idx Opps A Acc £ 1.12 - -0.01 - 13.41 - Royal London US Growth Trust 354.20 - -8.00 - 14.04 15.50 SI Asia Pacific A Inc £ 2.71 - -0.01 - -3.72 4.87 UK Smaller Cos B Inc X F 666.48 - -0.43 - 6.77 11.63
Janus Henderson Multi-Asset Absolute Return Fund A Acc 159.80 - -0.10 - 6.89 3.82 Additional Funds Available SI Asia Pacific Leaders A Acc 881.05 - -4.96 - -2.10 9.32 UK Income A Acc X F 329.87 - -1.04 3.80 6.61 4.62
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Active Fund A Acc 264.00 - -1.30 - 4.31 5.82 Please see www.royallondon.com for details SI Asia Pacific Leaders A Inc £ 2.99 - -0.02 - -2.15 9.24 UK Income A Inc X F 230.24 - -0.73 3.89 6.64 4.43
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Distribution Fund A Inc 135.80 - -0.40 - 2.31 3.89 SI Asia Sustainability A Acc 704.37 - -3.86 - -1.81 9.43 UK Income B Acc X F 367.06 - -1.15 3.79 7.41 5.41
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Diversified Fund A Acc 93.19 - -0.09 - 0.04 2.89 SI Global Emerging Mkts A Acc 774.33 - -1.70 - 2.26 -1.57 UK Income B Inc X F 256.36 - -0.81 3.88 7.44 5.33
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Global Select Fund Acc 310.50 - -2.60 - 6.30 8.71 Marwyn Asset Management Limited ( CYM ) SI Global Emerging Mkts Leaders A Acc 558.07 - -0.56 - 4.91 -0.22
Regulated
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Income & Growth Fund A Acc 196.30 - -0.50 - 2.29 3.82 SI Global Emerging Mkts Sus A Acc 369.59 - -1.13 - -8.43 4.55
Marwyn Value Investors £ 329.72 - -6.14 0.00 - -7.17
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Income & Growth Fund A Inc 157.60 - -0.40 - 2.29 3.83 SI Indian Sub-Cont A Acc 706.86 - 2.14 - 15.92 14.33
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Managed Fund A Acc 322.10 - -1.10 - 3.90 5.28 Platinum Capital Management Ltd SI Latin America A Acc £ 2.31 - -0.01 1.58 1.75 -6.90
Other International Funds
Janus Henderson Multi-Manager Managed Fund A Inc 311.80 - -1.00 - 3.90 5.29 SI Worldwide Equity A Acc £ 2.36 - 0.05 - 21.94 8.37
Platinum All Star Fund - A $ 161.38 - - - 11.31 9.49
Janus Henderson Sterling Bond Unit Trust Acc 235.50 - 0.60 - -6.21 1.92 SI Worldwide Equity A Inc £ 2.39 - 0.05 - 23.40 8.80
Platinum Global Growth UCITS Fund $ 11.61 - -0.15 - -20.37 4.38
Janus Henderson Sterling Bond Unit Trust Inc 65.35 - 0.16 - -6.21 1.91 SI Worldwide Leaders A Acc 563.32 - -8.91 - 2.11 8.53
Platinum Essential Resources UCITS Fund SICAV USD Class E $ 10.65 - 0.16 0.00 24.27 2.22 Zadig Gestion (Memnon Fund) ( LUX )
Janus Henderson Strategic Bond Fund A Inc 123.70 - 0.20 - -3.72 3.89 SI Worldwide Sus A Acc £ 2.59 - -0.05 - -4.98 8.19
Platinum Global Dividend UCITS Fund $ 54.07 - -0.08 0.00 -3.41 -0.63 FCA Recognised
Janus Henderson Absolute Return Fund A Acc 165.90 - -0.40 0.00 1.78 2.16 SI Worldwide Sus A Inc £ 2.51 - -0.05 - -4.87 8.32 Memnon European Fund - Class U2 GBP £ 218.02 - -0.97 - 9.73 11.55
Janus Henderson UK Alpha Fund A Acc 159.70 - -1.70 - 3.43 4.26 McInroy & Wood Portfolios Limited ( UK )
Easter Alderston, Haddington, EH41 3SF 01620 825867
Janus Henderson UK Equity Income & Growth Fund A Inc 542.80 - -0.10 - 16.91 2.73 Authorised Inv Funds
Janus Henderson UK Property PAIF A Acc £ 2.58 2.71 0.00 - 12.29 3.47 Balanced Fund Personal Class Units 5879.70 - 40.20 1.18 3.40 7.65
Janus Henderson UK Property PAIF A Inc £ 1.04 1.09 0.00 - 12.32 3.53 Income Fund Personal Class Units 2861.50 - 13.90 2.13 6.74 6.24
Janus Henderson US Growth Fund A Acc 1768.00 - -49.00 - 3.27 15.21 Emerging Markets Fund Personal Class Units 2330.20 - 22.70 1.37 -0.70 3.81
Smaller Companies Fund Personal Class Units 6804.90 - 32.70 0.96 -5.97 10.02
Ruffer LLP (1000)F ( UK )
65 Gresham Street, London, EC2V 7NQ
Order Desk and Enquiries: 0345 601 9610
Authorised Inv Funds
Authorised Corporate Director - Link Fund Solutions
LF Ruffer Diversified Rtrn C Acc 105.44 - -0.09 0.00 - -
LF Ruffer Diversified Rtrn C Inc 105.58 - -0.09 0.00 - -
Kleinwort Hambros Bank Limited ( UK ) LF Ruffer European C Acc 853.86 - -10.61 0.90 -1.78 13.70
5TH Floor, 8 St James's Square, London, SW1Y 4JU
Dealing and enquiries: 033 0024 0785
Milltrust International Managed Investments ICAV( IRL ) LF Ruffer European C Inc 154.53 - -1.92 - -1.77 13.70
mimi@milltrust.com, +44(0)20 8123 8316 www.milltrust.com LF Ruffer European O Acc 829.78 - -10.36 0.59 -2.08 13.36
Authorised Inv Funds Regulated
Unit Trust Manager/ACD - Host Capital LF Ruffer Equity & General C Acc 565.50 - -1.05 0.43 11.17 8.71
British Innovation Fund £ 121.92 - 2.89 0.00 - -
HC Kleinwort Hambros Growth A Acc 245.74 - -0.17 1.36 0.42 6.53 LF Ruffer Equity & General C Inc 514.99 - -0.96 0.43 11.17 8.71
MAI - Buy & Lease (Australia)A$ 103.45 - 0.50 0.00 -16.53 1.41 Polar Capital Funds Plc ( IRL )
HC Kleinwort Hambros Growth A Inc 222.96 - -0.14 1.38 0.42 6.53 LF Ruffer Equity & General O Acc 549.59 - -1.06 0.15 10.83 8.39 Stonehage Fleming Investment Management Ltd ( IRL )
MAI - Buy & Lease (New Zealand)NZ$ 91.20 - -6.06 0.00 -7.20 -2.67 Regulated
HC Kleinwort Hambros Equity Income A Inc 101.82 - -0.03 3.06 10.41 2.99 LF Ruffer Equity & General O Inc 508.14 - -0.98 0.14 10.83 8.39 www.stonehagefleming.com/gbi
Milltrust Global Emerging Markets Fund - Class A $ 112.55 - 1.40 0.00 -10.94 10.18 Automation & Artificial Intelligence CL I USD Acc $ 18.07 18.07 -0.40 - -6.32 20.30 enquiries@stonehagefleming.com
HC Kleinwort Hambros Equity Income A Acc 195.57 - -0.06 4.50 10.41 2.99 LF Ruffer Gold C Acc 265.03 - 6.47 0.00 -7.48 22.05
Asian Starts I USD Acc $ $ 17.85 - 0.04 - -15.48 18.75 Regulated
HC Kleinwort Hambros Multi Asset Balanced A Acc 178.15 - 0.05 0.81 -1.39 4.13 LF Ruffer Gold C Inc 160.41 - 3.92 - -7.48 22.05
Biotechnology I USD $ 35.93 35.93 -0.97 - -17.02 12.85 SF Global Best Ideas Eq B USD ACC $ 255.33 - -5.26 - -1.05 16.17
HC Kleinwort Hambros Multi Asset Balanced A Inc 168.39 - 0.04 0.81 -1.39 4.13 LF Ruffer Gold O Acc 257.48 - 6.27 0.00 -7.76 21.68
China Stars I USD Acc $ $ 14.11 14.11 0.00 - -28.19 14.06 SF Global Best Ideas Eq D GBP INC £ 284.42 - -6.73 - 0.66 13.93
HC Kleinwort Hambros Fixed Income A Acc 132.57 - 0.41 3.44 -4.25 0.82 LF Ruffer Japanese C Inc 163.92 - -0.69 - -9.22 13.23
Emerging Market Stars I USD Acc $ 14.21 - -0.04 - -18.61 16.14
HC Kleinwort Hambros Fixed Income A Inc 102.34 - 0.21 3.44 -4.25 0.82 LF Ruffer Japanese C Acc 352.26 - -1.48 0.00 -9.21 13.23
European Ex UK Inc EUR Acc € 13.77 13.77 -0.09 - 17.99 6.41
Financial Opps I USD $ 16.48 - -0.31 - 10.62 11.06 LF Ruffer Japanese O Acc X 341.87 - -1.45 0.00 -9.50 12.89
Global Convertible I USD $ 15.45 15.45 -0.17 - -13.06 5.47 LF Ruffer Total Return C Acc 569.70 - 2.85 1.13 8.63 10.09
Milltrust International Managed Investments SPC LF Ruffer Total Return C Inc 364.30 - 1.82 1.14 8.64 10.08
em@milltrust.com, +44(0)20 8123 8316, www.milltrust.com Global Insurance I GBP £ 8.34 - -0.14 - 15.24 7.90
Regulated Global Technology I USD $ 83.55 - -2.81 - -12.50 22.24 LF Ruffer Total Return O Acc 553.60 - 2.73 1.13 8.30 9.76
Milltrust Alaska Brazil SP A $ 79.38 - -1.48 0.00 6.76 - Healthcare Blue Chip Fund I USD Acc $ 18.36 18.36 -0.31 0.00 11.21 11.77 LF Ruffer Total Return O Inc 353.82 - 1.75 1.14 8.31 9.76
Superfund Asset Management GmbH
Milltrust Laurium Africa SP A $ 114.17 - -0.53 0.00 4.04 - Healthcare Dis I Acc USD $ $ 13.32 - -0.41 - -19.42 - www.superfund.com, +43 (1) 247 00
Milltrust Marcellus India Fund $ 142.59 - 0.42 - 14.25 - Healthcare Opps I USD $ 62.51 - -1.26 - -6.88 7.26 Other International Funds
Milltrust Singular ASEAN SP Founders $ 153.39 - -0.40 0.00 -14.12 - Income Opportunities B2 I GBP Acc £ 2.89 2.89 -0.02 - 18.37 9.40 Superfund Green Gold $ 1595.82 - 16.56 - 10.25 22.11
Milltrust SPARX Korea Equity SP A $ 132.63 - 0.04 0.00 -23.75 - Japan Value I JPY ¥ 130.94 130.94 -0.03 - 7.30 4.54 Superfund Green Silver $ 1404.77 - 7.74 - -11.38 23.06
Milltrust VTB Russia Fund SP $ 136.76 - -7.58 0.00 5.43 - North American I USD $ 36.08 36.08 -0.90 - 8.28 14.52 Regulated
Milltrust Xingtai China SP A $ 143.48 - 0.18 0.00 0.15 - Smart Energy I USD Acc $ $ 9.18 9.18 -0.21 - - - Superfund Green US$ $ 1160.23 - -6.93 - 4.09 11.19
The Climate Impact Asia Fund SP (Class A) $ 100.86 - -0.68 - - - Smart Mobility I USD Acc $ $ 9.38 9.38 -0.20 - - -
The Climate Impact Asia Fund (Class B) $ 100.63 - -0.69 - - - UK Val Opp I GBP Acc £ 14.04 14.04 -0.07 - 14.71 7.47

Lazard Fund Managers Ltd (1200)F ( UK )

P.O. Box 364, Darlington, DL1 9RD Thesis Unit Trust Management Limited ( UK )
Dealing: 0870 6066408, Info: 0870 6066459 Exchange Building, St Johns Street, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 1UP
Authorised Inv Funds Authorised Funds
Lazard Investment Funds (OEIC) B Share Class Ministry of Justice Common Investment Funds ( UK ) Polar Capital LLP ( CYM ) TM New Court Fund A 2011 Inc £ 19.53 - -0.21 0.00 5.06 9.08
Developing Markets Acc 131.25 - -1.33 - -18.38 4.44 Property & Other UK Unit Trusts Regulated
TM New Court Fund - A 2014 Acc £ 19.70 - -0.21 - 5.07 9.10
The Equity Idx Tracker Fd Inc 1962.00 - -7.00 - 8.78 7.57 European Forager A EUR € 227.04 - -2.52 0.00 19.12 7.42
Developing Markets Inc 129.27 - -1.31 - -18.38 4.43
Distribution Units
Rubrics Global UCITS Funds Plc ( IRL ) TM New Court Equity Growth Fund - Inc £ 21.61 - -0.28 0.00 6.56 10.96
Emerging Markets Acc 380.67 - -1.81 - 7.31 4.32 www.rubricsam.com
Regulated
Emg Mkts Inc 301.89 - -1.44 - 7.31 4.32
Rubrics Emerging Markets Fixed Income UCITS Fund $ 138.56 - -0.03 - -2.35 0.57
European Alpha Acc 1015.40 - -8.36 - 5.84 8.08
Rubrics Global Credit UCITS Fund $ 17.74 - 0.02 - -0.59 2.97
European Alpha Inc 882.31 - -7.27 - 5.83 8.08
Rubrics Global Fixed Income UCITS Fund $ 177.74 - 0.16 - -1.81 2.25
European Smaller Cos Acc 765.55 - -8.06 - 3.19 10.09
Global Equity Income Acc 227.00 - -1.87 - 14.54 9.76
Global Equity Income Inc 117.94 - -0.97 2.98 14.54 9.76 Private Fund Mgrs (Guernsey) Ltd ( GSY )
Managed Bal Inc 200.11 - -0.38 - 8.01 8.25 Regulated
UK Income Acc 1613.15 - -2.30 3.65 14.84 5.10 Monument Growth 15/02/2022 £ 551.40 557.05 -3.63 - 7.26 6.38
UK Income Inc 608.10 - -0.87 3.74 14.84 5.10
UK Omega Acc 286.09 - -0.46 - 14.56 5.24
UK Omega Inc 241.29 - -0.39 - 14.55 5.24 Scottish Friendly Asset Managers Ltd ( UK )
Scottish Friendly Hse, 16 Blythswood Sq, Glasgow G2 4HJ 0141 275 5000
UK Smaller Cos Inc 2457.80 - -25.66 - 7.73 10.16
Authorised Inv Funds
Managed Growth ♦ 344.80 - -1.80 - 5.25 9.38
UK Growth ♦ 410.70 - -2.50 - 3.27 12.25
Prusik Investment Management LLP ( IRL )
Enquiries - 0207 493 1331
Regulated Toscafund Asset Management LLP ( UK )
Mirabaud Asset Management ( LUX ) Prusik Asian Equity Income B Dist $ 191.96 - -0.31 - 6.15 4.05
www.mirabaud.com, marketing@mirabaud-am.com www.toscafund.com
Conviction based investment vehicles details available here www.mirabaud-am.com Prusik Asia Emerging Opportunities Fund A Acc $ 204.81 - -0.48 - 0.37 12.07 Authorised Funds
Lothbury Property Trust (UK) Regulated Prusik Asia Fund U Dist. £ 240.20 - -3.14 - -4.77 10.05 Aptus Global Financials B Acc £ 4.90 - -0.11 - 19.01 11.15
155 Bishopsgate, London EC2M 3TQ +44(0) 20 3551 4900 Mir. - Glb Strat. Bd I USD $ 121.52 - 0.01 - -1.09 3.22 Aptus Global Financials B Inc £ 3.25 - -0.08 - 20.74 13.44
Property & Other UK Unit Trusts Mir. - DiscEur D Cap GBP £ 198.42 - -2.45 - 6.21 13.20
Lothbury Property Trust GBP £ 2026.68 2183.37 5.97 - 9.40 0.97
Mirabaud - UK Equity High Alpha £ 149.92 - -1.41 - 0.60 7.48
Mirabaud - UK Equity High Alpha £ 149.92 - -1.41 - 0.60 7.48

Purisima Investment Fds (UK) (1200)F ( UK )

65 Gresham Street, London, EC2V 7NQ Toscafund Asset Management LLP
Order Desk and Enquiries: 0345 922 0044 www.toscafund.com
M & G Securities (1200)F ( UK ) Authorised Inv Funds Tosca A USD $ 435.51 - 18.22 0.00 27.22 14.31
PO Box 9038, Chelmsford, CM99 2XF Authorised Corporate Director - Link Fund Solutions
Tosca Mid Cap GBP £ 236.40 - 0.49 0.00 16.85 -4.14
www.mandg.co.uk/charities Enq./Dealing: 0800 917 4472 Global Total Fd PCG A 396.05 - 7.15 0.01 8.36 17.40
Authorised Inv Funds Tosca Opportunity B USD $ 360.92 - 1.38 0.00 19.61 -2.64
Global Total Fd PCG B 391.15 - 7.06 0.00 8.09 17.11 SICO BSC (c) ( BHR )
Charifund Inc 1560.69 - -1.61 4.79 14.45 6.25 Pegasus Fund Ltd A-1 GBP £ 54.08 - -2.15 0.00 9.78 -7.13
Global Total Fd PCG INT 384.70 - 6.94 0.00 7.82 16.82 +973 17515031.
Charifund Acc 29319.20 - -30.23 4.02 14.44 6.26 www.sicobank.com
M&G Charibond Charities Fixed Interest Fund (Charibond) Inc £ 1.19 - 0.01 - -2.65 - Khaleej Equity Fund $ 587.47 - 0.98 0.00 41.13 19.90
M&G Charibond Charities Fixed Interest Fund (Charibond) Acc £ 41.62 - 0.05 - -2.65 - SICO Gulf Equity Fund $ 158.45 - 0.16 0.00 28.89 -
M&G Charity Multi Asset Fund Inc £ 0.90 - -0.01 - 11.39 -
M&G Charity Multi Asset Fund Acc £ 104.82 - -0.23 - 11.39 -

Purisima Investment Fds (CI) Ltd ( JER )

Oasis Crescent Global Investment Funds (UK) ICVC( UK ) Regulated

Slater
Regulated PCG B X 333.64 - -1.77 0.00 5.71 17.03
Oasis Crescent Global Equity Fund USD A (Dist) $ 38.30 - -0.42 - 4.06 8.70 PCG C X 325.14 - -1.72 0.00 5.49 16.79

Investments
Oasis Crescent Global Income Fund USD A (Dist) $ 10.79 - 0.01 2.59 -0.93 3.67
MMIP Investment Management Limited ( GSY ) Oasis Crescent Global Low Equity Fund USD D (Dist) $ 13.48 - -0.08 0.08 4.23 4.82
Regulated Oasis Crescent Global Medium Equity Fund USD A (Dist) $ 14.84 - -0.10 0.11 4.04 5.71
Multi-Manager Investment Programmes PCC Limited Oasis Crescent Global Property Equity Fund USD A (Dist) $ 9.89 - -0.03 - 18.18 4.55
UK Equity Fd Cl A Series 01 £ 3413.21 3450.57 95.55 0.00 28.18 7.32 Oasis Crescent Global Short Term Income Fund USD A (Dist) $ 0.98 - 0.00 1.71 0.46 1.96
Diversified Absolute Rtn Fd USD Cl AF2 $ 1710.11 - 8.43 0.00 2.35 3.03 Oasis Crescent Variable Fund GBP A (Dist) £ 10.45 - -0.07 0.00 7.48 2.85
Diversified Absolute Return Stlg Cell AF2 £ 1599.62 - 6.86 0.00 2.11 1.59
Global Equity Fund A Lead Series £ 1798.17 1804.16 -92.22 0.00 11.25 7.76 Troy Asset Mgt (1200) ( UK )
65 Gresham Street, London, EC2V 7NQ
Order Desk and Enquiries: 0345 608 0950
Authorised Inv Funds
Slater Investments Ltd ( UK ) Authorised Corporate Director - Link Fund Solutions
www.slaterinvestments.com; Tel: 0207 220 9460 Trojan Investment Funds
FCA Recognised
Spectrum Fund O Acc 275.04 - -0.73 0.16 4.72 7.41
Slater Growth A Acc 787.96 787.96 -7.47 0.00 10.94 19.83
Omnia Fund Ltd Spectrum Fund O Inc 259.59 - -0.68 0.17 4.71 7.40
Other International Funds Slater Income A Inc 152.40 152.40 0.10 5.22 19.57 6.95
Trojan Ethical O Acc 127.98 - 0.41 0.00 7.53 -
Marlborough Investment Management Limited ( UK ) Estimated NAV $ 738.77 - 57.51 0.00 11.95 -2.00 Slater Recovery A Acc 386.04 386.04 -3.33 0.00 16.26 21.01
Marlborough House, 59 Chorley New Road, Bolton, BL1 4QP 0808 145 2500 Trojan Ethical Global Inc O Acc 98.13 - 0.42 - - -
Slater Artorius 367.20 367.20 -0.14 - 22.77 24.97
www.marlboroughfunds.com Trojan Ethical Global Inc O Inc 97.65 - 0.41 - - -
Authorised Inv Funds Trojan Ethical O Inc 127.73 - 0.41 0.00 7.53 -
Balanced 231.22 231.22 -0.57 0.17 2.57 6.29 Ram Active Investments SA
www.ram-ai.com Trojan Ethical Income O Acc 139.90 - 0.02 - 3.35 4.42
Bond Income 48.35 48.35 0.10 3.16 -5.19 1.05 Other International Funds Trojan Ethical Income O Inc 118.52 - 0.02 - 3.36 4.43
Cautious Inc 88.36 88.36 -0.13 1.46 -0.67 2.06 RAM Systematic Emerg Markets Eq $ 241.59 241.59 -0.31 - 2.53 12.10 Trojan Fund O Acc 385.34 - 0.86 0.00 9.25 8.23

Guide to Data
The fund prices quoted on these pages are supplied by the operator of the relevant fund. Details of funds published on these pages, including prices, are for the purpose of information only and should only be used as a guide. The Financial Times Limited makes no representation as to their accuracy or completeness and they should not be relied upon when making an
investment decision.
The sale of interests in the funds listed on these pages may, in certain jurisdictions, be restricted by law and the funds will not necessarily be available to persons in all jurisdictions in which the publication circulates. Persons in any doubt should take appropriate professional advice. Data collated by Morningstar. For other queries contact reader.enquiries@ft.com +44
(0)207 873 4211.
The fund prices published in this edition along with additional information are also available on the Financial Times website, www.ft.com/funds. The funds published on these pages are grouped together by fund management company.
Prices are in pence unless otherwise indicated. The change, if shown, is the change on the previously quoted figure (not all funds update prices daily). Those designated $ with no prefix refer to US dollars. Yield percentage figures (in Tuesday to Saturday papers) allow for buying expenses. Prices of certain older insurance linked plans might be subject to capital gains tax on
sales.
Guide to pricing of Authorised Investment Funds: (compiled with the assistance of the IMA. The Investment Association, Camomile Court 23 Camomile Street, London EC3A 7LL. Tel: +44 (0)20 7831 0898.)
OEIC: Open-Ended Investment Company. Similar to a unit trust but using a company rather than a trust structure.
Different share classes are issued to reflect a different currency, charging structure or type of holder.
Selling price: Also called bid price. The price at which units in a unit trust are sold by investors.
Buying price: Also called offer price. The price at which units in a unit trust are bought by investors. Includes manager’s initial charge.
Single price: Based on a mid-market valuation of the underlying investments. The buying and selling price for shares of an OEIC and units of a single priced unit trust are the same.
Treatment of manager’s periodic capital charge: The letter C denotes that the trust deducts all or part of the manager’s/operator’s periodic charge from capital, contact the manager/operator for full details of the effect of this course of action.
Exit Charges: The letter E denotes that an exit charge may be made when you sell units, contact the manager/operator for full details.
Time: Some funds give information about the timing of price quotes. The time shown alongside the fund manager’s/operator’s name is the valuation point for their unit trusts/OEICs, unless another time is indicated by the symbol alongside the individual unit trust/OEIC name.
Data Provided by
The symbols are as follows: ✠ 0001 to 1100 hours; ♦ 1101 to 1400 hours; ▲ 1401 to 1700 hours; # 1701 to midnight. Daily dealing prices are set on the basis of the valuation point, a short period of time may elapse before prices become available. Historic pricing: The letter H
denotes that the managers/operators will normally deal on the price set at the most recent valuation. The prices shown are the latest available before publication and may not be the current dealing levels because of an intervening portfolio revaluation or a switch to a forward pricing
basis. The managers/operators must deal at a forward price on request, and may move to forward pricing at any time. Forward pricing: The letter F denotes that that managers/operators deal at the price to be set at the next valuation.
Investors can be given no definite price in advance of the purchase or sale being carried out. The prices appearing in the newspaper are the most recent provided by the managers/operators. Scheme particulars, prospectus, key features and reports: The most recent particulars and
documents may be obtained free of charge from fund managers/operators. * Indicates funds which do not price on Fridays.
Charges for this advertising service are based on the number of lines published and the classification of the fund. Please contact data@ft.com or call +44 (0)20 7873 3132 for further information.
www.morningstar.co.uk
Data as shown is for information purposes only. No offer is made by Morningstar or this publication.
20 ★ 19 February/20 February 2022

Twitter: @FTLex

UK equities are on
a roll but don’t get
NatWest:
too carried away
out of the woods Book bans: page rage
Readers want more titles banned Sales following partial bans
or curbed
UK banks are enjoying an unusually
hospitable environment. The housing
market is red hot, the Bank of England
Requests for removal
of books from
schools or libraries
Books
targeted*
1960 1987
Katie Martin
UK International
The Long View
is imposing back-to-back rate rises and 600
the economy is strong enough for 2mn 2mn+
lenders to write back provisions made 500

during the pandemic. NatWest
demonstrated the benefits of all three
yesterday as it announced a rebound in
net profits to £3bn last year.
The prospects for shareholders in the
lender are brighter. It is distributing
£3.8bn of capital to shareholders for
2021. Taking that into account, its
common equity tier one ratio — a
measure of balance sheet strength —
was 15.9 per cent against a 14 per cent
target. That implies plenty more
distributions to come, with about £3bn
of excess.
But NatWest suffers from baggage
that will drag on shares even as rates
rise further. Finalising an exit from
Ireland is the most immediate concern.
NatWest has sold 60 per cent of Ulster
Bank’s assets in deals with Permanent
TSB and Allied Irish Banks. Loan sales
this year are set to incur losses of
€300mn. It has pencilled in additional
withdrawal costs of €600mn between
2022 and 2024, with €500mn of it
expected by the end of 2023.
Even so, NatWest is confident return
on tangible equity will be above 10 per
cent in 2023. Shares have re-rated to
match the outlook. These have risen 31
per cent over the past year and trade at
0.9 times tangible book value. That is
near the top of their post-financial-
crisis range.
The second unhelpful legacy is the
remainder of the government’s stake.
NatWest spent £1.1bn buying back
stock from its biggest shareholder last
year. Expect the purchase of another
chunk when the window reopens in
March. The government makes its own
share placements and market sales.
The sell-off is accelerating. The state
holding has fallen to 51 per cent from
over 60 per cent the year before. As the
outlook for NatWest improves, the day
when its largest shareholder can exit
completely is coming closer.
Hermès:
hell for leather
Hermès, the last of the big European
luxury houses to report annual profits,
spoiled the party. Its defining leather
goods and saddlery unit, behind
roughly half of turnover, fell in the
fourth quarter. Revenues dipped 5.4
per cent. Hermès blamed supply woes.
There have been other signs that all
is not well in the world of tanning and
saddle stitching. LVMH and Chanel
have both raised the price of handbags.
In China the price of the locally dubbed
“little mah-jong bag” reportedly rose
by half as much again, unleashing
complaints from outraged netizens.
Luxury leather-goods companies are
battling procurement issues just like
your high street burger joint. Supplies
of hides fell when pandemic-hit
restaurants cut their consumption of
beef. About 70 per cent of leather
comes from cattle, and slaughtering
fewer of them means fewer hides.
This winter, European abattoirs were
processing about one-fifth fewer
carcasses than is typical for the time of
year. Tanners, not keen to run
machinery at low levels, add a further
2010 12 14 16 18
*Data available from 2017 **Sep 1-Nov 30 2021
Sources: American Library Association Office for Intellectual Freedom; Penguin; NPD Group; NPD Bookscan; BBC
Cancel culture is thriving in the
analogue world. Complainants lodged
more than 330 calls to curb or ban
books — often about people of colour
or with LGBT+ themes — with the
American Library Association in the
three months to November alone.
That was before Art Spiegelman’s
Maus fell foul of Tennessee educators.
The graphic novel, depicting Jews as
mice and Nazis as cats, bears
eloquent witness to the impact of the
Holocaust on one family. But some
teachers and parents struggled to see
why the education system would
“promote this kind of stuff”. They
winced at the use of profanities in a
book available to 13-year-olds.
Book bans are as old as publishing.
Bishops in the Restoration era halted
reprints of Thomas Hobbes’
Leviathan. Three centuries later Lady
brake — as do shortages of processing
chemicals used in the process.
Much of the leather trade relies on
partially processed hides going from
the US and Brazil to China. Higher
freight costs and logistics delays have
had an impact. Changing demand from
other buyers — such as the automotive
and aviation industries — has added to
production volatility.
Yet investors who knocked 5.5 per
cent off the price of Hermès’ shares in
morning trade yesterday in Paris were
surely overreacting. The business is
less stellar than peers LVMH and
Kering. But operating profit trumped
analysts’ expectations.
This is an industry that can stimulate
sales ahead of expected increases and
add to the cachet of goods. This owes
more to marketing than it does to raw
materials. After all, Stella McCartney’s
vegan handbags can easily run into
four figures without so much as a hint
of leather.
Palantir:
open secret
Palantir says it is built for bad times.
Such fortitude is needed now.
Uninspiring guidance and lack of profit
from a group founded nearly two
decades ago are taking a toll. On
Thursday its stock fell 16 per cent. On
an enterprise value/sales ratio, Palantir
is back to the level it was when it listed
in late 2020.
The $23.5bn Denver-based software
group, known for its data analytics
work with government agencies, is
seeking to shift focus to commercial
clients. Commercial revenue topped
400 Lady Chatterley’s Spycatcher
Lover
300
2015 2022
200
US: 68,115 US: 17,511
100 (lifetime)
(ytd)
0 As a curmudgeonly Brit, steeped in
George Maus I
21** paperback paperback
Chatterley’s Lover was in the dock.
Yet bans are excellent publicity.
Second-hand copies of Leviathan went
for 10 times the original price. Maus
shot to the top of the bestseller charts
after the Tennessee school board’s
ban last month. So did The Satanic
Verses, a work of magical realism
deemed blasphemous by some.
Banned books also tend to have
longer shelf lives. George Orwell’s
dystopian 1984 has staged multiple
comebacks. The fable of post-truth,
newspeak and Big Brother has found
fertile ground in the 21st century.
It topped US charts during Donald
Trump’s presidency. In a Hong Kong
increasingly under Beijing’s
authoritarian grasp, it was the ninth
most borrowed adult book in 2020.
Its message continues to resonate,
as will that of Maus.
$645mn in 2021, up more than a third
on the previous year. But it was
dwarfed by $897mn in government
revenue. Palantir’s plan to cut reliance
on one-off state contracts and seek out
recurring revenue from more
corporate customers is a good one.
About half the rise in US commercial
revenue last year came from existing
customers. It suggests Palantir is doing
a good job of increasing the range of
services it offers.
The bad news is the cost of making
the transition. Palantir raised its
marketing spend in the final quarter of
2021 and is investing in smaller start-
ups that become customers. Net losses
persist, reaching $520mn last year.
Alex Karp, chief executive, points to
a stable balance sheet, including $2.3bn
in cash and equivalents. But Palantir
retains some of the secrecy it was once
famous for. It has 147 commercial
customers, for example. But it does not
specify who or where these clients are.
The mystique fits the outsider status.
In an earnings conference on Thursday,
Karp described Palantir as “non-
standard” and said some people viewed
him as “batshit crazy”. This plays well
with retail investors. One thanked
Palantir for furthering the ideals of
western democracy. For the rest of the
investor base, however, opacity in the
middle of transition is off-putting.
Details about how commercial clients
are using Palantir’s services and when
this will translate to profits would be
more useful.
Lex on the web
For notes on today’s stories
go to www.ft.com/lex
I
n a sea of red so far this year, one
country’s stock market stands tall:
the UK’s. It is comfortably the best-
performing market in Europe,
streets ahead of the US, and it is also
trouncing most of Asia.
the national tradition of self-depreca-
tion, I feel a duty to spoil the mood by
saying this reflects everything that is
wrong with the UK stock market.
First, though, the reasons for Team
UK to be cheerful.
Across the world, equities have tum-
bled on intensifying signs that central
banks are poised to pull the plug on the
pandemic-era largesse that has swept
them higher for almost two years. The
pain has been most severe in the flakier
parts of the US market, particularly in
the high-tech Nasdaq Composite, which
has fallen 12 per cent in the opening
weeks of this year.
By contrast, the FTSE 100 index of
British bulldog stocks is up about 2 per
cent, or nearly 2.6 per cent in dollar
terms to make a cleaner comparison
with US indices. Investors are waking
up. According to Bank of America’s lat-
est monthly investor survey, fund man-
agers’ net allocation to UK stocks has
grown by 9 percentage points since Jan-
uary, making this a top new pick.
What is more, the optimists will no
doubt note, that still leaves plenty of
potential buyers left to pounce. Even
with that scale of a shift, investors are
still net underweight the UK relative to
global benchmarks, the BofA survey
shows.
UBS Global Wealth Management,
among others, thinks the rally has fur-
ther to run, slapping a year-end target of
8,100 on the FTSE 100, another 7.5 per
cent above current levels. If that is right,
this will be one of the best years since
the financial crisis.
“Now is the time to invest in the UK”
has been a refrain among analysts and
investors for years. It has never worked
out, in part because Brexit uncertainty
has proven sticky. Instead, diving in to
the deep value of UK stocks has been a
lesson that, sometimes, assets are cheap
for a reason.
Maybe this time really is different —
the performance so far in 2022 certainly
suggests so. One problem — before eve-
ryone gets too carried away — is that it is
worth noting that the FTSE 100 has only
just regained the levels it held two years
ago, right before Covid-19 ripped
through markets.
The Nasdaq, by contrast, is up 44 per
cent from that point. For the S&P 500, it
is 30 per cent. In Europe, Germany’s
The UK excels in the old
economy stuff. BAT is
still one of the top-10
companies on the market
Dax and France’s CAC are comfortably
in double figures.
Investors are jumping in to the UK
now not because it has changed, but
because they have. Right now, fund
managers are unusually miserable.
They are looking for a safe room where
they can hunker down and see out the
global inflation scare.
Bank stocks — typically winners in
rising interest-rate environments — are
in favour. So are mining and energy
stocks. (Just as there are no atheists in a
foxhole, and no carb-avoiders in a lock-
down, there are few true sustainability
evangelists in a wave of inflation.)
These are the sectors where the UK
excels. The old economy stuff. British
American Tobacco is still one of the
top-10 companies on the market. Four
of the others are in oil or resources.
At a recent online event, I was asked
whether drab UK markets were a “cor-
porate old people’s home”. If they are,
then clearly investors can see the allure
of warmth, companionship and round-
the-clock medical care at this testing
time.
Just 1 per cent of the MSCI UK stocks
index are in the technology sector, as
UBS points out, whereas nearly a fifth
are in financials and 13 per cent in
energy. That energy slice of the index is
up by an eye-popping 18 per cent so far
this year, reflecting a rip-roaring run in
oil prices.
This, of course, is fine as long as inves-
tors as a whole remain nervous, misera-
ble or both. In the long term, it is hard to
imagine that the UK’s public markets
will be an exciting place to put money to
work.
Earlier this month, Japan’s SoftBank
delivered a reminder that for tech list-
ings, the US is still the only game in
town, when it revealed plans to list Arm,
one of the UK’s rare tech success stories,
in New York.
Tech investors and executives have
pressed the government to work harder
to attract fast-growing companies to the
London market, and keep up decent
momentum from last year.
The London Stock Exchange has
boasted that the pace of tech and con-
sumer internet company listings more
than doubled in 2021.
Fine. But most of those initial public
offerings have done badly, some very
badly indeed. The 37 companies also
include names that might be more at
home in a consumer retail portfolio
such as Victorian Plumbing, which
describes itself as “the digitally native
retailer of bathroom products”, and
whisky retailer Artisanal Spirits.
Being an inflation hedge and a some-
what dusty retreat for stocks with ques-
tionable sustainability credentials
works for now. But it is not a great call-
ing card for the long term.
katie.martin@ft.com

Drought: the new normal for much of the US

A dry week across most of the US
Feb 15 2022 has worsened the drought
Drought conditions that now cover more
Abnormally dry Moderate Severe Extreme Exceptional than half of the contiguous US – the
greatest extent since 2013.

More than half of Texas is in severe

or extreme drought. The dry
conditions follow record-setting
heat across much of the state in
January. With three-quarters of its
topsoil moisture rated as poor to
very poor, crops have been severely
affected.

At the end of January, a survey by

non-profit group Texas 2036 found
that nine in 10 Texans were
concerned that water supplies
would be exhausted, given current
weather trends and the prospect of
continuing drought conditions.

For the FT’s latest

climate change stories
Visual journalism: Alan Smith Source: US Drought Monitor Follow @ftclimate on Instagram ft.com/climate
Saturday 19 February / Sunday 20 February 2022

SUPPLEMENT OF THE YEAR

RZA ‘If it wasn’t for hip-hop you wouldn’t have had a black president’ — INTERVIEW, PAGE 11
Follow us on Instagram @ft_weekend

fixated on winning. Defeats become fod-

der for self-mocking humour, as in the
comedian Jasper Carrott explaining life
as a Birmingham City fan: “You lose
some, you draw some.” Manchester
City’s supporters, in the bad years when
they watched their team playing tiny
clubs in lower divisions, would sing, sur-
realistically: “We’re not really here.”
The great Dutch footballer Johan Cru-
yff told me in 2000: “If you look at other
countries, they have different values:
winning is holy. In England, you could
say that sport itself is holy.” Since Pre-
mier League teams are allowed to lose,
they dare to play open football.
The league drew on two other, osten-
sibly contradictory English assets: tradi-
tion and youth culture. The world’s old-
est clubs are staffed by young men with
attitude and avant-garde haircuts. In
September 1992, for instance, 17-year-
old David Beckham debuted for 114-
year-old Manchester United. As shown
by his marriage to Victoria Adams, a
singer in the Spice Girls at the time, Eng-
lish football synergises with that other
branch of British youth culture, music.
Liverpool produced The Beatles and
Liverpool Football Club. Manchester
City’s fans sing songs adapted from City-
supporting band Oasis.
The one thing English football was
short of at the start of the 1990s was
good footballers and managers. French
writer Philippe Auclair categorises early
Premier League players as “hard-
tackling box-to-box one-footed mid-
fielders” and giant centre-halves and
centre-forwards with heavy touches.
The league needed to import quality. Of
the hundreds of foreigners who arrived
from 1992, three did most to transform

In a league of its own

the backward game by outsiders.
Since England’s top clubs broke away 30 years ago, foreign players and A new satellite broadcaster, Rupert
Murdoch’s Sky Sports, outbid ITV, buy-
ing the league’s TV rights for £60.8mn
cash have flooded in. So, asks Simon Kuper, is football the winner? a season — a bonanza at the time.
Only people who bought satellite
dishes could watch the new league. But
gates or tunnels or other features which
make it home for the fans. For instance,
the tunnel in Liverpool [with the “This
is Anfield” sign] where the players
become aware that they are about to
enter the field is highly architectural.”
Herzog loved the cramped intimacy of
English grounds: “The Shakespearean
theatre — probably it was even a model
for the soccer stadium in England.”
Like the groundlings of Shakespeare’s
day, English fans consider themselves
participants in the show, co-creating it
with their cheers and songs. They aren’t
the English game: Eric Cantona, Arsène
Wenger and Roman Abramovich.
The Frenchman Cantona landed at
Leeds in January 1992 as a glorious fail-
ure. At 25, he had already played for six
clubs, and had even briefly retired from
football, after walking up to each mem-
ber of the French league’s disciplinary
committee and repeating the word
“idiot”. He collected red cards. Yet the
Premier League needed him.
The young Marlon Brando in raised
shirt collar was a visual shock in shabby,
Continued on page 2

O
ne freezing evening in
early 1993, the first season
of the Premier League, a
friend and I went to watch
Arsenal vs Leeds. We
showed up at Highbury stadium with-
out tickets, paid about £5 each, and
stood at the Clock End. The small
ground was only two-thirds full, with
26,516 spectators. Unfortunately, a large
chunk of them were standing in front of
us, so I could see little of the muddy
field, and nothing of the goal at our end.
All four goals were scored there.
Tiny Gordon Strachan was brilliant for
Leeds. “Dunno what they feed him on,”
said the man next to us, and he shouted
at the Arsenal defence: “Go on, tackle
him! What are you, the Gordon Strachan
Appreciation Society?” Arsenal’s David
Hillier, not a crowd favourite, got a book-
ing for his umpteenth clumsy lunge.
“Send him off, ref!” shouted an Arsenal
fan. “Ban him for life!” advised another.
“Or longer if possible!” added a third.
Watching the match highlights on
YouTube (time travel is now possible),
what struck me was that almost every
player was white and British, and that
the football was dreadful.
Thirty years ago this week, England’s
first-division clubs resigned from the
Football League to set up the Premier
League. Their creation has become the
most globally watched league in sport-
ing history. Judging by clubs’ results in
European competition, the Premier
League overtook Spain as the strongest
league in Europe, and therefore the
world, in 2017.
Almost every Premier League game
this weekend will feature multiple play-
ers of Strachan’s quality. All this has
happened in a midsized nation that pro-
duces few great footballers. The story of
the Premier League is an alternative his-
tory of modern England. The league has
succeeded thanks to English strengths
and peculiarities, among them the
country’s relationship with money.
English clubs had dominated Euro-
pean competitions in the late 1970s and
Illustration by early 1980s, helped by an excellent gen-
Shonagh Rae eration of Scottish, Welsh and Irish play-
ers. But the English game had entered
Below: the 1990s reeling from three crowd dis-
Liverpool player asters. On May 11 1985, 56 spectators
Fabinho touches died in a fire in an antiquated stand
the ‘This is at Bradford City. Later that same
Anfield’ sign on month, 39 people were crushed to death
his way to play at the Heysel stadium in Brussels as
against Arsenal Juventus fans fled from Liverpool sup-
in January — Andrew porters. Four years later, another crush
Powell/Liverpool FC/Getty
at Hillsborough, caused by bad policing
on a terrace like a cattle pen, ended up
killing 97 people.
Hopes were not high in October 1990,
when Greg Dyke, head of ITV Sport, the
channel that screened top-division
games, hosted a dinner for the chairmen
of England’s self-proclaimed “Big Five”.
They were scheming to break from the
Football League so they could stop shar-
ing TV rights income with the other 87
clubs. The plan was that ITV would buy
the five clubs’ rights directly. The chair-
men ended up deciding to create the Pre-
mier League. Dyke told me decades
later: “Who could have foreseen that
we’d end up with English football being
largely owned by foreign owners, man-
aged by foreign managers, and dispro-
portionately played by foreign players?”
The Premier League’s early advances
were partly accidental, thrust on
the government allowed it because post-
Thatcher Britain trusted the free mar-
ket — an essential condition for the Pre-
mier League’s success. A more social-
democratic Germany has kept a bigger
share of its league action on various free
channels. Admirable as that is, it has
meant that Europe’s biggest football
country and economy cannot finance
Europe’s best league.
Meanwhile, after Hillsborough, the
British government had ordered clubs
to renovate their crumbling stadiums
and make them all-seater. It was an
English fans consider
themselves participants in
the show, co-creating it
with their cheers and songs
obvious business idea, but football clubs
had always resisted it. Once they were
forced to modernise their grounds (and
toilets), bingo: more customers came,
including some women and families.
Once English stadiums became safe,
they became perfect venues. Simon Ing-
lis, chronicler of football stadiums, says
the genius of the British ground is
cheapness. In this historically under-
funded working man’s game, writes Ing-
lis: “Form follows whatever the club
chairman’s builder pal from the Rotary
Club could come up with at a cut-price.”
To save space, stands towered steeply
from the field’s edge. There was no ath-
letics track because athletics didn’t pay,
so fans were up against the pitch. Low,
cheap roofs amplified their singing. The
noise urged players into frenzied action
— a hallmark of the Premier League.
Swiss architect Jacques Herzog, of
Herzog & de Meuron, whose stadiums
include Beijing’s Olympic “Bird’s Nest”
and Munich’s Allianz Arena, once told
me: “The model which somehow
started our passion was the classical
English stadium. Often the stadium is
ugly, like Old Trafford or Liverpool. But
they have very interesting details, like
2 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

Life

A lexicon of We are more than halfway through

February, and the malaise that’s been
hovering in our lives for the past two
pleasure. We live so comfortably with
the belief that pleasure must cost us
something, rather than daring to

Life & Arts

years is yet to disperse. Between imagine that we were all born to
unending variants of the virus, the experience and embrace it as part of
state of global politics and rumours of our life, just as we will all freely
war, it’s a wonder that we get out of bed experience our share of challenge
most mornings. These are hard times, and strife without earning or deserving
there is absolutely no denying it. It’s as that either.
I’ve been though we are losing time, as if some
element of our lives were diminishing
It made me wonder what it would be
like to wake up in the morning
approaching in such small increments that, though
we sense a difference, we may not
assuming that pleasure-filled
experiences were awaiting me at
the idea of always be able to place our finger on it.
I’ve been thinking lately that what
various points of the day, regardless of
what else might be going on in my life. I

risk very differently might be winnowing away is our sense

of pleasure: the frequency with which
suspect it would train me to just be
more naturally alert to the world, and

post-pandemic’ we experience an enjoyment of

something. We’ve become so used to
it would heighten my senses, what I
heard, saw, smelled, felt, tasted.
wondering when things will get Children live that way. They expect
Style, page 4 consistently better that we’ve lost sight delight to be a part of each day. They
of how our lives still have room for are almost attuned to receive it. In fact,
pleasure. Or rather, that some element a day for a child seems insufficient
‘That gave me time of pleasure is available for the taking,
regardless of the larger complexities we
without some dose of pleasure.

to be inducted into are individually and collectively

wading through.
I’ve recently discovered the
watercolour paintings of the 35-year-
the secret fraternity I think the key to rediscovering this
lies in engaging our senses as we go
old Brazilian artist Marcos Beccari.
Whether the painting depicts a person
of gricers’ about our lives.
The German realist Lotte Laserstein’s
fallen asleep while reading a book,
their peaceful face illuminated by the
Travel, page 5 1930s painting “Rear Nude with Raised glow of afternoon sunlight pouring
Arms” is a gorgeous image that indoors, or tilting their head back to get
suggests the artist’s appreciation for the the last drops of a good cup of coffee,
‘The work does an beauty and delightfulness of the
human form. I sense that Laserstein
the people in his figurative art often

extremely powerful understood that any appreciation of

pleasure must begin with the
Children live that way.
They expect delight to be a
job of laying bare awareness and celebration of our
bodies as the centre of such experience. part of each day. They are
the delusions of We see the naked torso of a woman
from behind. Her hands are raised to almost attuned to receive it
the back of her head as though in the
meat-eating’ midst of grooming. The soft shades of
brown and peach are warm and seem caught unaware by the artist.
Books essay, page 7 inviting. Her nakedness is sensual They are in the middle of some
without being suggestive or distasteful. mundane activity that has captured
I love this image because it intimates them fully in the present moment, in
‘The paradigm of how human existence is a reality that
requires us to embrace our senses in
the midst of experiencing pleasure.
I’m drawn to his 2019 painting,
the studio was no order to live well. The ability to touch,
smell, see, hear and taste are gifts most
Simple, yet satisfying: Marcos Beccari’s ‘Having Coffee’ (2019) “Having Coffee”, because of the
simplicity of the subject matter. He has
longer a hermetic,
The pleasure principle
of us take for granted every single day. taken something so many of us
And yet, how we use our senses affects experience regularly and without
sealed place but a the quality of our lives in all sorts of
ways. Beyond protecting us and guiding
fanfare — a morning cup of coffee —
and shown it in a new light. A woman is
happening, sociable us, our senses are pathways to all sorts
of pleasures that we should delight in
sitting curled up at the edge of her
couch in comfortable day clothes, what
environment’ and encourage without reluctance or
shame. embodied existence without guilt or like an overindulgence, as if admitting
most of us have been living in during
the past two years. She holds a
Arts, page 14 In the name of puritan respectability, THE ART shame or doubt, then how do we learn an embarrassing desire to taste it, and teaspoon in one hand, as she raises the
I think we often tilt the scales too much to both offer and receive pleasure as a to feel it melt in your mouth. It’s a mug in her other hand to her lips,
the other way, teaching children not to
OF LIFE part of our daily lives, from the simple visceral reminder of one of the richest tilting her head all the way back to

‘While I’m cautious delight in their physical existence, not

to rejoice in their bodies, and not to
ENUMA
pleasure of what we eat, to what we
allow ourselves to stop for and embrace
pleasures available in our daily lives,
and yet one which we’ve convinced
capture the last drops.
It is a small and simple act. But in

of flagging so much hone their senses for the free pleasure

the world offers. Many of us were
taught to feel embarrassed about our
heteronormative body parts, as though the Earth’s
population didn’t have the same ones.
behaviour, it And, for the sake of humility, we are
not encouraged to celebrate what we
seemed like about ourselves or even each other.
We have fairy tales about the wicked
a good vanity of little girls and women, or the
narcissism of boys or men who
illustration unabashedly love themselves.
But if we do not know how to equate
OKORO during the course of a day?
“Mound of Butter”, a 19th-century
oil painting by Antoine Vollon, is a
heap of thick, creamy yellow butter
exposed from an airy cheesecloth that
has fallen at its base like a discarded
négligée. A small wooden spatula sticks
invitingly from the mass, just waiting
for a hungry hand to sweep up a soft
spread. Two small round white eggs
seem to almost rock against the folds of
the cheesecloth.
ourselves is too indulgent for regular
consumption.
this frame, lit by the morning sunshine
flooding through the window behind
Like so many of our unspoken pacts her and casting shadows on her face
around pleasurable activities, it feels
like something we have to earn or be
and sweater, it is a moment of delight
we can all recognise. With it, we
willing to sacrifice something else for.
Salad now, butter later. Where, I
celebrate how our senses invite us to
dwell in a present where everything is
wonder, did we learn that we had to
earn the right to even small delights in
heightened, where we can welcome
and receive every drop or thin thread
our lives?
Though butter is a base example, I
of pleasure awaiting us. The moments
add up, shaping our days — and, I
think we’ve managed to spread some
layer of guilt on many of the
suspect, our lives.

Jo Ellison, page 20 pleasure and delight with our own To gaze at the painting already feels experiences that can bring us daily Email Enuma at enuma.okoro@ft.com

A league of its own The Premier League era –

Continued from page 1
recession-hit early-1990s England. Can-
tona always seemed to know where eve-
ryone on the pitch was, could position
himself almost unmarked “between the
lines”, and passed with perfect speed
and spin. Three months after his arrival,
Leeds sealed the title. But such was Brit-
ish mistrust of what was then called
“continental flair”, the club soon sold
him to Manchester United for a derisory
£1mn. When United manager Alex
Ferguson told his assistant, Brian Kidd,
the fee, Kidd gasped: “Has he lost a leg
or something?”
As a self-proclaimed “artist”, Cantona
saw his job as performing to a crowd. He
had found French crowds cold and criti-
cal. But English fans responded to him.
Ferguson knew that United — without
a league title since 1967 — needed to
abandon primitive, long-ball “British”
football. Cantona showed him how. In
1993 the Frenchman led United to the
Premier League’s inaugural title. He
ended up a role model for the league.
In 1996, Cantona’s compatriot,
Wenger, became manager of Arsenal. “I
felt like I was opening the door to the
rest of the world,” Wenger said later. He
brought knowledge that nobody in insu-
lar England at the time possessed. For
instance, Michael Cox in The Mixer
describes Arsenal’s pre-Wenger diet:
They’d enjoy a full English breakfast before
training, and their prematch options
included fish and chips, steak, scrambled
eggs and beans on toast. Post-match,
things became even worse: on the long
coach journey back from Newcastle, for
example, some players held an eating
competition, with no one capable of
matching the impressive nine dinners
consumed by centre-back Steve Bould.
Wenger got Arsenal’s players eating
fish and steamed veg. A ceaseless pio-
neer, he encouraged the use of supple-
ments such as creatine; he used statis-
tics to analyse players’ performance;
and he knew foreign transfer markets. It
didn’t take mystical insight to perceive
the brilliance of Milan’s reserve Patrick
Vieira and Juventus’s reserve Thierry
Henry — the Highbury crowd saw it
inside 45 minutes on Vieira’s debut
against Sheffield Wednesday — but
hardly any other manager in England
seemed to have heard of them. English
clubs of the day rarely scouted abroad.
Soon most hired their own foreign
managers. (To this day, no English man-
ager has won the Premier League.) But,
crucially for the success of the reality TV
show the league became, they commu-
nicated in the global language. Football-
ers in England mostly keep silent
because the tabloids twist their words
into front pages, so the show’s main
characters are the managers. The beefs
between men such as Wenger, José
Mourinho and Pep Guardiola generated
worldwide daily interest. It wouldn’t
work if they were speaking German.
From 2003, club owners internation-
alised too. When the Russian oligarch
Abramovich decided to buy himself a
football club, he considered Spain and
Italy. But ownership there seemed com-
plicated. In Italy, many families who
owned clubs had been doing business
together for generations. In Spain, fans
themselves owned the biggest clubs.
Abramovich ended up club-hunting in
London. Having been wrongly informed
that Arsenal wasn’t for sale, he trekked
into the north London suburbs to
inspect Spurs, but found Tottenham
High Road “worse than Omsk”.
Chelsea’s stadium was handily located
near Knightsbridge. He bought the club
from Ken Bates in 2003, sealing the deal
over a bottle of Evian in the Dorchester
Hotel. That started a new era in the Pre-
mier League: foreigners buying and
funding ancient English clubs.
Some of these fortunes were murkily
begotten. When Vincent Kompany
signed for Manchester City in 2008, he
was told that his meet-and-greet with
the club’s then owner, former Thai
prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra,
had been cancelled because Thaksin
needed to go into hiding. Still, not to
worry. Keith Harris, the pink-faced
investment banker, always had a queue
of foreigners ringing his phone asking if
there were any English clubs going
spare. Even Myanmar’s military junta
considered buying Manchester United.
The Premier League benefited from
the modern English custom of welcom-
After England’s successful
tournaments in 2018 and
2021, anxiety about foreign
players dissipated
ing money of almost any provenance. If
the league is an overpriced, foreign-
owned, foreign-staffed bazaar, well, so
is much of the UK economy. The dis-
trust of international capital so wide-
spread in France or Germany remains
weak in England. When the Saudi
regime bought Newcastle last year, fans
celebrated in mock-Arab headdresses.
Free-spending foreign owners have
allowed multiple teams to challenge for
the title, avoiding the tedium of the
German, Italian and French leagues,
Newcastle United fans don Saudi dress after the club’s sale last year — Getty
where a single club established a
monopoly for long periods.
But the conversion of English top-
flight football into a globalised plutoc-
racy causes disquiet. There was a popu-
lar theory that England’s national team
failed because the Premier League had
too few English players. Here is England
midfielder Steven Gerrard speaking
before the team failed to qualify for
Euro 2008: “I think there is a risk of too
many foreign players coming over,
which would affect our national team
eventually — if it is not doing it now.”
The 2007-08 Premier League season
had kicked off with Englishmen making
up 37 per cent of starting line-ups. Last
season, they accounted for 38 per cent of
playing time. The question is: is 37-38
per cent a little or a lot? It equates to
more than 70 Englishmen per match day
— more than any other nationality in
what’s now the world’s best league. The
successful Croatians, Belgians or Portu-
guese dream of accounting for 37-38 per
cent of minutes in any big league.
English internationals learn best
practice from competing against foreign
stars every week. Their clubs learn, too.
The Premier League’s youth academies
have been remodelled, often under for-
eign supervision, and nowadays mass-
produce continental-style passing foot-
ballers such as Phil Foden, Bukayo Saka
and Mason Mount.
cosmopolitan teams playing in
full stadiums
1992-93 levels = 100*
Covid limit
on crowds
Proportion of
playing time by
foreign
players
Average match
attendances
1993 2000 05 10 15
*Foreigners played 31.2% of minutes in 1992-93,
65.5% in 2021-22 so far. Average crowds = 21,146
in 1992-93, 39,250 in 2021-22 so far
Sources: FBRef.com, FT research
Indeed, since the Premier League
went international in about the mid-
1990s, England’s performances have
improved. In the era of a British league,
from 1968 through 1992, England
reached the quarter-finals of major
tournaments four times in 13 attempts.
By contrast, in the “international”
period from 1998 to 2018, it reached five
quarter-finals in 11 attempts. (I am
excluding the three tournaments in
which England had home advantage.)
Match by match, the top four postwar
England managers with the highest win
percentage features all three post-2008
incumbents — Fabio Capello, Roy Hodg-
son and Gareth Southgate — alongside
Alf Ramsey, world champion in 1966.
The Premier League’s internationalism
seems to have benefited the national
team. After England’s successful tour-
naments in 2018 and 2021, anxiety
about foreign players dissipated.
But the biggest source of angst around
the league has always been money. As
early as 1995, Labour leader Tony Blair
told a dinner of players and managers at
London’s Savoy hotel that the newly
flush game risked being “tainted by
greed”. He questioned whether any
footballer was worth the £7mn recently
paid by Manchester United to Newcastle
for Andy Cole. He bemoaned rising
ticket prices.
Those anxieties persist today, when
transfer fees can reach £100mn and the
cheapest Arsenal season ticket costs
£891. The Premier League’s bottom club
receives more TV income than every
club in continental Europe except Real
220 Madrid, Atlético Madrid and Barcelona.
The annual TV revenues of English top-
200 division clubs rose from £11mn in
1991-92 to £2.5bn last season — a hun-
180
dredfold rise in real terms. Imagine how
160 much a person might change if their
income jumped one hundredfold.
140
Critics warn that English football has
120 lost its identity, or perhaps its soul. In
100 the daily football conversation, the Pre-
22 mier League’s “bubble” is always about
to burst. Yet fans from Tahiti to Burnley
seem oddly undeterred. All 20 clubs in
the Premier League in 2018-19 averaged
more spectators than in 1992-93, calcu-
lates sports economist Stefan Szyman-
ski, my co-author of Soccernomics. Of the
78 clubs present in the four top divisions
in both seasons, 64 had higher attend-
ance. The Premier League’s rising tide
lifted almost all boats.
Occasionally a small club folds under
financial problems but is swiftly
refounded again and soldiers on, as did
Bury and Macclesfield recently. Almost
every English club that existed a cen-
tury ago survives today.
It’s true that rising ticket prices — the
average cost is now £32 a match, accord-
ing to the Premier League’s figures —
exclude many poorer fans. Clubs ought
to follow theatres in reserving dis-
counted tickets for the unemployed,
disabled and NHS staff. However, before
the Premier League, English football
operated a different sort of exclusion:
scanning the photos of the crowds of
1992, you wonder: where are the women
and black and brown people?
Despite today’s ticket prices, all
60,000 seats in Arsenal’s Emirates Sta-
dium are full whenever Covid restric-
tions allow. If an Arsenal fan from 1992
or even 1922 were to return for today’s
match against Brentford, they would
find most things familiar: the game, the
club colours, the fans’ attachment, the
weekly ritual. Only the football is unrec-
ognisably better.
Simon Kuper is an FT columnist
19 February/20 February 2022
Lunch with the FT Kaja Kallas
‘There seems to be a
naivety towards Russia’ L
The Estonian prime minister talks
to Richard Milne over trout and
tea in Tallinn of her family’s
experience with Soviet oppression,
the Baltic country’s precarious
position in the Ukraine crisis — and
why many western European
nations continue to misread the
intentions of Moscow
O
n the wall of Stenbock
House, my Lunch guest’s
office in the heart of
Tallinn, are two modest
stone plaques. They record
the names of all 10 Estonian heads of
government and 56 other ministers who
perished in the Communist terror that
began in 1941. The past and present are
never far apart in Estonia’s capital.
Estonia has been on the frontline
between Nato and Russia ever since it
joined the military alliance in 2004. But
the security situation in the Baltics and
Europe as a whole in recent weeks has
been at its most tense in decades after
Russia massed troops on Ukraine’s bor-
der and also in Belarus, close to the nar-
row land border that ties the Baltics to
the rest of Europe.
I meet Kaja Kallas, Estonia’s prime
minister for the past year, in an Estoni-
an-Japanese fusion restaurant at the
foot of the Hanseatic old town’s ram-
parts, entering through a garden fur-
nished rather incongruously with busts
of Sean Connery and Alexander Flem-
ing. The Scottish Club, it turns out, is
also based here.
The restaurant has opened especially
for us, and the gentle thump-thump of
dance music replaces the buzz of other
diners. I greet Kallas, who is wearing a
pale yellow dress with a large brooch of
the Estonian flag, with one of my first
handshakes in two years.
We are meeting in the second week of
February before this week’s whirlwind
diplomacy. She sounds understandably
steeled for adversity, not just with
respect to the stand-off over Ukraine
but also the stakes for Estonia and its
two fellow Baltic countries, Lithuania
and Latvia, if President Vladimir Putin
is emboldened.
“Of course, we are members of Nato,
so it’s a bit different attacking a member
of Nato to attacking Ukraine [a non-
member],” she says. “But, still, if he gets
away with Ukraine, they’re just pushing
the boundaries even further and proba-
bly having this view: ‘How can we really
move on?’ ”
The waitress has brought us dark rye
bread and butter, and informed us that
we will be sharing a selection of three
starters, two main courses and a dessert
in a fusion of Estonian produce and Jap-
anese techniques. The starters soon
arrive: trout crudo, roast pumpkin and a
potato omelette. We’re left to share it
out ourselves, and I note wryly that
while I take half of everything, Kallas
serves herself smaller portions.
Kallas, who is still relatively new to
the job, may lead one of the least popu-
lous countries in the EU — Estonia has
just 1.3mn people — but both she and
her country have an outsized place in
the western debate. Estonia has become
Europe’s leader in digital government
and education, all the while keeping its
guard up against its bigger neighbour
and former occupier to the east.
Kallas talks about a five-and-a-half
hour cabinet meeting the previous week
to discuss the preparedness of Estonia
for conflict or hybrid attacks such as
cyber warfare. “What do we do when
there’s no electricity? What do we do
when there’s no internet? How do these
things function? How do we pay out the
pensions?” she says, adding that Esto-
nia’s mantra is: “Prepare for everything
and if nothing bad happens, then fine,
we’re positively surprised.”
French President Emmanuel Macron
had visited Moscow the day before. I ask
Kallas her views of the wisdom of such a
bilateral visit when she and others have
stressed the importance of Nato unity, a
unity that has until now held surpris-
ingly well.
“I’m wondering how frank I can be,”
she says, before having a mouthful of
the trout and making her mind up: “I
feel there is a strong wish to be the hero
who solves this case, but I don’t think it’s
solvable like that.”
Kallas adds: “There seems to be a
★ FTWeekend
certain type of naivety towards Russia. I
L ee r e sto r a n was trying to explain this to President
Uus 31, 10111 Tallinn, Estonia Macron as well: you’re seeing this
through the prism of a democratic coun-
Set menu x2 try. You say that’s it’s going to be super-
Roasted pumpkin, expensive for Russia to have a
cowberries, tofu and yeast war . . . [Putin] doesn’t care. He’s not up
emulsion
Japanese style omelette,
for elections.”
green onion sour cream, The turbulent history of Estonia,
crispy potato which was annexed after the second
Trout crudo, soy and lemon, world war by the Soviet Union, gives it a
roasted almond, shaved particularly acute perspective, I sug-
onion gest. Estonia had declared independ-
Steamed pike perch, ence in 1918 after periods in both the
smashed winter potatoes,
Japanese style pickles
Swedish and Russian empires but was
‘Kohuke’, sour cherry jam, promptly invaded by first Germany and
blackcurrant-glazed then Soviet Russia, before two decades
cherries €90 of relative peace before the second
Sparkling water €3.90 world war. During the conflict, it was
first occupied by Soviet forces, then by
Still water €3.90
the Germans and then by Soviets again.
Pot of green tea with “We have seen very closely how this
cookies €6 works and how the thinking goes,” says
Total €103.80 Kallas. “They [western European lead-
ers] don’t have the experience like this.”
She adds that the west would be better
served with “strategic patience” rather
than rushing to offer Putin something.
But she worries that with a new German
government, French elections on the
horizon and the Biden administration in
the US, Putin “definitely sees the oppor-
tunity there”.
F
or Kallas, as for most Estoni-
ans, this history is intensely
personal. Her great-grand-
mother, grandmother and
mother — then just six months
old — were deported to Siberia in March
1949. The journey took three weeks in a
cattle wagon, an ordeal that a baby was
not expected to survive. A gift of milk at
one station on the way, and the kindness
of strangers keeping the baby warm and
drying her nappies on their bodies,
helped keep her mother alive.
The family did well there, a Singer
sewing machine that they took with
them helping to provide an income in
the frozen north. It was quite a fall from
grace for the family; Kallas’s great-
grandfather was one of the founders of
an independent Estonia in 1918, and the
first chief of its secret police.
Kallas, who is 44 and spent much of
her childhood in Soviet times, relates
her surprise when her grandmother
told her stories from before the war
when she was a governess in Finland, a
short distance across the Gulf of Hel-
sinki from Tallinn. The younger Kallas
could scarcely believe her grandmother
that foreign travel had been possible.
“If I compare my generation to my
grandmother’s generation, they had
everything. They had the freedom, they
had all the choices, they had a free
world. Everything was taken from
them. And I’m absolutely the opposite
generation. We didn’t have anything, we
didn’t have choices, we didn’t even have
anything in the shops. Then we got eve-
rything, in 1991 we got our freedom
back,” she says.
One particular hardship stuck in her
mind. “We had a time when we didn’t
have any candies in the shop. We ate
sour cream with sugar. That was the
sweetest thing that we could get, so I
remember those days,” she adds.
When I mention the plaque outside
Stenbock House, she asks if I have vis-
ited Estonia’s memorial to victims of
Communism. I say no. “I was just think-
ing that if we had chosen another res-
taurant closer to it, I could have shown it
to you. It’s very powerful,” she adds.
That memory of the terror and depri-
vations of Soviet rule, and a desire never
to return to those days, explains why
Estonia has consistently warned the
west about the dangers of a revanchist
Russia, especially after Putin’s first
aggression in Georgia in 2008 and even
more so after its 2014 annexation of Cri-
mea. “A basic principle of our foreign
policy is that we are never alone again.
Because, in the 1940s, we thought that
we didn’t need anybody. Then we were
left alone, which our big neighbour took
advantage of,” Kallas explains.
I suggest to her that one of the divid-
ing lines between western and eastern
Europe is their differing views of the sec-
ond world war. In the west, Nazi Ger-
many tends to be seen as the sole aggres-
sor. But in the east, there are long mem-
ories too of the crimes and abuses by the
Soviet Union.
Kallas says the difference is most
vivid on May 9, commemorated as Vic-
tory Day in western Europe for the sur-
render of Nazi Germany. “It could be a
good day for us as well if on May 10 Sta-
lin had said: ‘You’re all free, go back to
being independent countries.’ Whereas
he didn’t. Then the atrocities started for
us — the deportations, the mass killings,
the pressure on our culture, the collec-
tivisation,” she says.
“A lot is talked about the Nazis, the
Holocaust. But there were so many vic-
tims of the Communist regime that are
not much talked about, even in our
country.”
Our first main course of pike perch
arrives, providing a break in conversa-
tion. Kallas divides the fish and its
Asian-inspired vegetables in two, and
reels off a series of statistics about Esto-
nia’s progress since regaining independ-
ence in 1991. Wages have grown 45-fold,
pensions 60-fold, and its income per
capita, which was once 40 per cent of
the EU average, is now 86 per cent and
bigger than that of Greece, Portugal
or Poland.
She underscores: “Just before coming
here, I was checking the num-
bers . . . Our development has been
quite rapid, but for me it’s very impor-
tant to understand that it’s not for
granted. We could lose it all again.”
ike many in northern Estonia,
Kallas had a porthole into life
outside the Soviet Union
through Finnish TV. “We saw
everything there, and we
were not naive. We didn’t believe that in
the Soviet Union there was a better life,
because we saw it very clearly on the
Finnish side,” she says.
She experienced the build-up to
regaining independence at close quar-
ters as her father, Siim Kallas, was one of
the driving forces, later becoming head
of the central bank, finance and foreign
ministers, as well as prime minister. She
talks of being allowed to remain at the
table as tactics were discussed.
She recounts a trip to East Germany
her father took her on before the fall of
the Berlin Wall when she was about 10.
“I remember when my father said: ‘Chil-
dren, breathe in, it’s the air of freedom
that comes from the western side.’”
She started studying and then practis-
ing law at a fertile time as new rules and
regulations were being written after the
regaining of independence. A partner at
Estonia’s second-biggest law firm at 27,
in her 30s she felt an itch no longer to be
a mere adviser but to make decisions
and try to improve the country.
She joined the Reform party and
became a MEP. In Brussels, she gained a
reputation as one of the stars of the par-
liament, with a focus on technology
matters, perhaps no surprise when
Estonia has the most advanced digital
government in Europe. In 2000, Estonia
discarded paper documents and intro-
duced a digital system for cabinet meet-
ings; citizens have been able to vote, fill
in tax returns and do most tasks elec-
tronically for more than a decade.
Kallas has been compared, often neg-
atively, to her father. But she adds of
one proud moment when a woman
wrote to her saying she had been photo-
graphed with Siim Kallas and that her
daughter had remarked on seeing the
picture: “Oh, you got a picture with
Kaja’s father.”
Her time as prime minister has been
tough, especially as she assumed office
in the middle of the pandemic. She
relates how she chaired a cabinet meet-
ing to impose fresh restrictions on her
first day in charge. She has suffered in
the opinion polls as voters struggle to
work out what she and her liberal
Reform party stand for.
Some of the criticism has been
fierce and personal. Andrus Ansip, a
former Reform prime minister,
called her a “selfish, ‘to the manor born’
lady” after she said she had con-
sidered resigning but decided not to
as it would bring the controversial
nationalist Ekre party to power. Kallas
3
Life
deflects my question but concedes: “I
had no illusions about the job and had
seen from my father how difficult it is.
But, of course, he says that he never
had as difficult times as I’m having.”
The waitress brings over new knives
and forks for our second main course. I
have a sense of relief when Kallas tells
her that she is full. Dessert, however, is
non-negotiable. A cute take on kohuke, a
chocolate-covered curd cheese snack,
soon arrives, filled with cherries. We ask
for some green tea, and some small
cookies appear too; Kallas says it was
these that attracted her to the restau-
rant first in an earlier location.
Some have suggested that the big
advances in digital government in Esto-
nia have rather stalled in recent years. Is
it time to reinvigorate the concept?
Kallas agrees, saying the new thing is
what she calls “proactive government
services”, where the administration can,
for instance, automatically set up child
benefit when a baby is born or send out a
message saying a driver’s licence will
soon expire and provide the link to
order a replacement. She says it’s “a pos-
itive side of being a small country — you
can easily turn a small ship whereas you
can’t turn a big ship.”
Kallas suddenly takes up her phone,
checks the time, and sends a quick
‘I had no illusions about the
job and had seen from my
father how difficult it is.
But, of course, he says that
he never had as difficult
times as I’m having’
message. “Are you in a rush?” she asks.
We eat a few of the tiny cookies and she
says she has just calculated she has time
before her next meeting to take me to
the Victims of Communism Memorial.
The memorial is several kilometres
outside the city centre and when we get
there it is snowing, and a biting wind is
blowing off the sea. Kallas, now clad in a
thin, beige hooded coat, strides out of
the car and shows me the long columns
detailing thousands upon thousands of
Estonia’s victims to Communism. We
walk up some steps to a section with bul-
let holes, each containing the picture of
an Estonian military officer. Different
sections explain the different parts of
Siberia, and elsewhere in the Soviet
Union, to which victims were deported.
“Sorry for the weather,” she exclaims
once we are in the car again. As we speed
back to the centre of Tallinn, I return to
the events of today. Is it Putin’s aim to
keep the Baltics permanently on their
toes, never able to let their guard down?
“Yes. This is what I sometimes feel
around the European Council discus-
sions. For some of those people, it is a
theoretical discussion. Whereas for us,
it’s an everyday worry, a real worry. I
would love to invest all this money that
we invest in defence, in education, but
being an independent country and the
things that we have to do for this, we
don’t really have an option.”
Richard Milne is the FT’s Nordic and Baltic
correspondent
4 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

Style
something good,” she said, underlining

Welcome
the raison d’être of her brand. “More
important than how you look, or what
you wear, is: what is it doing for others?”
Not every designer was keen to swad-
dle their models in cashmere and jersey.
Celine alum and 2014 LVMH Graduate
Prize winner Peter Do sent out a razor-

to the new
focused, largely monochromatic collec-
tion of sharp narrow coats, backless
gilets and deconstructed suits softened
by fluid, wide-leg trousers and denim.
Tailoring was also the main story at
Khaite. Drawing on the tough, gritty
glamour of 1990s New York, designer

formality
Cate Holstein outfitted her models in
double-breasted blazers with promi-
nent shoulder pads and long, narrow
skirts slit high up the middle, black
leather moto jackets and mini skirts,
and smocked dresses accessorised with
large totes and low, sharp d’orsay heels.
Other designers turned up the vol-
ume. Puffy sleeves, exaggerated ruffles
New York Fashion Week | Track and full skirts abounded at Carolina
Herrera and Jason Wu, which were enli-
vened by more youthful, short cocktail
pants have been swapped for dresses.
Joseph Altuzarra acknowledged he
used about three times as much fabric
slick tailoring. By Lauren Indvik as usual to create the wide, floor-skim-
ming pleated silk skirts and military-in-
spired coats, made grand with their

W
e’re tired of sneakers,”
moaned designer
Lazaro Hernandez
backstage after his
opening-night show for
Proenza Schouler, the nearly two-
decades-old label celebrated for its pol-
ished day-to-evening dresses and
graphic prints. “We want fashion.”
It was a cry echoed by other designers
at New York Fashion Week, which drew
to a close Wednesday evening after six
days of shows at which masks, IDs and
proof of double-vaccination (and often
a booster jab) were requirements for
admission. It is a desire not to return to
normal — “I avoid using that word,” said
Coach executive creative director Stuart
Vevers in a separate preview — but at
least to shed the tracksuit bottoms
and other slovenly hallmarks of work-
from-home dressing and to serve up
something a little more daring and
streamlined.
So, against the buff-coloured brick
and polished concrete of the Brant
Foundation Art Study Centre edging
Manhattan’s Alphabet City, Hernandez
and Jack McCollough introduced what
they dubbed “a new formality” — two-
toned strapless dresses with slim knit
tops and moulded hips from which hung
wide skirts of black jersey; polished silk
shirts and shirt dresses that buttoned
from wrist to collar, worn over glove
boots and ballet flats; and angular coats
and straight-leg trouser suits that but-
toned on the side, hugging the waist.
They were not so much fashion as sen-
sible wardrobe investments — sleek, ele-
gant, versatile clothes for professional
women to go to work and then to dinner
in, and which, particularly in the case
of the moulded knit-jersey dresses,
looked as comfortable as pyjamas. “It’s
the idea of dressing up again but doing it
in a way that feels contemporary,
through knitwear and flat shoes and
ease,” said Hernandez.
American designers are simultane-
ously celebrated and derided for being
“commercial” — for showing clothes on
the runway that are familiar and there-
fore “safe”, and that women actually
want to buy.
That approach has served them well
during the pandemic: designers, usually
loath to talk numbers backstage,
boasted of sales growth of 20 to 55 per
cent over 2019, propelled by investment
in their core product lines and websites,
a boom in domestic luxury spending,
and strong demand from department
stores that found themselves woefully
short on inventory after cancelling
orders at the start of the pandemic.
Yet a sense of caution lingered.
Though many spoke this week of a
desire to “take risks”, to “be creative”
and “extreme”, for the most part design-
ers did what they’ve long done best,
offering practical, on-brand clothes that
answer the needs of the moment.
That meant an emphasis on ease and
comfort, also seen at Ulla Johnson, via
roomy quilted jackets, ruffled bias-cut
dresses and matching marled-knit sepa-
rates (which looked smart layered over
tissue-thin printed turtlenecks)
beneath the ornate marble ceilings of
New York Public Library’s Astor Hall.
Michael Kors layered large, lush faux
From top, left to right: Michael
Kors; Proenza Schouler; Michael
Kors; Gabriela Hearst; Altuzarra;
Jason Wu; Tory Burch; Khaite;
Collina Strada — Ik Aldama/DPA
fur and blanket-like camel coats of dou-
ble-faced alpaca over thick ribbed-knit
dresses, cashmere leotards, or (for
evening) slim, short racerback dresses
and snug over-the-knee “stocking”
boots in grey or camel suede. “It’s all
about glamour and polish but [not
needing] to give up the comfort,” Kors
said in a preview before the show.
“It’s about comfort for sure, but also
freedom,” echoed designer Tory Burch
after her night-time show across from
Manhattan’s iconic New Yorker Hotel,
on which the Tory Burch name and logo
had been beamed in red lights.
This confident collection married the
best of American sportswear — car
coats and high-waisted slacks of the
Lauren Bacall variety, hoodies and loaf-
ers, and colour-blocked dresses in soft,
clinging jersey — done with lots of tex-
ture and zingy colour combinations of
mustard and pistachio, and chocolate
and neon yellow.
Freedom, too, was on the mind of
Gabriela Hearst — namely freedom
from gender. She and her team have
taken a series of lectures from Stanford
art history professor Emanuele Lugli,
whose teachings resulted in a merging of
shapes and silhouettes across Hearst’s
men’s and women’s collections.
The craftsmanship was exquisite:
trenchcoats in black and caramel were
topped with storm flaps in fine woven
leather, a dress of yellow and orange
teardrops was hand-crocheted by
Madres y Artesanas in Bolivia, and a
pastel drawing by New York artist Ana
Martínez Orizondo was beautifully
transferred on to an ankle-length cash-
mere poncho.
Forty-nine per cent was made from
recycled or deadstock material, includ-
ing linen-wool suits in yellow and black
made from upcycled fabrics. Thick
knits, amazingly soft to the touch, were
made of recycled cashmere felt col-
oured with botanical dyes.
Hearst wore one of the jumpers back-
stage, in grey. “This jumper, made in my
country, feels amazing, but it also does
stand-up shearling collars, that were the
cornerstones of his excellent, mermaid-
inspired autumn/winter line-up.
‘I just feel like everything I
do now should just be the
most extreme, the most
creative version of an idea’
“I’ve been really approaching the idea
of risk very differently post-pandemic,
and I just feel like everything I should do
now should just be the most extreme,
the most creative version of an idea,” he
said backstage. The final two dresses
were made of heavy golden metal pail-
lettes that overlapped like fish scales
and sounded like the crashing of waves.
“Comfort”, “freedom”, “ease” — if
there was a fourth buzzword of New
York Fashion Week, it was certainly
“metaverse”. Jonathan Simkhai staged
his runway show in the game Second
Life; the clothes were surprisingly
detailed, if difficult to envision how they
might look in the physical world. Maisie
Schloss, of the Kanye West-backed label
Maisie Wilen, showed her collection via
holograms. Dressed in lab coats, glitter-
ing dresses and stretchy, laser-cut
bodysuits, models were transformed
into fantasy creatures with gills and elf
ears. Though the format drew attention
away from the clothes, it did enhance
their otherworldly feel.
Less technologically impressive, but
perfectly on point, was Collina Strada’s
collection video — a riff on reality TV
series The Hills that follows a young
Collina Strada intern (played by
Tommy Dorfman) as she attempts to
navigate the not-entirely-glamorous
world of “sustainable fashion”. Cen-
sured for using disposable coffee cups
and bringing a pastrami sandwich to
a vegan team lunch, the video is amus-
ing and paints an inviting portrait of
Collina Strada’s cute, colourful and
inclusive universe.
“We’re trying to do our part [with cli-
mate change] but we can also make fun
of ourselves,” said designer Hillary Tay-
mour. It’s the kind of daring American
fashion could use more of.

That’s a bit rich: the ‘fake heiress’ chic in ‘Inventing Anna’

Television | The subject of a Netflix drama, Anna Sorokin dressed the part of a wealthy socialite. The show’s designers tracked down her outfits on Instagram. By Carola Long

F
rom Billy McFarland, co-
founder of the ill-fated Fyre
Festival, to Theranos’s Eliza-
beth Holmes and The Tinder
Swindler, popular culture is
often mesmerised by confidence trick-
sters. Now, the spotlight is on Anna
Sorokin, also known as “the fake heir-
ess” or “the Soho grifter.”
From 2013 to 2017 Sorokin convinced
Manhattan society she was a wealthy
heiress named Anna Delvey, staying in
hip hotels, eating at the hottest restau-
rants, flying by private jet and seeking
investment for an elite arts foundation.
However, she couldn’t pay her ever
increasing bills and in 2019 she was
found guilty of theft of services, grand
larceny and attempted grand larceny
and imprisoned. Her story has now
been adapted into a fictionalised Netflix
drama called Inventing Anna, created
and written by Shonda Rhimes.
Just as the Steve Jobs-inspired polo
necks worn by Elizabeth Holmes pro-
jected gravitas so designer clothes
helped Sorokin build a persona, and
seem like she really did have a multimil-
lion dollar trust fund. By the time her
case came to court she was already noto-
rious and had enlisted a stylist, Anasta-
sia Walker, who told Elle magazine, “I
selected some timeless pieces, given
that everything is so public today and
[trial] photographs can be saved, poten-
tially, forever.”
Series’ co-costume designer Laura
Frecon, whose credits include Mad Men,
believes fashion and image was essential
to Delvey’s effectiveness in duping indi-
viduals and institutions alike. “How
Anna did what she did is beyond me,”
she tells me on a call, “but I don’t think it
would have worked if she hadn’t looked
the part through her clothes, her jewel-
lery, her glasses. She needed to sell that
story and say, I am wealthy. I am a Ger-
man heiress.”
Frecon, who worked with co-costume
designer Lyn Paolo (TV shows Little
Fires Everywhere, Scandal) aimed to rec-
reate many of Anna and the other char-
acters’ looks exactly, which required
detective work. “We started by going to
Anna’s Instagram,” she recalls, “We
would look at the pictures and say, ‘who
is that person next to her?’ and of course
they were all tagged so then I would go
down that person’s Instagram and then
that person’s Instagram, and we just
dove deep into who they were.”
Frecon and Paolo also aimed to match
the clothes Delvey wore for her 2019
trial (of course there’s an Instagram
account called @annadelveycourt-
looks). Her courtroom-as-catwalk
ensembles included her signature baby-
doll dresses in black, swiss-dot cream
cotton and snake print; a black pencil
dress, and black trousers with a beige
jumper, mainly accessorised with an
oddly Victorian black ribbon choker
and heavy black Celine glasses.
While Frecon and Paolo wanted to
recreate many outfits exactly, Frecon
says she also wanted to “elevate” the
overall style and that Anna’s wardrobe
becomes more sophisticated as she
emulates the different people she is
using for money or connections. She
says “the real Anna wore a lot of street
style and Rick Owens, and a little leather
bomber jacket, and at the start she
wears a lot of baby-doll dresses. How-
ever, [in the drama] when this wealthy
older character Nora takes her under
her wing, and introduces her to power-
ful friends with amazing careers and
super high fashion, she steps up her
fashion game.” Nora wears a camel cape
by Celine that radiates old-money, plush
privilege, so Anna dons a checked Val-
entino cape teamed with leather gloves.
When Anna and her boyfriend jet-set
around the world, Frecon says of Anna’s
wafty yacht-wear “it’s that idea of faking
it til you make it”.
The wealthy wardrobes in Inventing
Anna aren’t of the “corporate, but make
it cashmere”, Loro Piana baseball caps
and gilets variety you see in Succession.
The aesthetic is conspicuously rich and
jet-set via Valentino, Alaïa, McQueen,
Gucci and Dolce & Gabbana. One scene
in particular delivers a vicarious fashion
Julia Garner as Anna Sorokin in
‘Inventing Anna’ — Nicole Rivelli/Netflix
thrill, when Nora and her alpha friends
take a private shopping suite in Berg-
dorf Goodman, and are handed
swatches of leather to choose for their
own customised bags.
Frecon says inspiration for how rich
Manhattanites dress came from seeing
them wafting around Bergdorfs and tel-
egraphing their status “not so much in a
label, as in how it’s worn or carried. On
the Upper East Side you can pick out
those old money ladies who know where
to shop, you can see the way the clothes
are tailored or they are walking around
in a shoe that a ‘normal’ person
wouldn’t be able to ride the subway in
but these people have a driver”.
Unlike on a fashion shoot, where
almost everything will be loaned, most
of the garments on Inventing Anna were
bought as they can get more wear and
tear. But what happens to delicious
pieces such as the red Alexander
McQueen dress Delvey wears with head-
scarf and oversized shades aboard a
yacht? Or the camel cape? Netflix
archives some of the most “quintessen-
tial” looks; many of the rest are being
sold on luxury resale site The RealReal.
Frecon says, “We had a great budget
in the millions of dollars for costumes,
so we could buy the right clothes and
jewellery and do it to the highest level.
Shonda Rhimes really writes fashion
into the drama. For anybody who loves
fashion this show is like candy.”
19 February/20 February 2022
Driving the ‘breathing dragon’
Poland | Martin Fletcher takes the controls of one of Europe’s last passenger
steam trains — and meets the English rail enthusiast who helped save it
I
t is 5.20am and I’m sound asleep in
a guest house in Wolsztyn, a small
town in western Poland. The light
snaps on outside my room. I hear
Howard Jones, my host, shout: “It’s
working, it’s working.” It takes me a sec-
ond to register what’s happening, then I
leap from my bed and hurriedly dress.
Thirty minutes later Jones and I reach
the train station. It is cold, dark and
raining but, sure enough, there’s a huge
black steam engine standing at the plat-
form, steam and smoke billowing from
its chimney.
We climb up into the cab, where
Andrzej and Marcin, the driver and fire-
man, are waiting in their grimy clothes
and baseball caps. At precisely 6.03am
the great steel monster pulls out of the
station, clanking and creaking, shaking
and shuddering, huffing and puffing as
it slowly gathers pace.
Thus the last daily standard-gauge
scheduled steam train service left in the
world, the last one providing primarily
for regular passengers not tourists,
begins its morning journey.
It is also the last one on which novices
like me can learn to drive, but I’m get-
ting ahead of myself.
It was three years ago that a friend of a
friend who happened to be a steam-
train lover — also known as a “gricer” —
told me about Wolsztyn’s steam engines
and of the curious Englishman who had
done so much to keep them going by set-
ting up “footplate courses” for those
who longed to drive them.
Intrigued, I contacted Jones, who
invited me to visit in February 2020. I
booked my flights, but the day before I
was due to leave he called to say that
unfortunately none of the three service-
able steam engines was working. Then
came Covid-19 and the lockdowns.
I resurrected my plans last month,
booked a three-day visit and flew out to
Poznan with a gricer named Peter Lock-
ley, a retired solicitor from Leamington
Spa who now travels the world photo-
graphing steam engines for fun. An hour
later we arrived in Wolsztyn, where
Jones broke the discomfiting news that
just one of the locos was working.
The service to Leszno runs twice daily,
at 6.03am and at 11.41am. Having got in
late, I opted to lie in the next day and
take the second one. That was a bad mis-
take. The loco developed a fault in its
brake pump during the early-morning
run, so the later one was cancelled.
That gave me time, at least, to be
inducted into the strange and secret fra-
ternity of gricers — most of them men
old enough to remember Britain’s last
steam trains; men raised on Thomas the
★ FTWeekend
Tank Engine and films like The Titfield
Thunderbolt, The Great St Trinian’s Train
Robbery and The Railway Children.
I admired the guest house where Jones
accommodates his visitors, and which
he has filled with steam-engine memo-
rabilia: signals, ticket collectors’ caps,
guards’ lamps, platform signs, model
trains, jigsaws, a library of railway DVDs
and, of course, photographs galore.
Lockley and I explored the Wolsztyn
engine shed, where there is a splendid
old “roundhouse” (workshop), a work-
ing turntable of a sort I had not seen
‘To me a steam engine is the
closest thing in machinery
to being alive . . . They
are temperamental’
since childhood and 18 ageing steam
engines in various states of repair — or
disrepair. Lockley knew them all.
“That,” he would say knowledgeably, “is
a Pm36-2, built in Poland in 1937 and the
last of its kind in the world.”
And over a long lunch of wild mush-
room soup and venison in a prewar aris-
tocrat’s country mansion, Jones, now sil-
ver-haired and 70, told me his story.
Born and raised in south London, he
was taken by his father to see a rare
“Clan Stewart” steam locomotive at
Liverpool Street station when he was
just five. As a boy, he would sneak into
“sheds” at Cricklewood, Neasden and
Old Oak Common to admire the steam
engines. “In the summer it was trains-
potting and in the dour winter days it
was a model railway in the bedroom,”
he said. When the last regular steam-
train passenger service ended in
Britain in 1968 “it was almost like losing
a close friend”.
From top: the Wolsztyn to
Leszno steam train
crossing the landscape
amid clouds of steam and
smoke; starting out before
dawn; Martin Fletcher in
the cab; Howard Jones,
who set up the Wolsztyn
Experience ‘footplate
courses’; Wolsztyn’s
working turntable
Peter Lockley
i / d E TaI lS
Martin Fletcher was a guest of
The Wolsztyn Experience
(thewolsztynexperience.org). It
offers a week-long ‘footplate
course’, including basic
accommodation and four round
trips totalling 240 miles in a steam
engine’s cab, for £1,785. Shorter
courses are also available
He left school just as the era of cheap
package holidays was beginning. He
worked for Clarksons and Freddie
Laker before both went bust, then set up
a company that organised weekend
trips for British gricers to heritage rail-
ways in Germany and Poland. That was
how he discovered the Wolsztyn depot.
Steam trains had survived longer in
communist Poland than elsewhere
because the country produced lots of
cheap coal, and diesel locomotives were
expensive. They were still common in
the 1980s, and three or four working
sheds survived until 1990, but by 1994
Wolsztyn was the last one left. “It was
just clinging on” thanks to a wheeler-
dealer manager whom Jones described
as a “Polish Del Boy”.
By that time Jones’s company — and
his marriage — were in trouble, so he
decided to follow his heart. In 1997 he
moved from Burgess Hill, West Sussex,
to Poland to try to save Wolsztyn and its
steam engines.
“It was a kind of eureka moment,” he
said. “Someone said ‘you’ll never get
away with it’ and that was a bit of a kick
in the backside. They said ‘you’ll never
get beyond five years’ and here we are 25
years later.”
He promised to raise funds for the
shed provided the state railway com-
pany continued to run the trains. He
tapped into the surprisingly large com-
munity of British train lovers (the UK
supports at least eight railway maga-
zines). He persuaded 40 gricers to
invest £2,000 each, in return for which
they could spend a week a year for the
next five years learning to drive the
steam trains. He moved out to Wolsz-
tyn, launched his footplate courses and
began organising special steam train
trips around Poland.
His scheme worked. By the early
2000s he was contributing about
£50,000 a year to Wolsztyn’s shed and
attracting visitors from around the
world to that small Polish town. In 2006
he was awarded the MBE for his contri-
bution to British-Polish relations. “I felt
a bit of a fraud because all I’d done is
play trains,” said Jones, who also mar-
ried a Polish woman. Today the Wolsz-
tyn to Leszno service carries about
50,000 passengers a year, of which only
about 5,000 are tourists.
I asked Jones what it was about steam
engines that he found so fascinating?
“To me, a steam engine is the closest
thing in machinery to being alive. It’s
like a breathing dragon,” he explained.
They are temperamental. Each has its
own personality. “No two steam engines
are alike. They’re all completely differ-
ent. You have to learn the characteris-
tics of each loco. You have to learn how
each one handles. You call them ‘she’,
and you certainly swear at them . . . It
requires a lot of skill to drive a steam
engine, but any idiot can drive a diesel
or an electric.”
Jones, incidentally, can drive a steam
engine but cannot drive a car.
The next morning brought more bad
news. The brake pump was still not
mended, and I was due to fly home at
noon the following day. Desperate situa-
tions require desperate measures, so
late that afternoon a young employee of
the Wolsztyn shed was dispatched on a
650-mile, 10-hour round-trip drive to a
railway museum in Chabowka in south-
east Poland to collect a cannibalised
spare part. He returned in the small
hours of the morning, the faulty pump
was swiftly mended and at 5.20am
Jones woke me up. Over the next three
hours I began to understand why gricers
are gricers.
Dressed in a boiler suit, I climb up 6ft
of metal steps to the cab of the steam
engine, an OL49-69 built in Poland in
the early 1950s. It has old wooden floor-
Baltic Sea
POLAND
Berlin Wolsztyn
Poznan
GERMANY Warsaw
Leszno
Wroclaw
Prague
Katowice
CZECH REPUBLIC
100 km maps4news.com/©HERE
©Mapcreator.io/©HERE
boards; the doors and windows are held
together by bits of wire. In front of me,
above the firebox, is a huge and bewil-
dering bank of levers, wheels and dials.
Behind is the coal tender. Every surface
is oily, black and grimy. There is a strong
smell of sulphur.
Jones briefly introduces me to the
“regulator” (a long steel lever that
serves as the accelerator), the
“reverser” (a wheel that operates the
gears) and a handle for the brakes. Then
we’re off — 140 tonnes of steel rumbling
out into the pre-dawn darkness amid
clouds of steam and smoke.
It is thrilling, but a little alarming too.
We can barely see the line ahead
because the loco’s great long boiler is in
the way. Andrzej, aged 67 and a 48-year
veteran of the railways, relies almost
entirely on his intimate knowledge of
the track to know when to accelerate
5
Travel
and when to stop. Fortunately, he could
navigate it blindfolded.
Leszno is 30 miles and 73 minutes
away. En route we stop at 11 village sta-
tions with Polish names comprised
largely of consonants. Normally there
would be lots of schoolchildren and stu-
dents waiting on the rudimentary plat-
forms, but it is half-term so today we
pick up just a few huddled figures,
mostly early-morning commuters.
They are blithely unaware that they
have a complete beginner not actually
driving the train, but pulling levers and
turning handles as Andrzej barks
instructions at me in broken English.
I’m told to blow the whistle as we
approach level crossings. I help Marcin
shovel large chunks of glistening
coal into the blazing firebox, filling the
cab with an orange glow and a blast of
hot air each time we open its steel
doors to expose the red-hot furnace
inside. At times we reach 40 or 50mph,
and the whole loco is vibrating, but
somehow we make inch-perfect stops
at every station.
Approaching Leszno, a major junc-
tion, our single branch line merges with
a dozen others. We place our lives in the
hands of an unseen signalman, who
somehow guides us through the tangle,
and we grind to a halt in a crescendo of
noise and smoke. Diesel and electric
trains glide in and out almost silently,
but steam engines are drama-loving,
attention-seeking prima donnas — a
statement.
A dozen passengers get off, and
scarcely 20 minutes later we set off back
to Wolsztyn, only this time the loco is at
the back of the train so we are going in
reverse. It is light now, though grey and
misty. We pass factories, warehouses
and modern boxy houses as we leave
Leszno. We speed under bridges, past
old-fashioned signal boxes and over
level crossings where cars as small as
Dinky Toys wait as we roar past. We
thunder through flat rich farmland,
then forests of pine and silver birch,
scattering deer. We pick up shoppers
heading for Wolsztyn’s market, and
Ukrainian workers heading home, 38
passengers in all. In no time we’re pull-
ing into Wolsztyn’s station having burnt
our way through two tonnes of coal.
It is 9.07am. Elated, I thank Andrzej
and Marcin, pull off my boiler suit and
sprint to a waiting car with my hands
and face still black and filthy. I should
just make my plane. Either way, Jones
informs me: “You are now one of per-
haps 2,000 people in the world who
have helped drive a steam locomotive
on a main line in the 21st century.”
6 ★
Travel
T
he Twin Otter plane
swooped low over emerald-
green forests and turquoise
lagoons, our pilots appear-
ing to be relishing the jour-
ney, in no rush to get to their destina-
tion. After two long, hard years without
tourism, who could blame them? Fiji
had just reopened, and everyone
seemed to have taken on the role of
impromptu welcome party, simply glad
to be able to show off their island nation
to the world once more.
The very name had evoked in my
mind that mid-century notion of para-
dise both pristine and remote, though in
truth, Fiji had long ceased to be all that
inaccessible. Commercial tourism
began in the 1960s, and over half a mil-
lion tourists were arriving every year by
the new millennium. Pre-pandemic,
tourism contributed about 38 per cent
of Fiji’s GDP so, desperate to restart the
industry, the authorities set out a robust
vaccination campaign, with the tagline
“no jab, no job”. With nearly 70 per cent
Vanua Levu
Viani Bay
Resort
FIJI
Nadi SOUTH
Viti Levu
PACIFIC
Pacific OCEAN
Suva
Harbour
Beqa Island
50 km ©Mapcreator.io/©HERE
of residents fully vaccinated, and a suite
of Covid safety protocols in place, the
country finally threw its borders open to
visitors on December 1.
Our first port of call was Viani Bay,
tucked away on the eastern spur of Fiji’s
second island, Vanua Levu. There are no
roads in or out of the horseshoe bay; all
of its roughly 100 residents trek over the
nearby hills on foot, or motor in and out
by boat. We chose the latter, skipping
over the waves from nearby Taveuni
island at first light, a flood of moonlight
giving way in quick succession to ver-
milion, orange, and sapphire blue skies.
I suspected the long journey would be
worth it. Viani, after all, is perfectly situ-
ated for divers looking to access Fiji’s
famed Rainbow Reef, first mapped by
Jacques Costeau and now one of the
world’s prime examples of the soft-coral
ecosystem. In normal times, the reef
would be teeming not just with fish, but
with divers from across the world. But in
these early days of Fiji’s tentative reo-
pening, we would have this bucket-list
dive site virtually to ourselves.
Home for the first week was the Viani
Bay Resort, a three-bungalow operation
that stands in stark contrast to the large,
luxurious resorts on Fiji’s main island,
Viti Levu. The trickle of tourists return-
ing to Fiji was still a far cry from the days
of mass tourism, a model many had
begun to question because of its envi-
ronmental impact. I wondered if locally
rooted, low-impact, high-value opera-
tions might show the way forward.
The resort, which also brands itself
the Dive Academy Fiji, was created by
Marina Walser and Jone Waitaiti, busi-
ness partners who had met on Ger-
many’s scuba diving circuit. Marina,
tired of a long career in the corporate
world, had wanted a change of scenery
that involved better weather and div-
ing; Jone had longed to return to his
native Fiji.
Marina told me of the long journey to
making their dream a reality. Camping
on the beach for nearly a year, they had
worked with local tradespeople to put up
wooden bungalows, built in the tradi-
tional Fijian bure style. Slowly winning
the trust of the community, they’d built a
successful, sustainable dive operation
that lasted three years. Then the pan-
POSTCARD
FROM . . .
PIC DU MIDI
i / D ETAilS
Eric Kendall was a guest of Hautes-Pyrénées
Tourism (pyrenees-holiday.com) and the Pic du
Midi (picdumidi.com). The ‘Night at the Summit’
package costs €469 for two people, including
dinner, breakfast, use of telescopes and guided
stargazing. For the descent, Evasion Hors Pistes
(horspistes.fr) offers guided ski descents from
€150 for two people
Diving in paradise
Fiji | The vulnerable island nation is slowly rebounding from the pandemic,
but what is the right balance on commercial tourism? By Siddarth Shrikanth
demic hit and Fiji shut down, forcing
them to survive by catering to local visi-
tors and the occasional yacht. Later, I’d
discover many of Fiji’s tourism workers
had returned to their villages, making
ends meet through farming, fishing and
government relief. While much of the
world moved online, many Fijians had
quite literally gone back to their roots.
We were the first group back since the
big reopening, and what the resort
lacked in outright luxury was more than
made up for with personal touches. For
one, there was the food: seasonal, locally
sourced and tailored to guests’ dietary
preferences. Our plant-based diets
seemed to pose no problem, and we
quickly became acquainted with the
overlooked delights of Fijian cuisine.
T
he first visitors to the top of
the 2,877-metre Pic du
Midi de Bigorre didn’t
come to ski. Nor, of course,
did they arrive by cable
car. From a distance this steep and
unforgiving mountain in the French
Pyrenees doesn’t look a likely prospect,
either up or down. But goat herders
and adventurers reached the summit
many centuries ago and scientists have
come since the early 18th century,
studying the botany, weather, geology
and, latterly, the night skies.
The snow-covered winter
surroundings make for a particularly
stable atmosphere, which, in
combination with frequently crystal
clear skies, led to the development of
an observatory on the peak. Building
started in 1878, with materials hauled
up by mule, and continued throughout
the 20th century with the addition of
ever more powerful telescopes. A cable
car was added by 1955 and in the early
1960s Nasa funded a new telescope
used to survey the moon in preparation
for the Apollo landings.
Even for non-astronomers, the Pic is
well worth a visit. Daytime tourists
come just for the view over the
Pyrenees (cyclists will probably be
familiar with the mountain pass just
below the peak — the Col du
Tourmalet, one the Tour de France’s
FTWeekend
Clockwise from
main: a bull
shark in Beqa
lagoon; the coral
colours of
Rainbow Reef;
early morning
on Taveuni
island;
traditional
bure-style
bungalows at
Viani Bay Resort
Tim Rock/Polaris/eyevine;
Alamy
Generous three-course meals featured
taro, breadfruit, pumpkin and Fijian
spinach, interspersed with Indian-
influenced soups and curries and sea-
soned with local fleur de sel and wild
chillies. Coconut-milk ice cream was a
regular, welcome feature, cutting as it
did through the summer heat.
All the more remarkable was that
these beautifully presented dishes were
prepared not by professional chefs from
the big city, but by women recruited and
trained locally in tiny Viani Bay. That
this was the first job they’d held in their
lives was impossible to tell. The same
ethos of opportunity for the community
animated the dive operation; the dive
guides, knowledgeable and meticulous,
were from local fishing families and had
most hallowed sites). A lucky few stay
the night to experience the inky, star-
studded skies; and skiers make the trip
to tackle the descent. Best of all is to do
the lot: ascend in late afternoon, stay
overnight and ski down after a leisurely
breakfast, while skiers from the resort
of La Mongie are still queueing for the
first lift up.
The observatory has 15 bedrooms in
what were the scientists’ quarters —
sleek and minimal, dominated by a
triple-glazed window, there are even
fluffy slippers in which to pad to the
shared bathroom. Guests are taken
received scholarships that covered their
certification as dive masters.
A week flew by, dictated by the
rhythms of sun and sea. We would rise
early, feasting on fresh fruit as dive
guides pored over tide charts to pick out
the day’s sites. This patient approach
yielded fabulous results; plunging in
just as a nutrient-rich current roared to
life after two days of quieter seas, we saw
the Great White Wall of soft coral in full
bloom and swam through eerie forests
of sea fans. Afternoons were spent alter-
nating between paddleboards, ham-
mocks and volleyball with a band of
local kids. The sun would set as dinner
was served; the bugs would emerge; and
rather than fight them fruitlessly, we’d
retreat to our bungalows, in bed by nine
and up at sunrise to dive once more.
The Rainbow Reef is not immune
from the pressures of warming seas and
overfishing that afflict reefs across the
world. El Niño of 2014-16 hit the South
Pacific particularly hard; but I was glad
to see Fiji’s reefs bouncing back. The
ghostly signs of bleaching were mostly
in retreat, and the colours of the coral
and the fish shone through the blue.
Conservation-minded operators like
Marina and Jone weren’t taking this
rebound for granted. They had per-
suaded locals to cut back on fishing,
enticed by the promise of well-paid jobs
for the community at the resort, and
had worked with the authorities to
establish a coral nursery to replant
nearby reefs. Divers were encouraged to
visit the site and assist with the replant-
ing. Was all the expense and effort worth
it? “Looking at all the locals who we have
trained to become divers . . . and the
excitement of every local who we take to
the reef, we can strongly say it does,”
Marina told me. “And the guests turn
into ocean ambassadors too.”
The second leg took us back to the
beaten path on Viti Levu. We spent a
day in the capital, Suva, staying at the
Matthew Cook
into the depths of the observatory
and as well as dinner, there’s an
in-depth planetarium-style
exploration of the cosmos in one of the
domes, to be followed by stargazing
through a number of the telescopes
Strange to think that the
infinite lightness of cosmic
rays needs such mammoth
structures to intercept them
colonial-era Grand Pacific Hotel that
has played host to celebrities and heads
of state including the Queen. The opu-
lent hotel was quiet, but the rest of the
city was abuzz. With a population split
roughly equally between indigenous
Fijians and those of Indian origin, there
is a trilingual culture (virtually every-
one speaks English, Fijian and Hindi)
unlike any other in the region.
But Viti Levu was also the gateway to
Fiji’s infamous shark diving. Our guides
(and guardians) for the cage-free dives
were from Aqua Trek, an operator
based in Pacific Harbour with an all-
local dive team armed with underwater
shepherds’ crooks to gently nudge
sharks away if they got too close to their
curious, defenceless visitors.
Plunging into Beqa lagoon off the
island’s southern coast, dozens of reef,
nurse and lemon sharks circled around
us, mere inches away. But the stars of
the show were the bull sharks. Display-
ing none of the raw aggression they are
famed for, the muscular figures largely
ignored us, far more interested in the
fish heads in the feeder and the schools
of fish all around the reef.
This feeder, filled with discarded tuna
heads from a nearby processing plant, is
what has made the shark dives contro-
versial. I will admit part of me — the part
with an academic background in con-
servation biology and a preference for
leaving nature alone — was sceptical.
But Jona, our guide, won me over:
“Before we began the shark dives, I
remember locals would hunt sharks to
make a living. Now, we’re able to show
our community that they’re worth pro-
tecting.” Studies have found that sharks
manned by helpful experts.
From our room, my wife and I
walked via rough concrete passages
towards the vast Lyot dome, perched
on the west side of the peak, where
astronomers probe stellar magnetic
fields. Climbing endless rickety steel
steps between the inner and outer
skins of the dome, we finally reached
the business end: a vast yoke
supporting a telescope with a mirror
two meters in diameter. Strange to
think that the infinite lightness of
cosmic rays needs such mammoth
structures to intercept them. Even
stranger that they can’t get a bit of
heating organised — the cold was bitter,
but apparently that’s just how they like
it for optimal image quality.
The following morning, when it was
time to depart, we did so via another
concrete tunnel, followed by a clattery
steel stairway then a door that looked
like a prop from Ice Station Zebra.
Finally, an awkward snowy-icy
scramble to reach a safe point where
our guide, Claude Etchelecou, watched
as we clicked into our skis while trying
not to drop anything down the steep,
featureless face beneath us. That was to
be the day’s big skiing challenge, with
no warm-up. In deep snow conditions
this slope alone would be the reason
you’re advised to come with a guide, to
negotiate the safest line with minimal
19 February/20 February 2022
are not permanently attracted to the
area and that supplementary feed only
constitutes a small part of their diets.
Uneasy as it may be for purists, the
results have been striking. Over the
years, the villages adjoining the lagoon
relinquished their fishing rights in
exchange for a levy paid back to the
community and jobs with dive opera-
tors; in 2004, a marine protected area
was declared, and later expanded to a
30-mile “shark corridor” along the
coast. Fish populations have
rebounded, with the main threat now
coming from foreign fishing vessels
rather than Fijians.
To my mind, Viani Bay and Beqa
offered two distinct, but distinctly prag-
matic, models to prove that nature can
be worth more alive than dead. Both
were works in progress and had each
been rattled by a global pandemic, but
they seemed far better options for peo-
ple and the planet than the unchecked
destruction that is too often the default.
As Fiji emerges from its pandemic-
induced slumber, questions of sustaina-
bility will come to the fore. For one,
there is the undeniable fact the South
Pacific is a long carbon-spewing flight
away for most visitors. But Fiji is a devel-
oping country at the coalface of rising
seas that has done nothing to contribute
to the climate crisis. In the absence of
While much of the world
moved online, many Fijians
had quite literally gone
back to their roots
large numbers of altruists willing to part
with their money via video link, inviting
visitors to experience its natural wealth
first-hand remains Fiji’s most obvious
way to fund conservation.
Perhaps places like Fiji deserve a
notional carbon budget that they can
use to justify bringing in sustainable
numbers of visitors independent of
their personal carbon footprints. Per-
haps the developed countries that are
most culpable can first do their part and
pay their fair share to help fund adapta-
tion in poorer countries. Funding the
protection of natural carbon sinks cer-
tainly provides a climate service to the
world. In any case, we will need to work
urgently to decarbonise aviation so fara-
way places can remain connected to the
rest of a net-zero world.
But even if the carbon question can be
squared, unchecked mass tourism
could threaten the very ecosystems
Fijian are seeking to protect. “We’re no
longer looking at pure volume coming
in,” Brent Hill, chief executive of Tour-
ism Fiji, told me, pointing to Fiji’s
renewed focus on attracting higher-
value tourists and dispersing them
across the archipelago’s 330 islands. “If
people are really engaged with Fiji’s
environment . . . and they’re doing
things like planting coral or mangroves
when they’re here, they’re going to pro-
tect it, come back and spend a fair bit
more as well.”
I had seen first-hand what chasing
“pure volume” looked like when I lived
in southern Bali and worked on its cata-
strophic plastic and waste problem. As I
wound my way back down the coral
coast to Nadi, I left hopeful that Fijians
would be able to chart a different path,
for the sake of their people and the
island nation’s rare natural treasures.
Siddarth Shrikanth is the author of ‘The
Business Case for Nature’, to be published
by Duckworth next year
i / D E TA i l S
Entry restrictions from some countries remain —
for details see mcttt.gov.fj. The Viani Bay Resort
(diveacademyfiji.com) has bungalows for two
from $270. Aqua Trek Fiji (aquatrek.com) offers
shark dives from $180 per person
avalanche risk. When it’s firm to icy,
it’s hard to imagine how anyone could
help if you started to fall.
We focused on Claude’s languorous
turns — he’d done this many times
before — and made it to the bottom of
the critical section intact. Even though
we were just a fraction of the way down
you could sense that everything to
follow would be plain sailing, a feeling
confirmed by a leisurely traverse of a
high plateau, passing snow-blown
vestiges of buildings from where,
before the installation of the cable car,
a funicular once climbed straight up
the face we’ve just skied.
Heading east past the Roche Noir
and into the Arizes valley, the way on
was effortless skiing over rolling slopes,
with long ridges towering above us,
then down into a river valley to glide
gently over pastures. The sting in the
tail was a twisty trail through forest; I
wondered just how much lower we’d be
going, not just because my thighs were
threatening to boil over but because it
was obvious we were a long way — and
the wrong side of a ridge — from La
Mongie, where we were staying. But
Claude had thought of everything: we
emerged from trees on to a road, right
by a handy bus to take us back to the
pistes of La Mongie, the observatory
just visible far above.
Eric Kendall
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 7

by our hominid ancestors goes back

Essay | Bee Wilson on a more than 3mn years, and the fact that
— unlike chimps — we can metabolise
animal fats suggests that our genetics
powerful and provocative are adapted to meat-eating.
Percival adds that in the context of
nutrition across the world, there are bil-
investigation into humanity’s lions of people with “limited means” —
including the one in three women of
reproductive age in the world suffering
often conflicted approach from anaemia — whose health would
benefit from eating more meat because
to meat-eating of the vitamin B12 and iron, among
other nutrients.
While Percival is much closer to the
vegan position than that of the low-carb

I
meat lobby, he is not vegetarian himself.
f you had to be reincarnated as a In broad terms, he agrees with the EAT-
chicken, would you prefer to be Lancet Commission on Food, Planet,
born on a farm supplying KFC as Health, which published a report in Jan-
opposed to any other intensive uary 2019 from 37 experts in the field
chicken farm? arguing that for the sake of both plane-
Halfway through Rob Percival’s bril- tary and human health, people in the
liantly provocative book on the psychol- affluent west need to radically downsize
ogy of meat-eating, this is the question meat consumption.
he poses to Charles Way, the head of The report suggested that a sustaina-
food quality assurance for KFC UK & ble diet would include no more than 98g
Ireland. Way has been telling Percival of red meat, 203g of poultry and 196g of
how proud he is of the welfare standards fish per week. For someone on a low
of chickens supplied to KFC, which he income in Asia or Africa, this would
describes as higher and more sustaina- mean a lot more meat than before, but
ble than those of the average British for the average person in the US it would
chicken farm. mean a drop of about 85 per cent.
But, in response to the question of Clearly, this is not good news for the
whether Way would prefer to be reborn meat industry.
as a chicken in the KFC supply chain Percival traces the “virulent and
rather than some other chicken farm, bizarre” reception accorded to the EAT-
his answer is “no” because “it wouldn’t Lancet report, in which a vast swell of
make a world of difference”. The life of a voices on social media depicted the
chicken reared for cheap meat is one report as a vegan conspiracy.
that no human would choose. He rightly shows that this is nonsense,
When it comes to eating animals, we given that the recommendations of
often say one thing and do another. EAT-Lancet would actually result in
Meat-eaters tend to claim that their con- more meat, dairy and fish being pro-
sumption is more moderate than the duced by 2050, allowing for rising popu-

norm. Perhaps we boast that we only eat
“white meat” or flatter ourselves that
we are ethical omnivores.
Percival, whose day job is working on
policy at the organic body The Soil Asso-
ciation, notes that a survey from Janu-
ary 2021 found that 85 per cent of the
British public wanted an urgent ban on
all factory farming. Yet as things stand,
about 95 per cent of all British chicken
reared for meat is produced in indus-
trial units and there are also some 200
vast industrial farms in the UK produc-
ing pork.
“Globally, over 90 per cent of animals
are reared on such farms,” writes
Percival.
We are at a breaking point in human
meat consumption. Those mass-
produced chickens now make up 70 per
cent of all living birds on the planet and
create pollution on a vast scale; suffer-
ing is experienced by people who work
in the industry as well as the animals
themselves.
The global demand for meat is set to
rise 73 per cent by 2050, from a 2010
baseline, and yet veganism is on the
increase, and there is a flurry of investor
interest in the development of plant-
based meat substitutes.
As the debate around meat-eating
grows noisier and more pertinent, Per-
cival sets out to explain how the human
relationship with meat became so dys-
functional; and what, if anything, can be
done to recalibrate it.
Most humans are deeply confused
and irrational on the subject. As the phi-
losopher and animal rights campaigner
Peter Singer observed, a person can
declare themselves an animal lover
while eating a ham sandwich. What
Carnivore confusion
Employees handle racks of
imported pork bellies that
will be processed into
bacon at a factory in
Zhengzhou — Qilai Shen/Panos
Pictures
The Meat Paradox: Eating,
Empathy and the Future
of Meat
by Rob Percival
Pegasus $27.95/Little, Brown
£18.99, 384 pages
makes The Meat Paradox so original —
and, at moments, electrifying — is that
instead of trying to argue this confusion
away, Percival addresses it head-on,
locating the hypocrisies of meat-eating
within some of the deepest aspects of
human psychology.
The book takes its title from a concept
first coined in 2010 by Brock Bastian
and Steve Loughnan, two Australian
psychologists. Bastian and Loughnan
argued that meat-eating was a form of
“cognitive dissonance” because unless
she or he is actually a psychopath, the
meat-eater does still care about ani-
mals, at some level.
Humans can be empathetic towards
other species, recognising something of
our own souls in their tender gaze. Yet
we can also allow them to be flayed and
butchered on our behalf so that we can
roast their legs for Sunday lunch. The
question — as with any form of cognitive
dissonance — is how we can hold these
two positions without being driven mad
by the contradiction.
Some of the most fascinating passages
of the book concern the ways in which
hunter-gatherer societies come to terms
with eating meat, through a complex
series of rituals and beliefs designed to
distinguish their actions from wanton
murder. The Tucano people of the
Amazon, for example, place strict limits
on how many animals can be hunted
because each one is seen as an exchange
for a human soul.
Modern industrial meat comes with
no such sense of balance or respect. We
are almost completely dissociated from
the reality of what happens to the ani-
mals before we eat them.
“We do not witness their final
moments,” writes Percival, “and we typ-
ically play no part in disassembling their
bodies.” One of the central delusions is
what Percival calls the idea of the “con-
senting animal”, which depends on “wil-
ful” ignorance of the processes of pro-
duction.
But The Meat Paradox is not a straight-
forward polemic for veganism
(although if you can eat meat straight
after reading the passage describing a
skip in a slaughterhouse filled with
“hundreds of pairs of eyes”, you have a
stronger stomach than I). What makes
this such an unusual book is its prag-
matic sense of nuance. Percival refuses
to pick sides in the strident debate
between pro-meat lobbyists and vegan
evangelicals.
As well as exposing the cognitive dis-
sonance of meat-eating, the author
examines the irrational biases in
certain strands of veganism. In a
chapter called “Herbivore”, he discusses
a pro-vegan 2017 documentary called
What the Health?, made by the
team behind Cowspiracy, another influ-
ential anti-meat documentary shown
on Netflix.
Percival notes that What the Health?
persistently makes the assumption that
if plants are good (in purely health
terms) this must mean that meat is bad.
One of the central
delusions is what Percival
calls the idea of the
‘consenting animal’, which
depends on ‘wilful’
ignorance of production
But one does not follow from the other.
Kip Andersen, the film’s co-writer, tries
to make the case that humans are natu-
rally and anatomically herbivores,
“adapted for a diet of plants without
meat or animal foods”. Percival calls this
“pure chicanery”, noting that evidence
of animal consumption is “written
throughout our bodies and across the
archaeological record”.
Indeed, the first evidence of butchery
lations and a fairer distribution of the
meat across the world.
The Meat Paradox does an extremely
powerful — and sometimes humorous —
job of laying bare the delusions and
destruction of modern meat-eating.
The question is how to reform an indus-
try that has such a grip on the way we
eat. Percival repeatedly returns to the
image of a Lion Man sculpture in the
Natural History Museum, which was
carved from a mammoth’s tusk 40,000
years ago.
The statue depicts the head of a lion
on a human body. For Percival, this is a
metaphor of “the contradictions in our
nature” and the ways in which we can
both empathise with animals and treat
them in unspeakable ways.
His vision for the future is one in
which “ethical omnivory” stops being
an idle boast and starts to be something
real. Percival argues that as individuals
we should withdraw all of our custom
from industrial animal farming
and, where possible, buy smaller
amounts from “organic and regenera-
tive” farmers.
But if this fascinating book has a flaw,
it’s that Percival is stronger on philoso-
phy than on practical solutions. There is
no proposal here for the policy levers
that could reform a global meat indus-
try that causes so much ethical and
environmental harm.
Nor does he explain how, as an entire
population, we could ever find our way
back to ethical meat-eating from where
we stand, as he puts it, “chicken nugget
in hand, swaying over the precipice”.
Bee Wilson is author of ‘The Way We Eat
Now’ (Fourth Estate/Basic Books)

Creative writing as a cold war weapon

An absorbing portrait of one
of the more bizarre East
German attempts to weaken
the west. By John Kampfner
week to discuss the sonnet. On one side
of the heavily reinforced seminar room
was a portrait of communist party
leader Erich Honecker, on the other
Vladimir Lenin.
As the German Democratic Republic
was formed out of Nazism and the divi-
The Stasi yet been drained of colour or aspiration. Phones ringing, teletypewriters chattering. reunification. They wanted to reform
Poetry Circle: Instead, it was “brimming with utopian Tired yawns, but excited concentration. their existing state.
The Creative hope, feverish creative ambition and at At the end of this engrossing tale, one
Writing Class times absurdly idealistic expectations”. The protagonists have complex can sense the author’s frustration as he
that Tried to Of the half a dozen dramatis personae, motives and mixed outcomes. I’ll reveal struggles in the present day to persuade
Win the Cold the starring role is played by a man but one: a teenage rebel called Annegret his characters to reflect on their
War called Uwe Berger, the supervisor of the Gollin, snatched from the streets by the own stories. Some of the poets have

A
few months ago, I went on a
tour of the Stasi headquar-
ters in Berlin. The last time
I’d been there was in Janu-
ary 1990 to watch protest-
ers storm the compound. Most of the
German group I was with this time
weren’t born when the wall came down.
Next to me, however, was a man who I
guess was in his seventies. I watched
him as he watched the guide, his eyes
narrowing with each explanation of
their techniques. Was he, I wondered, a
former state security agent? Was he one
of the hundreds of thousands of inform-
ers? Was he a victim?
I was reminded of that nagging uncer-
tainty when reading The Stasi Poetry Cir-
cle, Philip Oltermann’s absorbing por-
trait of the era through a bizarre lens.
Unknown to most people, certainly to
me (I was a correspondent during the
death throes of communist East
Germany), one of the weapons it sought
to deploy against the capitalist enemy
was poetry.
The Working Circle of Writing Chek-
ists — the abbreviated nickname of the
Soviet secret police — gathered in the
headquarters of the elite guard once a
sion of Europe, it was decreed that liter-
ature would be a central pillar of the
new state. “Now we must also scale and
seize the heights of culture,” declared
Walter Ulbricht, the first leader of the
Socialist Unity party. Workers were
required to improve themselves by
going to the opera or theatre, according
to an allocation of tickets per factory. A
decree stipulated that large enterprises
have an in-house library. A target was
even set (90 per cent of the adult popu-
lation) for the reading of Goethe and
Pushkin. Poetry was integral to the
notion of socialist self-improvement.
by Philip Oltermann
Faber & Faber £14.99
224 pages
The author came across this little-
known aspect of GDR life referred to
fleetingly in an article in Der Spiegel
magazine in 2006. He avoids both
mockery and Ostalgie, the trend of some
in the east (usually those who did quite
well out of the system) to look back
wistfully. He seeks to differentiate
between the early years and thereafter.
The nascent GDR, he suggests, had not
One of the
weapons East
Germany sought
to deploy
against the
capitalist enemy
was poetry — DPA
Picture Alliance/Alamy
Working Circle. Berger apparently pro- Stasi in broad daylight and interrogated died; some refuse to meet; others tell
duced 20 volumes of poetry, essays and 36 times about her modest poetic out- half-truths.
novels in as many years. He was the put. She ended up an impecunious tour Which brings me back to the man I
most published poet in Neues Deutsch- guide at Angela Merkel’s chancellery. was sitting next to at the Stasi HQ. I
land, the party daily, alongside being a One of the paradoxes of the GDR couldn’t bring myself to ask him which
member of the board of the writers’ is that artists were often among the one he was. Perhaps it was better left
union and vice-president of the cultural first to fall foul of the Stasi. And yet that way.
association founded as “the intellectual when it came to 1989, they and others
parliament”. who considered themselves genuine John Kampfner is the author of ‘Why the
He reserved his most prolific output, socialists were the most hostile to Germans Do it Better’ (Atlantic)
however, for snitching on the other
poets. He used florid language to
denounce critical authors as “opposi-
tional gangs” who “strive for hegem-
ony” in order to carry out “frontal
assaults”. The question writers should
ask themselves, Berger portentously
told the writers’ union, is: “Does the
poem serve the truth or not?”
Did any of the poems serve poetry?
The following, by a man called Björn
Vogel, the second-oldest member of the
poetry circle, has a certain Stasi
swagger about it as it tries to imbue
some glamour into the work of the all-
knowing agent:
Between night and morning
A radio call
Quickly!
Frenzy.
8 ★
Books
O Held to account
ne of Brighton’s stranger
sights is a burlesque music
bar called Proud Cabaret,
currently advertising a
show with mistress of cere-
monies Dolly Rocket. Only a distinctive
Indo-Saracenic dome gives a hint of the
building’s exotic origins.
It’s hard to believe this was once the
mausoleum of one of the world’s richest
dynasties — the Sassoons. The name will
be familiar to many through the poet
Siegfried Sassoon. But the family’s full
story is little known beyond historians
of the British empire.
Few fortunes have been built so
quickly or dissipated so rapidly as the
Sassoons’. Between the mid-19th and
mid-20th centuries, these Sephardic
Jewish refugees from Baghdad came to
dominate business life in Bombay, build
glittering towers in Shanghai, and host
London’s finest soirées.
The fact their riches were established
on the infamous China opium trade
barely raised an eyebrow in Britain at
the time. Ennobled by Queen Victoria,
the Sassoons partied with royalty,
sealed a marriage with the Rothschilds
and showered money on charity, art,
horseracing and glamorous women. As
late as the 1930s, they were still counted
as billionaires. By the 1950s, they were a
spent force.
The latest historian to delve into a tale
reminiscent of Thomas Mann’s Budden-
brooks is himself a Sassoon — Joseph
Sassoon, an academic at Oxford and
Georgetown universities. As he writes in
The Global Merchants, he was drawn to
the family past by accident after a letter
from a distant relative prompted his
curiosity.
Unlike Siegfried, the author is not
himself a descendant of the business
dynasty, which fled Baghdad in 1830 to
avoid Ottoman oppression. Joseph Sas-
soon’s family left only in the 1970s,
when he was a boy, to escape Saddam
Hussein. However, as well as a remote
blood tie, he shares a crucial link with
the merchant Sassoons — knowledge of
the obscure Baghdadi-Jewish dialect
that the business family used in their
correspondence to keep it secret.
It gave Joseph Sassoon access to an
untapped trove of archival material, fir-
ing a passion for discovery that inspires
this well-balanced and fluently written
book. As he says: “I felt sometimes as if
the historian in me, the migrant and the
Baghdadi Jew were all jockeying for
position.”
David Sassoon, the business family’s
founding father, was lucky in his timing:
the globalisation of trade, the Industrial
Revolution and the rise of the British
empire (to which he wedded his inter-
ests) all created huge opportunities. So
did technological advances such as
steamships, railways and the telegraph.
Other dynasties also profited might-
ily, including the Rothschilds, the Kes-
wicks (Jardine Matheson), and India’s
Tatas. But, as Joseph Sassoon says, only
the Sassoons “bridged east and west”.
David Sassoon was fortunate in siring
a big family. With eight sons and six
daughters, he had enough suitable boys
to head operations in far-flung outposts
and enough eligible girls to make useful
marriages. While it worked, this per-
sonal approach to business was spectac-
ularly successful.
But it carried the seeds of its own
decline. Already, in the second genera-
tion, the two most dynamic brothers fell
out and split the business — Abdallah
(later known as Albert) focused on
India and England, while Elias concen-
trated on Shanghai and the east. Still,
trade prospered and the family wealth
A fearless, talented critic but a turbulent personal life
A tempestuous marriage is at
the core of a biography of
writer Elizabeth Hardwick.
By Jonathan McAloon
FTWeekend
Family fortunes
The story of the Sassoons, from the opium trade to
aristocracy, has its echoes today. By Stefan Wagstyl
The Global Victor, the most flamboyant Sassoon of
Merchants: The all, inherited his grandfather Elias’s
Enterprise and businesses in the 1920s. Convinced that
Extravagance of nationalism and socialism would wreck
the Sassoon India, he focused on China. For a while,
Dynasty it seemed the right choice, as he built a
by Joseph Sassoon property empire in Shanghai crowned
Allen Lane £30 by the luxurious Cathay Hotel.
448 pages He lost almost everything, of course,
in the Communist Revolution of 1949.
But even then he had a chance to
regroup by switching to Hong Kong, as
multiplied. But, by the third generation, the rival Kadoorie business family did
the rot set in as the descendants lost successfully.
interest in the business and focused on Instead, Victor turned his back on
their fabulous social lives. Asia, moved to the Bahamas and
Others, notably the Rothschilds, suc- focused on pleasure, his horses espe-
cessfully managed this tricky transition cially — winning the Derby four times.
from migrants to lords. But the Sassoons The author approvingly quotes a com-
littered their path with strategic errors. mentator who wrote: “You can’t blame
In particular, they were slow to diversify Sir Victor for the war. But you can hold
from opium, continuing to flood China him responsible for the failure to diver-
with drugs that wrecked millions of lives sify and the failure to rebuild.”
long after the “devastating effects Joseph Sassoon grasps the complexi-
became widely known”. The author ties of the story — the Jewish heritage,
eschews sweeping moral judgments, the migrant experience, the brushes
pointing out that opium remained legal with anti-Semitism and the tensions of a
in Britain as late as the first world war. big multigenerational family. If there is
But he rightly condemns the family for a weakness it is that the Shanghai story
hanging on to the bitter end to monetise is less richly told than those of Baghdad,
their huge stocks of the drug. Bombay and London. Readers who
Even late in the day, the family’s want to know more about Victor Sas-
financial fate was far from sealed. soon’s extraordinary life on the Bund
T
he spirit of Elizabeth Hard- tionally unusual 1979 novel Sleepless
wick (1916-2007) is perva- Nights appears to anticipate com-
sive and invisible. Her pressed, koan-like autofictional meth-
prose’s sharp edge and ods employed today by Jenny Offill,
rhythmic bent were emu- Sheila Heti and Maggie Nelson. She co-
lated by Joan Didion, who passed them founded the New York Review of Books.
down to authors across the generations, And yet a taste for Hardwick seems the
from Bret Easton Ellis to Rachel Kush- preserve of the initiated.
ner and Emma Cline. Hardwick’s excep- Her quiet, almost academic reputa-
tion is the result of a combination of fac-
tors: most of her work happens to be
criticism, and her marriage to the poet
Robert Lowell created a limelight that
only had room for one. (Though in their
world, there was no question surround-
ing the equivalence of their talents.
They were both giants.) But it could also
be down to the lack of a biography: a
project made more intimidating by
Hardwick’s hatred of the form and
dread of one being written about her.
Cathy Curtis has written previous
lives of painters Elaine de Kooning,
Grace Hartigan and Nell Blaine, and she
is a keen observer of Hardwick, espe-
cially when following the “darting link-
ages” of the author’s mind in her writ-
ing. We are taken briskly through Hard-
wick’s working-class childhood in Ken-
tucky and her escape to New York in
1939 where, after tiring of postgraduate
study and bit work for publishing
houses, she wrote short stories and book
reviews for the Partisan Review.
Friends with Mary McCarthy and
Hannah Arendt, Hardwick circulated
among the best writers of the day, while
being admired and feared by them. One
The Sassoons
where a
Baghdadi Jewish
family who went
on to dominate
business life in
Bombay, build
glittering towers
in Shanghai and
host London’s
finest soirées
Universal Images via Getty
Images
should look at China expert Jonathan
Kaufman’s The Last Kings of Shanghai.
But this is a quibble. The strength of
The Global Merchants is its relentless
focus on the family’s rise and fall. Not
only is this a powerful human story but
it also carries contemporary resonance
in a time when great fortunes are again
being made.
Will today’s super-rich families avoid
the fate of the Sassoons? Tech billion-
aires today may not face the same famil-
ial challenges, as few have as many chil-
dren as the prolific David Sassoon. But
then divorce is much more common.
Meanwhile, the headaches of turning
a personal operation into a corporation
persist, as do the tensions between
entrepreneurial founders and profes-
sional advisers, and the risks of putting
too many eggs in one basket.
The distractions of great wealth are
also as captivating as ever. How else to
explain the temptations of the $1bn
superyacht and the private island? And,
in Britain, where Joseph Sassoon writes
the dynasty “fell under the spell of the
English upper class life”, who would say
that title, land and status have really lost
their allure?
As a footnote, it’s worth saying that
those visitors to Brighton who venture
into the Proud Cabaret won’t risk danc-
ing on the tombs of the Sassoons. Their
remains were disinterred decades ago
and laid among thousands of others at
the Liberal Jewish Cemetery in Willes-
den, north London. Sic transit etc.
Stefan Wagstyl is the FT’s money and
wealth editor
A Splendid
Intelligence:
The Life of
Elizabeth
Hardwick
by Cathy Curtis
Norton £25
400 pages
acquaintance called her “frighteningly
severe and intellectual”. Another called
her mind “dreadful” as a compliment.
“Hatchet woman sounds too gentle
for her,” the novelist Katherine Anne
Porter said. She wrote brilliant essays
her whole career, and when she eventu-
ally became famous in 1959, it was for a
piece in Harper’s attacking the bland-
ness of mainstream books coverage. It is
quaint to imagine a time when this
could have caused so public a scandal
that newspapers phoned her extended
family for comment.
In 1948, she became involved with
Robert Lowell in the midst of what she
would later be able to identify as one of
his manic episodes. After the two were
married they spent the first years of the
1950s travelling around Europe, with
Lowell doing what he liked and Hard-
wick carting their luggage between a
succession of unheated rooms. There
were frequent spells in mental health
facilities for him, as well as separations
owing to his “infatuations” with other
Merryn Somerset Webb calls for individual investors
to have more say in the running of the companies they
own — and offers practical solutions. By Emilie Bellet
Share Power:
How Ordinary
People Can
Change the Way
Capitalism
Works — and
Make Money
by Merryn
Somerset Webb
Short Books £9.99
208 pages
W
e love investing in
shares. Whether
directly through
individual savings
vehicles, such as
ISAs, or indirectly through our
personal or workplace pension
plans, tens of millions of us are
invested in the stock market.
Not that you would always know
it. Over the past decades individ-
ual investors have become a less
visible presence on company
shareholder registers — and a less
vocal one. The proportion of
shares held by individuals in the
UK today is 13 per cent, down from
66 per cent in 1957, and most of us
own shares inside funds.
Even when we’re technically the
owners, we have delegated our
rights to the big players. The asset
management industry is domi-
nated by titans managing trillions
of dollars. Capital is now increas-
ingly concentrated on a small
group of players, leaving private
investors often marginalised.
With this loss of control comes a
feeling of disempowerment. Far
too many of us feel disconnected
from how the companies we invest
in are run. More broadly, this
threatens to undermine support
for shareholder capitalism.
It is time then, FT investment
commentator Merryn Somerset
Webb argues, for private investors
to get active, reclaim their powers
and in the process get a better
return on their investments. This
is the premise of Share Power, her
concise and enjoyable read that
offers both a timely overview of
the situation as well as proposals
for how to fix it.
Shareholder activism is an
increasingly powerful force in cor-
porate life. Highly mobilised
investor groups with a particular
agenda — higher returns, sharper
strategic focus or concerns for
environmental or social issues —
are a familiar feature in many
boardrooms. But they are “big
players”, the professionals. Indi-
viduals have been less active,
though that could now change.
Technology is definitely part of
the answer, writes Somerset Webb,
as it allows fund managers to hand
the votes on our shares back to us.
But she adds that there are a
number of simple, small steps that
investors can also take to ensure
they have a greater say in the busi-
nesses they ultimately own. These
include being more visible and
vocal by banding together in
women. Curtis describes for us a terrible
situation. Friends deemed Hardwick’s
behaviour “heroic”. There was eventu-
ally some financial stability, fixed
addresses in America and a daughter,
Harriet. But their marriage followed the
above pattern until Lowell left her for
Caroline Blackwood in 1970.
What followed was the central tor-
ment of Hardwick’s life. Lowell wrote
The Dolphin, a poetry collection about
his infidelity and their break-up that
quoted from her letters to him but
changed and even invented her words,
lending authority to an image of Hard-
wick that had very little relationship to
the truth. The fallout led to reviewers
criticising her (and even their teenage
daughter) personally. In 1973, the book
won a Pulitzer. Curtis is good at linking
the public humiliation that Hardwick
suffered as a result of The Dolphin scan-
dal, to that caused by the openness of
Lowell’s previous affairs over the years.
Hardwick’s thoughts about biography
were numerous, sometimes contradic-
tory — she ended up writing a short one
about Herman Melville — and nearly
always pessimistic. But a belief that
there should be “some claim to equity
between the subject and the person
putting on the shoes” appears often in
her work in different permutations. She
also demanded “serious, incomparable
reflection” from the biographer.
No one would require of the writer’s
own biographer that their verbal gifts
match those of Hardwick, who Susan
19 February/20 February 2022
grassroots shareholder activist
groups or engaging with invest-
ment platforms, fund managers
and even local politicians.
Companies and regulators need
to act too. Among the changes
Somerset Webb calls for are mak-
ing it easier for private investors to
use their votes with clear, trans-
parent information that is availa-
ble to all and giving incentives to
people to attend shareholder
meetings. More companies should
be encouraged to list on the stock
market with direct allocation and
a better tax regime for those sell-
ing shares (as opposed to more
favourable tax treatment of debt).
Given how busy our lives are, it
can at times all seem a bit over-
whelming. The author writes per-
suasively about how powerful
fund managers are. Yet that can
only make the mountain that
needs to be climbed appear even
more daunting. Yes, technology is
here to help us and can certainly
make voting more accessible, but
integration can sometimes be lim-
ited. It is also important to con-
sider that a lot of investors don’t
pretend to be activists, and feel too
disconnected from their invest-
ments. Others might have differ-
ent priorities altogether.
As Somerset Webb herself asks,
do we really know what we want?
We want to diversify our invest-
ments to reduce risk and, for most
investors, “setting it and forgetting
So how do we
encourage investors to
stay active with a
number of companies?
it” is an easier route to long-term
balanced portfolios. So how do we
encourage investors to stay active
with a number of companies?
Given the rise of huge fund man-
agement groups on the one hand,
and well-organised shareholder
activist groups on the other, retail
investors who care about capital-
ism — and about their returns —
need to have a bigger voice, as the
author rightly notes.
Share Power is a very useful guide
and contribution to a bigger argu-
ment. But it will need regulators,
asset managers, boards and
investment platforms to make
sure they take a big, long-term
commitment to realign ownership
with stewardship to ensure that
shareholders’ voting power is
aligned with their economic inter-
ests. We should remind ourselves
that, as per the subtitle of the
book, we “ordinary people” can
make money too. Let’s make sure
we don’t miss this opportunity to
make capitalism work for all.
Emilie Bellet is the founder of
Vestpod and author of ‘You’re Not
Broke, You’re Pre-Rich’
Sontag said wrote “more beautiful sen-
tences than any living American
writer”. But the reflection offered by
this book can be thin too. There is com-
mentary as Curtis goes, but she rarely
stays with an idea long enough to build
on it. When critical insight is given, for
example that “Elizabeth’s gift for
pointed observation is less in evidence”
in a certain late review, we are offered
neither demonstration nor qualifica-
tion. These judgments would be uncon-
vincing even if they bore out when
tested against the material, which they
don’t always.
The result is that Hardwick doesn’t
exist as vividly for us as she might, an
unfortunate irony, since Hardwick’s
essays could pungently summon an
author or literary character for a reader
in a couple of sentences. Mary McCarthy
said Hardwick could make figures “dead
or imaginary” seem to be “living a few
blocks down the street”.
A Splendid Intelligence shows us,
through quotes and the facts, the things
she said and wrote and did. But Hard-
wick herself seems to remain just
behind the curtain of this book: coura-
geous, loyal but with an integrity that
sometimes appeared to those she knew
and whose work she criticised like dis-
loyalty. Read the essays, though, and the
subject Curtis narrowly fails to embody
materialises; there she is, mimicking
her enemies and alienating her friends
with hour-long streams of tipsy, pol-
ished invective.
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 9

Books

T Sleuths to stimulate
he mysteries surrounding
the Holy Grail — the relic
that Jesus Christ is said to

the little grey cells

have drunk from at the Last
Supper and that was later
used to collect his blood at the Crucifix-
ion — are manifold. It may have been
rediscovered, and now be sitting,
resplendent, in the Capilla del Santo
Cáliz in Valencia, Spain. It might have
been buried in Glastonbury by the bibli- taking readers to every point of the com-
Chivalry cal figure of Joseph of Arimathea, still yet pass in exploring the criminous side of
by Neil Gaiman and to be found. Then again, it may simply be human nature. Sheer pleasure.
Colleen Doran hiding in an Oxfam store, under a A “cancelled” book is at the heart of
Headline Publishing threadbare fur coat. Chivalry takes this The Twyford Code by Janice Hallett
Group, £14.99 last, whimsical thought and spins it into (Viper, £14.99), an epistolary narrative
80 pages/Dark Horse
Comics, $19.99
a fascinating short story. First published told not through a series of letters but
72 pages by Neil Gaiman in his 1998 collection of via error-filled computer transcriptions
short fiction Smoke and Mirrors, the work of audio files. Ex-con Steven Smith has
has now been adapted as a graphic novel recorded the story of his life on his
by Gaiman and the American writer, art-
GENRE ROUND-UP mobile phone. As a child he was fasci-
ist and cartoonist Colleen Doran. nated by a children’s book, Six on Gold-
Little old ladies are, sadly, under-rep- CRIME FICTION top Hill, which he was told by his English
resented in fiction, let alone graphic fic- teacher, Miss Iles, had been banned.
tion. But Gaiman is on to a good thing By Barry Forshaw However, on a trip to the house where
when he leaves the Holy Grail in the the book’s author, Edith Twyford, lived,
hands of Mrs Whitaker, an elderly Miss Iles disappeared. We learn that the

T
widow who rejects a stuffed cobra, the book is a repository of codes for secret
aforementioned moth-eaten coat and he best detectives refuse to agents — and why the luckless Steven
other charity-shop delights in favour of die — even after their crea- was incarcerated for so long. The frag-
two romance novels and the Grail, tors have done so. Two key mentary form of the book may sound
which is priced at a modest 30 pence. examples? Sherlock Hol- challenging but readers are pleasurably
“She put it on the mantelpiece in her mes (many writers have tasked with extricating the truth.
parlour, where it sat between a small taken up metaphorical residence in Two striking new novels in transla-
soulful china basset hound and a photo- Baker Street, post-Conan Doyle) and tion: from Spain, Even the Darkest
graph of her late husband, Henry, on the Raymond Chandler’s tarnished knight- Night by Javier Cercas (MacLehose,
beach at Frinton in 1953.” errant Philip Marlowe. £16.99, translated by Anne McLean)
Gaiman, who was born in the UK, is a The talented American writer Joe Ide and, from Sweden, We Know You
renowned storyteller in many fields: has already channelled the former with Remember by Tove Alsterdal (Faber,
fantasy (his Sandman graphic novels are his Sherlockian African-American £14.99, translated by Alice Menzies).
among the most influential modern sleuth Isaiah Quintabe in several novels, Cercas presents a town in Catalonia hor-
classics in that genre), young adult fic- and he now takes on the Chandler man- rified by ritualistic killing, and a drug
tion, films, screenplays and novels, tle with The Goodbye Coast (Weiden- dealer turned copper, Melchor Marín,
including American Gods and Good feld, £16.99). But is it a foolhardy move? who finds his career on the line; mean-
Omens, which he co-wrote with Terry Ide transposes Marlowe to the present while Alsterdal (a publishing sensation
Pratchett in 1990. As Pratchett wrote, day and gives him an uncanonical alco- in Sweden) has detective Eira Sjödin
his friendship with Gaiman was based holic father. He is hired by a starry investigating a murder from decades
on “a shared delight and amazement at actress in Malibu to track down her ago when the perpetrator returns to his
the sheer strangeness of the universe, in teenage stepdaughter, even though both claustrophobic community.

A homely and
stories, in obscure details . . . ” women loathe each other. The plot is as In A Killing in November by Simon
The appeal of Chivalry as a short story chaotically tangled as vintage Chandler, Mason (riverrun, £14.99), argumenta-
lay in Gaiman’s ability to make magical and Ide supplies a satisfying bushel of tive working-class detective Ryan
things happen in the most ordinary of Marlovian one-liners. But dumping the Wilkins and Balliol-educated London
settings. Mrs Whitaker tends patches of cynical first-person narration that dis- Nigerian Ray Wilkins enter an

handcrafted quest
herbs and her gladioli in Hawthorne
Crescent and she is tenderhearted in her
disposal of garden slugs; she eats cheese
on toast, or a nice piece of fried liver —
and when Galaad, a knight in shining
armour, arrives on his quest for the
Grail, she makes him a nice cup of tea.
Chivalry tackles the big questions in
the gentlest of ways: what do you truly
treasure, how may a genuinely chival-
rous knight earn what he seeks so fer-
vently (small spoiler: it might involve
cleaning out attics and the care of errant
slugs), and what would you choose in
the face of temptation?
Mrs Whitaker is made of sterner, and
wiser, stuff than most of us. Given the
legendary swords and the objects of
power that Galaad brings to her door-
step, hoping to dislodge the Grail from
its spot by the china basset hound, I, for
one, would have made an instinctive
Galaad arrives and regrettable trade off.
at Mrs This is partly the fault of Colleen
Whitaker’s door Doran, whose stunning artwork turns
in Colleen Arthur’s knight into the kind of dashing,
Doran’s courtly hero who is obliged to seduce a
graphic-novel maiden. Doran’s illustrations, drawing
adaptation of from a soft palette of blues, pinks and
Neil Gaiman’s greens that flare into sudden glorious
short story bursts of dazzling crimson and gold at
Colleen Doran
need, are what will make Chivalry a per-
A whimsical Neil Gaiman story is given a graphic twist
in this gloriously illustrated adaptation. By Nilanjana Roy
ennial Christmas gift. Famous authors
are often at risk of having their old work
briskly repackaged by clever marketing
departments but Doran, a Gaiman fan
since her youth, has, for complicated
rights reasons, waited over two decades
to work on this short story.
Her first impulse, as an artist who was
also obsessed with Arthurian myths for
many years, was to create a genuine illu-
minated manuscript — a project that
never took off (parchment is more
expensive than you imagine). But the
magic she brings to Chivalry is in the
details borrowed from illuminated
manuscripts, tarot cards, bestiaries, old
water-stained books — and this hand-
craftedness in a digital age leaps out at
the reader, making the book a collector’s
item for art lovers and those steeped in
the beloved legends of King Arthur and
the Knights of the Round Table.
The question of whether a single
short story taken from a far more
varied fantasy collection is satisfying
as a standalone graphic novel remains.
Certainly, Gaiman and Doran’s book
feels too slight on its own to measure up
to the best of Gaiman’s output. Still,
Chivalry reminds you that, some days,
all you need is to believe in impos-
sible quests.
tinguished The Big Sleep et al may not
have been a prudent move.
It may be Donna Leon’s 80th birthday
this year but it is her readers who will be
getting a present, in the form of a new
Commissario Brunetti novel, Give Unto
Others (Hutchinson Heinemann, £20).
All the elements we enjoyed in Leon’s
past work are present and correct: the
breathtaking architecture of Venice, the
gustatory delights of Italian food, the
richly drawn Brunetti family (the Com-
missario is one of the few happily mar-
ried detectives in the genre) and the
unsettling sense that La Serenissima is
always a place of menace. An old neigh-
bour of Brunetti’s visits him with a prob-
lem: she is unhappy with the suspicious
behaviour of her son-in-law, and is wor-
ried that her daughter may be in danger.
Brunetti’s initial conclusion — that he is
dealing with an overprotective parent —
is changed when an act of violent van-
dalism takes place.
The fact that The Perfect Crime
(HarperFiction, £20) is edited by two
luminaries of the crime scene (a newish
star and a respected veteran) has made
for an irresistible collection of short fic-
tion. Vaseem Khan and Maxim
Jakubowski have assembled 22 bestsell-
ing crime writers from diverse cultures,
unwanted collaboration when a
woman’s body is found in an Oxford
provost’s study. A modern retooling of
Colin Dexter’s Morse and Lewis? Per-
haps — as in the nonpareil evocation of
the Oxford locales. That said, this is a
very individual piece of work, with a sat-
isfying plot involving Syrian refugees,
snobbish dons and nimble interaction
between the ill-assorted protagonists.
There is real craftsmanship here.
Finally, Amanda Jennings’ hypnotic
The Haven (HQ, £14.99) has a young
couple fleeing their quotidian life for a
commune on a remote farm. But things
turn nasty, rendering the novel’s title a
distinct misnomer. Debut British writer
Amen Alonge’s A Good Day to Die
(Quercus, £14.99) intriguingly channels
the crime world of such US writers as SA
Cosby, but places its criminal anti-hero
in an acerbically realised UK setting.
And Charlie Higson’s lively Whatever
Gets You Through the Night (Little,
Brown, £14.99) has his resourceful fixer
McIntyre encountering a sinister cult in
a sun-kissed Corfu setting. It’s a trium-
phant return to adult fare from the
Young Bond author.
Barry Forshaw is the author of ‘Crime
Fiction: A Reader’s Guide’

Small-town shadows A touch of evil

focus is on the sadness of trying — ing an antagonist in Murt’s anar-
Colin Barrett’s latest Home-
sickness
and failing — to save someone’s chic and fatalistic older brother A fast-paced story told Mouth to
that the act suggests he’s a good
short-story collection life. The story ends with the Jamie. He tells her: “You care for person. Arsenault, by contrast,
by Colin
officer carefully putting her him . . . but you have no pity for by narration breathes Mouth
later tells him that “there is no
brings western Ireland Barrett by Antoine
Jonathan Cape, paperwork in order. him.” When the suicide attempt new life into the literary Wilson
good or bad, only advantageous
to life from both near From then on the stories are that has hung over the story hap- and its opposite” and that youth is
£14.99, 224
notable for their eschewal of pens, it is from an unexpected thriller. By Mia Levitin Atlantic Books
about going after “everything you
and far. By Luke Brown pages
pyrotechnics, for ending on notes quarter — and shocking.
£12.99/Avid
want”. As Arsenault takes him

W
Reader Press
of mystery and ambiguity. Some Other stories are more comic in $26, 192 pages under his wing, Cook’s eyes open

C
olin Barrett’s debut
short-story collection,
Young Skins, was a
thrilling arrival in
2013, introducing a
funny and compassionate chroni-
cler of small-town Ireland with a
serious prose style. Barrett won
prizes (Guardian First Book,
Frank O’Connor, Rooney Prize)
and plaudits, and was soon a regu-
lar in the New Yorker, where half
the stories in this new collection
were first published.
As before, Homesickness is
mostly set in County Mayo in
rural west Ireland. Here are tales
of the village community, where
people know their neighbours
and their business. We recognise
the remarkable Irish short story
tradition, which imbues regional
settings with rich significance
with a regularity that draws atten-
tion to a difference between Irish
and British literary fiction.
In the opening story, “A Shoot-
ing in Rathreedane”, a police
officer responds to a call from a
man who has shot a trespasser on
his land. After following careful
instructions “to a farm with a yel-
low bungalow and a ’92-reg Fiat
motorhome up on bricks out the
front”, she discovers she knows
the injured man, who “possessed
real criminal instincts but no real
criminal talent”.
Barrett has made use of the
apparatus of crime fiction before,
most notably in the novella “Calm
with Horses”, the centrepiece of
Young Skins, which was told from
the point of view of a reluctant
gangland hard man. In this collec-
tion Barrett relies less on sensa-
tional material to drive his narra-
tives: the dangerous situation is
quickly defused and after that the
Tales of the village
community — Getty Images
of the works are more comic than
tragic: every one is haunted by
death in some way. Barrett moves
us by showing us moments of
great loss as they are in the proc-
ess of being managed, deflected,
so they strike with renewed force
as they emerge from stoical
Barrett moves us by
showing us moments
of great loss as they are
in the process of being
managed, deflected
attempts to get on with life.
“The Ways” takes us through
the point of view of three orphans,
living on in their family home
with the vacuum of their parents’
absence, made more poignant by
the way they try not to think of it.
“Whoever is There, Come on
Through” is perhaps the strongest
and saddest story in the book, and
begins with Eileen picking up her
friend Murt after he’s been
released from his latest stay in
hospital with depression.
Eileen keeps herself busy trying
to improve Murt’s life, while fac-
tone, and show a lineage with
Kevin Barry, another celebrated
west Ireland writer. “Bobby Tallis
possessed the drainpipe phy-
sique, knee-length mackintosh
and balefully frail demeanour of a
poet, or so he believed” are the
opening words of “Anhedonia,
Here I Come” and could have
been written by either writer.
The two stories that leave
small-town Ireland both feature
writers in cities. One is set in
Toronto, where Barrett now lives,
and the title, Homesickness, may
be explained in that way, though
most of his characters are missing
an idea they once had of home:
parents, a football career, a part-
ner. The view across the Atlantic
is never nostalgic.
Small-town life is claustropho-
bic, but can be redeemed through
community. And it is in the sto-
ries of the characters who haven’t
left where Barrett’s achievements
are most extraordinary. In these
he sets out characters in a web of
relationships that most novelists
would struggle to inflict fewer
than 80,000 words on. They live
and breathe, and so does County
Mayo. This is a beautiful and
moving collection, from one of
the best story writers today.
hat is the value of
saving someone’s
life if they turn
out to be “an ass-
hole”? In his lat-
est novel, a Highsmithian literary
thriller, Antoine Wilson tracks
the aftermath of a fateful inter-
section of two strangers.
The story at the heart of Mouth
to Mouth is nested within a fram-
ing device. The narrator, a strug-
gling writer in his forties, runs
into Jeff Cook, an old classmate
from UCLA, while on a layover
at JFK.
With both of their flights
delayed, Cook invites him to the
lounge and, over beers, proceeds
to share a story he claims he has
never told anyone before.
Shortly after graduation, alone
on a Santa Monica beach, Cook
sees a swimmer in crisis. Acting
on instinct, he rescues and resus-
citates the drowning man. When
he doesn’t receive any thanks,
Cook becomes curious about the
person he gave a second chance at
life, a gallerist named Francis
Arsenault. Cook tails him, osten-
sibly to make sure he’s all right.
He takes an entry-level job at
Arsenault’s gallery but gets more
embroiled than expected when
he begins dating Arsenault’s
daughter, Chloe, and quickly gets
promoted. “I never forget a face,”
says Arsenault, but doesn’t let on
if he recognises Cook from the
beach.
Wilson’s 2007 debut, The Inter-
loper, was a first-person account
of a man who becomes increas-
ingly unhinged as he seeks to
Propulsive prose
moves the plot forward
until the final twist in
the last sentence
avenge the murder of his brother-
in-law. In his 2012 follow-up, Pan-
orama City, Wilson pivoted from
noir to humour, with a Forrest
Gump-type narrator imparting
wisdom to his unborn son.
While Wilson’s first two novels
plumbed the polarities of good
and evil, Mouth to Mouth keeps us
guessing by swinging between the
two. When Cook rescues Arse-
nault, he is comforted by the idea
to the gallerist’s shady dealings.
The book’s title refers of course
to the resuscitation performed to
save Arsenault, an act that could
be considered the opposite of
murder. But with the reliability of
Cook’s narrative called into ques-
tion, it also suggests the passing of
stories from one person to
another. “You knew me then.
That I had a good heart,” Cook
replies when the narrator asks
why he’s chosen to tell him about
the intervention on the beach and
all that ensued. What kind of self-
portrait is Cook hoping to paint
by sharing his secrets with a
writer?
Despite the risk of creating dis-
tance with a framing narrative,
the precision with which Wilson
details the worlds in which the
story unfolds — from the first
class lounge to the LA art scene —
renders it real. In a landscape of
literary fiction trending towards
navel-gazing, it’s a delight to read
a pacy story, well told.
Wilson’s propulsive prose
moves the plot forward until the
novel’s final twist in its last sen-
tence. Mouth to Mouth is to be
devoured in one greedy gulp, but
the questions it raises linger long
afterwards.
10 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

Books

A study in intellectual courage

[was] speechless in the face of this new
Philosophy | How four reality”.
Foot thought that in their zeal to
reconfigure and streamline the subject,
female Oxonians countered the Oxonian revolutionaries had made
it hard to see how “one could imagine
oneself saying to a Nazi, ‘But we are
the mid-century narrative. right, and you are wrong’, with there
being any substance to the statement.”
This was because the ordinary lan-
By Jonathan Derbyshire guage philosophers had inherited from
the logical positivism of the 1930s, a dis-
tinction between those bits of our

T
he women are up to some-
thing.” That was the
rumour circulating among
male Oxford dons as they
gathered on May 1, 1956,
ahead of a vote on a proposal by the uni-
versity to award an honorary degree to
the former US president Harry Truman.
In fact, one woman in particular was
up to something: the philosopher and
Catholic convert Elizabeth Anscombe,
who believed that a man she regarded as
a murderer should not be honoured in
this way. In ordering the dropping of
atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Naga-
saki in August 1945, Anscombe argued,
Truman had chosen to kill the innocent
as a means to an end (the end in this
instance being the unconditional
surrender of Imperial Japan). And
“choosing to kill the innocent as a
means to your ends,” she added, “is
always murder”.
Although there were suspicions
that Anscombe had “got up a party”
to block the award, in the end hers
was a lone voice. And the motion to
bestow the degree on Truman was
passed unanimously.
The following year Anscombe wrote a
pamphlet about the affair, and in it she
wondered how it was that “so many
Oxford people should be willing to
flatter such a man”. The answer, she
thought, lay partly in the “productions
of Oxford moral philosophy” — notably
in a doctrine, popularised in the 1930s
by AJ “Freddie” Ayer, according to
which moral or ethical terms such as
“good” don’t describe the intrinsic
goodness of some action or other, but
rather express a “favourable attitude”
on the part of the person uttering them.
In other words, it’s one thing to say that I
approve of acts of charity, say, and
another to say that they are good in and
of themselves.
Iris Murdoch, facing away (right) with colleagues in Oxford, 1958 — Courtesy of the principal and fellows of St Anne’s College, Oxford” 1958
Clare Mac Cumhaill and Rachael
Wiseman’s lively and enlightening
book, Metaphysical Animals, opens with
Anscombe’s vain opposition to Truman.
Her undaunted stance, and the work of
her friends and fellow philosophers
Philippa Foot, Mary Midgley and Iris
Murdoch (who in 1956 was better
known for her philosophical essays than
for her fiction), illuminate what the
authors describe as a “counter narrative
Metaphysical Animals: to the prevailing history of 20th-
How Four Women Brought century philosophy”.
Philosophy Back to Life It might be more accurate to say that
by Clare Mac Cumhaill and what emerges here is a counter to a way
Rachael Wiseman of writing the history of philosophy that
Chatto & Windus £25 was prevalent in mid-century Oxford,
416 pages which, in the words of one of its deni-
zens, was “for a shortish time . . . the
philosophical centre of the world” — the
English-speaking world at any rate.
Gilbert Ryle, the éminence grise of the
Oxford school of philosophy, who, like
several of his peers, had worked in the
secret intelligence services during the
second world war, embarked on what
Mac Cumhaill and Wiseman describe as
a “great non-military expansionist cam-
paign” to train and then send out into
the world a new generation of young
philosophers equipped with the latest
analytical techniques.
In the same year as Truman received
his degree, the BBC Third Programme
broadcast a series of talks under the
heading The Revolution in Philosophy,
later published as a book edited by Ryle.
This was a manifesto for a revolutionary
view of the nature of the discipline
according to which it is the study of the
words and concepts we employ, rather
than of the things to which they are
applied.
Take the concept of “mind”. In Ryle’s
view, it is a “category mistake” to think
that mental concepts such as “belief”,
“desire” and so on function in the same
way as the words we use to describe the
material world. When we talk about a
person’s “mind”, he said, what we’re
really talking about is his or her being
disposed to behave in certain ways —
intelligently, stupidly or imaginatively.
This “ordinary language” or “linguis-
tic” philosophy was largely indifferent
to broader problems of a moral, political
or religious kind — problems that, by
contrast, fascinated the subjects of Mac
Cumhaill and Wiseman’s book.
Linguistic philosophy had certainly
helped to encourage in its practitioners
the cultivation of a nose for verbiage and
bullshit. But for Anscombe, Foot, Midg-
ley and Murdoch, “clarity [was] not
enough”. In different ways, each of them
felt the pull of “large-scale metaphys-
ics” — that is, the big questions about
the ultimate nature of reality and the
good life that the Ancient Greeks had
wrestled with.
When news of the Nazi death camps
had emerged at the end of the war, Foot
remarked: “Nothing is going to be the
same again.” Yet, Mac Cumhaill
and Wiseman write, “philosophy
speech which state facts about the world
— for example, that water boils at 100C
— and those that express principles, pol-
icies or decisions to change it — that cer-
tain sorts of behaviour should be out-
lawed, say. Because the language of eval-
uation is essentially emotive, people
might agree on all the facts and still dis-
agree on ethical or political matters.
Though if values are merely subjective,
then such disagreements must ulti-
mately be trivial.
Anscombe pointed out that this way
of treating moral principles fitted very
Each of them felt the pull of
‘large-scale metaphysics’ —
the big questions about the
ultimate nature of reality
well with the belief, widespread by the
mid-1950s, that substantial conflict over
values or ideology was at an end.
But in their unfashionable view that it
is possible, as Mac Cumhaill and Wise-
man put it, to “use [the] language of
morals and speak of objective moral
truth”, and their conviction that human
beings are “social, creative, curious,
spiritual” creatures rather than mere
“efficient calculating machines”, the
four heroines of this book were
untimely.
They resisted the zealots who thought
most of the traditional problems of phi-
losophy could be dissolved provided we
paid close enough attention to the way
language works.
As an account of four young women
who sought to “bring philosophy back to
life”, Metaphysical Animals is a portrait in
intellectual courage.
Jonathan Derbyshire is the FT’s executive
opinion editor

CHESS LEONARD BARDEN
Britain’s over the board Four
Nations Chess League
(4NCL), which went online
during the pandemic,
returned last weekend with
over 80 teams in action in
several divisions following a
winter break due to Omicron.
Internet games are
convenient and are preferred
by many casual players, but
have important drawbacks.
Most online chess is at very
fast speeds. Five-minute or
three-minute blitz or one-
minute bullet for the entire
game is the prevailing time
control, making it as much a
test of mouse dexterity as of
chess skill. Website ratings
have no status for over-the-
board play, while there is a
small but ever-present risk
of losing to a computer-
aided opponent.
So the 4NCL’s return, at a
Daventry hotel, was widely
welcomed, and after four
rounds (of 11) the season is
taking shape.
The title favourites are
London’s top club Wood
Diversions
BRIDGE PAUL MENDELSON
8
Speelman and by England’s Only a few pairs reached the 10 8 7 6 5 2 Dealer: South E/W Game low diamond and ruffs
7 rising star Ravi Haria, while optimum contract of 6H on K4 2 again. Next, he cashes K♥
- North East South West
6 Manx, with backing from this deal, and then some J 8 7 4 — — 2C NB before returning to hand
the chess.com website, have failed in the play. Test your N 2D NB 3D NB with a spade ruff. He lays
5
a phalanx of grandmasters declarer play by imagining KQ9 4 J3 3S NB 4H NB down ♥AQ, which draws all
986 J5 5H NB 6H
4
from Romania, Poland that you are South. 8 3
W E
J9652 the trumps, and now he
3 and Hungary. Should North make a slam Q 10 9 5 A6 3 2 plays his diamonds from
S
2
2457 try? It’s very close. South A probably return 2♣. As so the top and watches East’s
Constantin Lupulescu v has shown a game-going A Q 10 7 3 often, the secret will be not J♦ fall on the fifth round,
1
Tamas Fodor. White to hand with six diamonds and A K Q 10 7 4 to draw trumps until your making declarer’s 10♦ a
A B C D E F G H K
move and win. How can five hearts, so North’s K♥ is side-suit is established. winner, and bringing home
Green and Manx Liberty, he take advantage of clearly huge. In the auction Declarer should ruff the club the slam.
who both have a touch of Black’s disorganised army above, North decided to bid On 10♣ lead from West, return and lead a low Notice that to play any
class and drew 4-4. Wood while dealing with the 5H, inviting South to bid 6H how should you play the diamond to trump in top diamond early on
Green are led by the former threat of Nxe2+? if he didn’t have two losers slam? dummy. He returns to hand increases the risk of an
world semi-finalist Jon Solution, back page in clubs. East will win A♣ and with A♠ and leads a second over-ruff and failure.

POLYMATH 1,166 SET BY AARDVARK CROSSWORD 17,023 SET BY ALBERICH

19 February/20 February 2022
‘Hip-hop
has become
one-sided’
RZA | The Wu-Tang Clan founder is back with a
mini-album to prove the genre is still a potent
positive force, he tells Ludovic Hunter-Tilney
RZA poses for a
portrait in New
York, 1994
David Corio/Redferns
THE LIFE
OF A SONG
FLOWERS
I
n the spring of 2000, an insistent
tune blossomed from Britain’s club
hotbeds into the commercial
charts — and it has lingered in pop
culture ever since. “Flowers” by
Manchester outfit Sweet Female
Attitude set an old-fashioned romantic
serenade — “I’ll bring you flowers in
the pouring rain” — to a distinctly
contemporary UK garage groove. The
song (written by Michael Powell and
Martin Green, aka Shine MC) initially
appeared as a midtempo R&B number,
produced by Euro production team
Cutfather & Joe, who had created 1990s
hits for acts such as Ace of Base. But it
was the remix of “Flowers” by London
DJ/producer Sunship (aka Ceri Evans)
that sealed its status as a platinum
single and a perennial classic.
★ FTWeekend
I
t is noon in Los Angeles. RZA — pro-
nounced “Rizza” — a trim 52-year-
old, sports a pair of aviator-style
sunglasses, a customary accessory.
“You cool with the shades and all
that?” he asks, to which I answer in the
affirmative. I thank him for his time.
“My time is ready to be given,” he
replies, Zen-like.
RZA is among the most significant fig-
ures in the history of rap music. His real
name is Robert Diggs. Thirty years ago
he founded arguably hip-hop’s greatest
group, Wu-Tang Clan. Originally com-
prising nine rappers, including RZA,
who also acted as their producer and
impresario, their origins lie almost
2,500 miles away from his current Cali-
fornian base — in New York City’s Staten
Island borough.
Wu-Tang Clan emerged from their
island fastness with their 1993 debut,
Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers). A
hard-boiled masterpiece that often tops
lists of the best rap albums, it opened a
portal into a richly imagined Wu-Tang
world. Their outlook was eccentric and
encyclopedic, drawing on esoteric
knowledge, comic books, street lore,
chopsocky films, crime stories, black
nationalism, martial arts and chess.
They are still active, despite periodic
disputes about musical direction and
money. (A few days after we speak, Ice-
lene Jones, widow of original member
Russell Tyrone Jones, aka Ol’ Dirty Bas-
tard, served a lawsuit on the RZA-run
Wu-Tang Clan Productions for allegedly
unpaid royalties.)
Their last studio album was 2015’s
Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, which RZA
limited to a single pressed copy to be
“Flowers” spliced the vivacious tone decades, with a career spanning
of its young vocalists Leanne Brown numerous genres. “I loved it,” Evans
and Catherine Cassidy with Sunship’s says, “ because coming from a funk/
innovative production. By 2000, the soul background, as well as classical,
UK garage scene was in full bloom, reggae and house, I felt like I could put
yielding major label crossover hits. all of these influences into my
“Flowers” was only kept off the productions — and I did.”
number one spot by another anthem of Indeed, the spirited opening notes of
the era: “Fill Me In” by Craig David and “Flowers” move into a poignant chord
Artful Dodger.
Brown recalls singing “Flowers” at
early club PAs, and being struck by its
inclusive appeal. “We often came on
stage after a really dark bassy song
that’s very masculine. We’d come on
with this fluffy girlie song and the
guys would go for it as much as the
girls,” she said in 2016.
UK garage was a multi-stranded
expression: inspired by the soulful
vocal-led sound of US garage house,
but elevated by the creative free rein
of pirate radio stations. Musical
elements were chopped and distorted,
with homegrown twists, notably a
restless “two-step” beat. By the time
Sunship remixed “Flowers”, Evans had
been musically active for a couple of
sold to the highest bidder, who would
have sole listening rights to it. The
ingenious scheme was controversial
within the group, and became more so
when the album was purchased for
$2mn by “Pharma Bro” fraudster Mar-
tin Shkreli. Subsequently seized by the
US Department of Justice, it was bought
by a crypto art investment collective
last year. Might the tantalising day
when the album is made public be draw-
ing near? “There is some hope,” RZA
says, teasingly.
Meanwhile, he has a solo release on
the way. Saturday Afternoon Kung Fu
Theater is a mini-album that reactivates
his rapping alter ego Bobby Digital after
more than a decade of dormancy.
Named in tribute to the kung-fu films
that inspired the Wu-Tang Clan, its no-
nonsense old-school beats and dense
loquacity aim to rectify what RZA
views as the troubled state of contempo-
rary rap.
“We’ve lost more hip-hop artists in
the last few years than ever before,” he
says. “Growing up in the golden age of
hip-hop, we lost maybe like a couple of
artists, but not a dozen artists or more.”
The feud between East and West Coast
rap that was blamed for the murders of
Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls in the
1990s has been followed a rising toll of
slain rappers: Nipsey Hussle, gunned
down in 2019; Pop Smoke, 2020;
Young Dolph, 2021; and so it goes on.
“No one knows for whom the bell
tolls,” RZA intones on one of his new
songs, “Fisherman”, in which he also
casts a baleful eye at the high rates of
incarceration for African-American
young men. “So many black youths lost
in the box for life.”
“Sometimes hip-hop music glamor-
ises certain things,” he says. “It glamor-
ises prison life, it glamorises gangsters
and thugs. I understand that, because I
grew out of that. But it doesn’t give you
the total tragedy of what that can end up
being, nor are we being represented
with a lot of alternatives.” He reels off a
list of back-in-the-day acts, from Eric B
& Rakim to Queen Latifah, some of
sequence that has strong echoes of
French composer Erik Satie’s
Gymnopédies: late 19th-century piano
works, aptly named after a ritualistic
dance celebration — albeit in ancient
Greece rather than Ayia Napa.
“Flowers” works both as an
empowering pop blast and a beguiling
curiosity. “It has a sweet vocal, and
when the chorus kicks in, there’s also a
Sweet Female Attitude on ‘Top of the
Pops’, 2000 — Alpha Press
From top: whom specialised in rapping about
Wu-Tang Clan
founder RZA;
street life, others who looked beyond it.
“The point being made is there was
Wu-Tang Clan in more bounce, there was more sub-
their heyday; stance. Hip-hop has become one-sided.”
RZA performing The first time he heard a person rap
live with the was when he was eight years old. It was
band Oslo, 2019 the summer of 1976 and he was at a
Andrew Cotterill/Camera
Press; Tsuni/Alamy; Terje
block party at a housing project in
Staten Island. At this early stage of the
Dokken
genre’s development, it consisted of an
MC at the microphone reciting a couple
of rhymes repeatedly. Yet the young
Robert Diggs was thunderstruck by the
novel sound of someone speaking over a
twisted string sound that gives it a
quirky edge,” adds Evans. “All great
dance music has an immediacy, and it’s
also meditative.”
Sweet Female Attitude’s appeal was
grounded in their relatability; even the
casual party vibe of the “Flowers”
video felt quintessentially British — a
contrast to the big-budget US R&B and
hip-hop visuals of the time. They
would not repeat the success of
“Flowers”, but more than two
decades on, there is still enduring
love for the track. Brown, now Sweet
Female Attitude’s sole remaining
original member, still tours and
plays live, occasionally guesting with
The House & Garage Orchestra.
In recent years, the track has also
cropped up in a bunch of different
forms. London girl group MO
sampled “Flowers” for their single
“Dance On My Own” (2014); pop-
rockers Bastille and James Arthur
covered the track for a mixtape
(2018); vocal trio Sugababes delivered
an orchestral version with UK garage
pioneer DJ Spoony (2019); AJ Tracey
11
beat. He chants the words that he heard
that night to me: “Dip, dip, dive, so-so-
cialise, clean out your ears and open
your eyes.”
He grew up in challenging circum-
stances. His parents broke up when he
was three. In his memoir, The Tao of Wu,
he describes his last memory of his
father: “He’s holding me in one hand
and a hammer in the other, smashing up
the furniture.” At one point there were
19 members of his extended family liv-
ing in a two-bedroom apartment. He
and his brother, Divine, used to lie in
bed at night conducting imaginary acts
of escapism with toy racing cars.
“We would actually get into those
with our minds and drive places,” he
remembers, laughing, “because really
somebody is sleeping over there and
somebody else is over here. In that
space, we’re imagining going to the
burger shop, we’re going to the movies.”
His appetite for scholarship was
honed not at school but by the Five-Per-
cent Nation, a black nationalist offshoot
from the Nation of Islam. Introduced to
its teachings by his cousin Gary Grice,
aka GZA, later a fellow member of the
Wu-Tang Clan, RZA had students of his
own by the time he was 18. But he also
became involved in crime, culminating
in his arrest in an Ohio town for taking
part in a shootout. Charged with
attempted murder, he was found not
guilty in 1992. The experience con-
vinced him to concentrate on music. He
formed the Wu-Tang Clan that year.
His production set a new threshold for
1990s rap. He used different vocal com-
‘If it wasn’t for hip-hop you
wouldn’t have had a black
president. Hip-hop cancels
out the reality of what a
racist can argue’
pressors for each Wu-Tang rapper and
tailored beats to their personalities. The
sound was raw and rough but also
shaped with an acute ear for mood and
tension, enhanced by samples of old
soul songs and chopsocky dialogue. He
had a master plan to franchise the Wu-
Tang Clan with a mix of joint releases
and spin-off solo albums by the rappers,
mostly also produced by him. In the
2000s, when he moved to LA, he turned
his attention to scoring movies, includ-
ing Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill films.
“When you’re young you think you
can do it all,” he says. He hasn’t pro-
duced the songs on Saturday Afternoon
Kung Fu Theater; that role has been
taken by DJ Scratch, a New York rap vet-
eran who efficiently mimics the classic
Wu-Tang sound.
RZA has an idiosyncratic, wordy style
with high-wire riffs and didactic mes-
saging. “People say: ‘Why are you
rhyming? You’re a triple OG [original
gangster],’” he laughs. “I’m not doing it
for the money. I’m doing it so that it’s
done, that’s all. So that the option is
there. So that you can open up an RZA
song and you can hear a world that may
inspire you.”
He reaches for an analogy from parti-
cle physics to sum up the present condi-
tion of rap. The positive mass of the pro-
ton, he explains, is much bigger than the
negative mass of the electron. Similarly,
hip-hop’s positivity exceeds the present
turn to what he construes as negativity.
“If it wasn’t for hip-hop you wouldn’t
have had a black president,” he says.
“Hip-hop cancels out the reality of what
a racist can argue.” He cites a 2017 study
showing some rappers having a wider
vocabulary than Shakespeare. “And if
you go back and check about these art-
ists, they didn’t even have a 12th-grade
graduation from academia. To me the
positive is growing and growing. The
negative is trying to make a comeback,
but the positive’s weight is too big.”
‘Saturday Night Kung Fu Theater’ is out
March 4 on 36 Chambers/MNRK Music
Group
and Jorja Smith performed a
captivating rap/soul duet for BBC
Radio One’s Live Lounge (2019).
British DJ/producer Nathan Dawe also
released a hit reworking of “Flowers”
(featuring guest vocalists Malika and
Jaykae) which had amassed more than
30mn streams by April 2020. “I feel
like because of the current [pandemic]
situation, it’s such a feelgood happy
song and it gives people a bit of escape
from what’s going on,” Dawes told the
Official Charts website.
In the opening episode of Michaela
Coel’s TV drama I May Destroy You, we
see “Flowers” light up a dance floor
(“Big tune!”) before the night spirals
into hell. “Flowers” continues to fuel
fresh productions: it’s wistfully
sampled by PinkPantheress (BBC’s
Sound of 2022 artist) on her track
“Pain”, and by laddish Brighton rapper
ArrDee on his recent single “Flowers
(Say My Name)”. This Y2K classic has
become a timeless Valentine that
always finds the sweet spot.
Arwa Haider
More in the series at ft.com/life-of-a-song
12 ★ † FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

Arts
One of the great things about

Blood, flashbombs
Music | It briefly swept from Bristol NWOBHM was how homespun it was.
Scores of the bands learnt their trade
playing their local working men’s clubs
to Belfast and its influence reached and pubs, where they tried to replicate
the stage effects they had seen at much
bigger shows, with frequently disas-
America. Michael Hann on the 1980s

and confetti
trous results.
“Our band Dumb Blondes heard Kiss
were doing all this theatrical stuff —
New Wave of British Heavy Metal blowing things up — so we went to this
theatrical store and bought all this gun-
powder,” said Phil Collen, later of Def

T
Leppard. “We stole a couple of dustbins
hink of the rock music and set this thing up in the Ruskin Arms
scenes that pass into leg- to use at the end of our set, and this thing
end: San Francisco in the went off before we even went on stage.
late 1960s as psychedelia Bang! There were bits of shrapnel flying
bloomed, New York and about. It was really dangerous.”
London a decade later as punk was Through 1980 and 1981, NWOBHM
fomented. They shared traits, at least in became commercially successful. Metal
their earliest days: small groups of peo- bands were regulars on BBC TV’s
ple in big cities, driving fashion and the unmissable weekly chart show Top
wider popular culture. of the Pops; metal albums scaled the
There was one scene that was differ- charts; bands who had been playing
ent, though. It was geographically and tiny rooms in 1979 were filling the
stylistically diffuse and never fashiona- halls that were the staples of the big gig
ble, even when its bands were racing up circuit in those days. But when one par-
the charts and even though it trans- ticular band became successful in
formed rock music, permanently and America, it spelt the end for the golden
profoundly. age of NWOBHM.
The New Wave of British Heavy Metal Def Leppard had always been pop-
came into focus in May 1979. Its heyday pier than the other bands, but their
was brief — maybe a couple of years — third album, Pyromania, was custom-
and it was brought to a close when Def made to sell in America, and when it did
Leppard released their album Pyro- just that, the record labels encouraged
mania at the start of 1983. But in those the other bands to try to make softer,
few years, NWOBHM (pronounced more melodic albums to follow suit.
Nuh-wobbum) transformed heavy The problem was they didn’t have the
music, codifying it and giving heavy same time, money, songwriting nous
metal the coherent identity associated and producer.
with it today. Diamond Head’s third album, for
“NWOBHM is the starting point of example, was produced by Mike
modern heavy metal,” Tom G Warrior,
the founder of the pioneering Swiss
metal bands Hellhammer and Celtic
Frost, told me in an interview for my
book Denim and Leather: The Rise and Fall
of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal
(Constable). “All the bands who have
shaped modern metal directly are in

The scene was unusually

disparate. It didn’t have its
own base, in the way punk
had CBGB in New York

turn directly influenced by the New
Wave of British Heavy Metal.”
The Newcastle band Venom, for
example, adopted extreme satanic
imagery and paid less attention to
recording fidelity than to sounding
horrible, thus inspiring the growth of
extreme metal, especially the thrash
metal and black metal bands of the
1980s and 1990s.
Or take Metallica from the US, the
most important metal band of the past
40 years — who would never have
formed but for the excitement about the
records they were buying on import
from the UK.
Consider the universal look of metal
Clockwise from bands to this day — leather and studs —
main: Judas which evolved in the late 1970s as
Priest in 1979; groups copied Judas Priest (their break-
fans in London’s through album, British Steel, was
King’s Road in released in NWOBHM’s annus mirabilis
the 1980s; of 1980). “Heavy metal needed to be
Girlschool; more than just a name, it needed to be a
Iron Maiden’s thing, it needed to be identified,” former
Steve Harris; Priest guitarist KK Downing told me. “If
Def Leppard a band wanted to be heavy metal, you
Fin Costello/Redferns;
Universal Images Group/
needed to add some of that look, at least
Getty; Tony Mottram/Retna in part.”
UK; Michael Ochs Archives;
Paul Natkn/Getty Images
The strange thing is that even by the
standards of scenes, NWOBHM was
unusually disparate. It went from
Venom at one extreme to the pop rock of
Praying Mantis at the other. It didn’t
have its own base, in the way punk had
CBGB in New York or The Roxy in
London, because it did not have a single
centre. Every town and city had its own
NWOBHM band — Sweet Savage from
Belfast, Holocaust from Edinburgh, Jag-
uar from Bristol, Vardis from Wakefield,
Sledgehammer from Slough.
A handful of bands came from east
London, notably Iron Maiden; Neat
Records in Newcastle released the first Shipley, who had engineered Pyroma-
records by bands from the north-east; nia. “He said they spent two weeks on
the West Midlands had plenty of groups, the first four lines of [thesingle] ‘Photo-
and the small town of Stourbridge pro- graph’, just getting the vocal, whereas
duced two of the most influential ones, most bands could do an album in that
Witchfinder General and Diamond time,” said Diamond Head’s Brian
Head, Metallica’s great inspiration. Tatler.
So diffuse was it that it wasn’t even a But while Pyromania became a huge
scene until Alan Lewis, the editor of hit, the watered-down albums the other
Sounds magazine, made it one. When bands made to ape its success did not.
the magazine ran a review of a May 1979 NWOBHM gave way to two American
show by Iron Maiden, Angel Witch and movements — hair metal, which was
Samson, Lewis added the subheading softer and more female-friendly, and
“If you want blood (and flashbombs and thrash metal, which doubled down on
dry ice and confetti) you’ve got it: the the aggression.
new wave of British Heavy Metal”. That “What caused NWOBHM to fade? In
review — by the writer Geoff Barton, one word: America,” said Metallica’s
who became the genre’s kingmaker — Lars Ulrich. “In order to become suc-
was a clarion call to the legions of musi- cessful in America, they had to take
cians around the country who had what made NWOBHM into NWOBHM
thought they alone were playing this out of it. Especially the Britishness.”
kind of music. Forty years later, though, almost all
“After Sounds coined that phrase it these bands are still playing in one form
became easier for new rock bands to get or another. Some play for a few quid in
the recognition they hoped for,” said pubs. Some play stadiums. The other
Robb Weir, the guitarist of Tygers of Pan week, Saxon, Girlschool and Diamond
Tang. “And it also made all the major Head shared a bill at the Eventim Apollo
record companies look up and think, in London, which 40 years ago was the
‘Right, this is the next big thing, we will Hammersmith Odeon, mecca of British
need to sign a New Wave of British metal. And still the fans poured in.
Heavy Metal band.’” Metal never forgets its heroes.

‘This film could be transformative’

Cinema ‘The Power of the Dog’ producers Emile Sherman and Iain Canning talk to Christopher Grimes as Jane Campion’s Western vies for 12 Oscars

T
he idea of turning Thomas
Savage’s 1967 novel The
Power of the Dog into a film
had been kicking around
for years but it never
seemed to get off the ground —
until Oscar-winner Jane Campion got
hold of a copy.
Campion sensed that the dark West-
ern psychodrama could be a great
motion picture, so in mid-2018 she
asked producer Emile Sherman to meet
her at a café in Sydney’s Bondi Beach to
discuss making it. “Jane had a real glint
in her eye,” Sherman, 49, says in a Zoom
interview from his home in Sydney.
“The book sounded intriguing but, to be
honest, we would have done anything
Jane wanted.”
Sherman and Iain Canning, his Lon-
don-based partner at independent pro-
duction house See-Saw Films, had
worked with Campion on a television
series, Top of the Lake, and they cleared
the next day to spend with the book. “It
was a great joy not just reading the
novel . . . but also knowing that the best
film version of this could be quite
extraordinary,” Sherman says. “In Jane’s
hands you had the potential for great
visual cinema. It could be transforma-
tive [for the Western film genre].”
It has certainly touched a cultural
nerve. The Power of the Dog, released in
December on Netflix and in a limited
number of theatres, has been nomi-
nated for 12 Academy Awards, includ-
ing Campion for director and adapted
screenplay. This is familiar territory for
her, having been nominated for best
original screenplay and best director in
1994 for The Piano, winning the former.
The Power of the Dog stars Benedict
Cumberbatch as Phil Burbank, a bril-
liant, conflicted, cruel cowboy who runs
the biggest ranch in Montana with his
soft-spoken brother George (Jesse
Plemons). After George marries widow
Rose (Kirsten Dunst), an embittered
Phil wages a vicious campaign to tor-
ment his sister-in-law and her bookish
son, Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee). All four
have been nominated for acting Oscars.
Visually, the film has much of what
you expect to see in a Western, including
Left: director
Jane Campion
talks to Benedict
Cumberbatch on
the set of ‘The
Power of the
Dog’
Below: Iain
Canning and
Emile Sherman
of See-Saw Films
Kirsty Griffin/Netflix; Chris
Chen
expansive skies — with New Zealand
standing in for Montana — and plenty of
chaps and cattle. But it is hardly a con-
ventional Western, reflecting the fact
that this take on a masculine genre was
written and directed by a woman and
shot by a female cinematographer, Ari
Wegner (also Oscar-nominated).
The result, says Canning, 42, is a “sub-
versive” Western set in the 1920s, when
real-life cowboys had already become
aware of — and influenced by — cinema
cowboys.
“There is this idea of masquerade, and
what cinema Westerns had brought to
the actual west in terms of [defining]
how to be a cowboy, what it means to be
a cowboy and that element of masculin-
ity,” says Canning, joining the Zoom
interview from Los Angeles. “It’s a West-
ern but the fundamental aspect of many
Westerns is the gun, and this film does
not have one.”
The Best Picture nomination for The
Power of the Dog is the third for Sherman
and Canning, who won the award for
The King’s Speech (2010) and were nomi-
nated for Lion (2016). It is a remarkable
record for the independent See-Saw, a
14-year-old production company with
35 employees split between offices in
Sydney and London.
The partners say they have managed
to hold on to their independence in part
by taking advantage of the government
incentives offered by the UK and Aus-
tralian funding bodies, from Screen
Australia to the British Film Institute,
Channel 4 and the BBC.
“This is crucial to maintaining our
authenticity and our approach to risk-
taking,” says Canning. “It mitigates the
risk in terms of the commercial money.”
After starting off making films — usu-
ally producing just one a year — See-Saw
branched out into television as the
streaming boom began. The company
counts Apple, Amazon, Hulu, Netflix
and other streamers as customers or
partners.
“We’re lucky that now the streaming
world has hugely boosted the appetite
for content and injected a huge amount
of money,” Sherman says. “It’s a crazy
market at the moment.”
The level of ambition and competi-
tion in the market became apparent as
See-Saw and the other members of
the Power of the Dog team, which
included co-producers Tanya Seg-
hatchian and Roger Frappier, went to
Cannes to strike a deal for the film in
2019. A number of companies were
eager to buy it, but Netflix executives
captured Campion’s attention by asking
her to imagine what she could do with
more money and freedom than she had
with her earlier projects.
Still, there were concerns about
whether Netflix could deliver the majes-
tic big-screen experience for a Western
such as Power of the Dog. Once the
streaming company said it could
arrange a theatrical release for about
200 screens in the US, the deal was
sealed, though it has hardly been a box
office hit.
For Netflix’s prestige films, such as
The Power of the Dog or its other Best Pic-
ture nominee, Don’t Look Up, the theatri-
cal release’s primary role is to ensure
that they qualify for Oscar considera-
tion, not rake in ticket sales at the cin-
ema. The film has been viewed in more
than 40mn homes on Netflix itself.
Sherman and Canning note that the
distinctions between film and television
have been blown up by streaming —
which is fine with them. “Now is the
moment for great stories,” says Sher-
man. “We’re just looking out for stories
that are distinctive, voiced, entertaining
and urgent in some way that can reso-
nate around the entire world.”
For now, it appears to be a moment to
savour. In a later interview on a sun-
drenched afternoon in Los Angeles,
Canning pauses to reflect on the heady
experience of being in Hollywood as one
of his company’s films is up for 12
Oscars.
“The Power of the Dog is such a wonder-
fully strange film, and now it’s on a bill-
board on Sunset [Boulevard],” he says.
“It was surreal to be speaking to Jane
after the nomination while also walking
past a huge billboard of her. It’s a defi-
nite pinch-yourself moment.”
The 94th Academy Awards take place on
March 27; see-saw-films.com
19 February/20 February 2022
T
he two drawings are dimin-
utive in scale and reticent in
expression. In the top
image, “Untitled” (1966), a
daffodil-bright perimeter
rings four rows of faint black dashes that
stutter downwards before petering out
into unpainted canvas, leaving one stark
line to cross the yellow threshold. Below,
“The Circle — Red Disc” (1967), a fire-
red sphere seething with pencil lines
and a central black spot, operates as an
oblique response inaudible to all but the
most finely tuned ears.
Bice Lazzari is an artist who makes
you listen as much as look. Trained at
the Conservatory in Venice as well as at
the Academy of Fine Arts, her musical-
ity hums through her paintings. By the
time she painted the two drawings
above, she had distilled her vocabulary
to dark lines, small motifs, restrained
colour and swaths of unpainted space.
With wonky staves, cryptic chords and
virtuoso silences, these are scoresheets
written for an orchestra of the spheres.
The intimate, modulated, chronologi-
cal display at the Estorick Collection in
London tracks Lazzari’s journey with
sure-footed expertise — more than 40
years since she died. There’s no mystery
behind her low profile. Born in 1900 in
Venice, she lived at a time when women
— especially in paternalistic Italy — were
supposed to be objects of the gaze.
When Lazzari’s talent emerged in the
1920s, she was advised to put it in the
service of design rather than fine art.
Her counsellors must have been
blind. The earliest work on show at the
Estorick, “Abstraction of a Line No 2”
(1925), sets diagonal lines soaring hither
and thither across a square fringed by
notched lines that resemble rulers. This
call to order is typical of an artist who
once said: “Everything that moves in
space is measurement and poetry.” Laz-
zari may have exulted in liberty but she
never lost control.
In 1928, her father’s death demanded
she earn a living. “I had to face life on a
practical level,” she recalled, so she
started making applied art — fabrics,
scarves, bags, belts, carpets — “in order
to continue living in the climate I so
adored, namely, freedom”.
Through the 1930s, Lazzari dedicated
herself to design, showing regularly at
Milan’s Triennial of decorative and
modern arts. In any case, the 1930s were
a terrible era to be a non-figurative artist
in Italy. The Fascist government
condemned abstraction as a “foreign
Symphonies of the spheres
Bice Lazzari | This show of the unfairly neglected Italian abstractionist’s
work reveals her quiet rhythms and subtle grandeur. By Rachel Spence
Clockwise from top left:
‘Abstraction of a Line No 2’
(1925); ‘Untitled’ (1966);
Bice Lazzari in 1957
Alfredo Libero Ferretti
★ FTWeekend
disease” and demanded artists churn
out realist images that better lent them-
selves to Mussolini’s imperial fantasies.
According to Renato Miracco, curator
of the Estorick show, Lazzari was “a
democratic person” who was “never in
her life linked to the Fascist movement”
— but, he says, financial need drove her
to create decorative panels, blending
figurative and abstract imagery, for the
pavilions that housed Fascist propa-
ganda exhibitions.
In truth, these were murky years.
Many artists, including Giorgio Morandi
and Lucio Fontana, forged links — eco-
nomic, ideological or a mix of both —
with the regime. Often, as with Lazzari,
the ties were transient. Nevertheless,
some artists, including Emilio Vedova
and Renato Guttuso, actively resisted
and their courage is laudable.
After the war, she cleaved once more
to her illegible alphabet. By now mar-
ried to the architect Diego Rosa, she
worked with modernist architect Gio
Ponti, her architectural awareness
infusing her small canvases with a gran-
deur that defies their scale.
A sequence of five glorious paintings
from the mid-1950s — “Untitled”
(1952), “White and Black” (1954), “Blue
Architecture” (1955), “Motif in Red”
(1955) and “Marine Tale” (1956) —
shows her placing fractured lines and
yelps of shape against uneven slabs of
colour as if excavating the dainty,
abstract skeleton of a medieval Chris-
tian painting.
An artist who once said that when she
painted a picture, “I secretly think of the
wall on which I could be painting at the
moment . . . of the architecture for
which that painting could be destined”,
Lazzari’s aesthetic impulses may have
been fostered by the imprint of Renais-
sance art in the churches of her native
Venice. Although she says that as a
young woman she arrived at abstract art
“without any teachers or models”,
thanks to the “provincial climate of cul-
tural isolation” of 1920s Italy, her oeu-
vre shares a lineage with artists includ-
ing Wassily Kandinsky, Kazimir Malev-
ich, Agnes Martin and Nasreen Moham-
edi, for whom the abstract grid encoded
a spiritual impulse, the expression of a
nameless deity that signified inner unity
and freedom.
In the mid-1960s Lazzari, in true
saintly tradition, experienced epiphany
through suffering when her failing eye-
sight obliged her to give up painting in
oil. Stuck in hospital with “a large white
wall in front of me, which acted as a
screen”, she was stimulated to “play
13
Arts
with images, rhythms, spaces, inter-
sected by segments . . . This experience
was incredibly positive.”
A small work on paper in pastel and
pencil, “Untitled” (1970), testifies to her
words. Counterpointing blocks of brief
vertical lines, its austere, staccato syn-
copations are an example of less-is-
more splendour. That gift for squeezing
maximum expression out of minimal
signs by varying their length, weight and
spacing let Lazzari create one gem after
another over the next decade.
Painted now in acrylic, “Vertical
Sequence with Red” (1971), “White
Square, No 2” (1974) and others from
the period reveal Lazzari employing her
new medium to saturate her canvas in a
single tone, usually cream, black or red.
On this solid foundation, her broken yet
Her petite, unflashy art
may appear too
unassuming for our
bombastic times
harmonious matrices vibrate with
numinous interior light.
To look for rational meaning in these
images would be like asking for a con-
versation with a tree or flower. But to
commune with them in silence is to
understand, as Lazzari once put it, that
“listening carefully to a day’s rhythm is
what works best”. Later paintings —
“Oblique Red Line” (1979) — employ
looser, longer lines as if the music in her
head was growing dissonant. Yet
in “Untitled” (1981), the urgent punctu-
ation of four tiny red blobs on a black
ground strafed by sky-blue streaks tells
you her commitment to her “inner emo-
tions” is as earnest as ever.
She died in Rome in 1981. By then she
had shown widely in Italy, including —
back in 1950 — at the Venice Biennale,
but international recognition was scarce
and has remained so. Her petite,
unflashy art may appear too unassum-
ing for our bombastic times. But Lazzari
believed that “art is a sign of love that
humanity seeks to give to others in a
continuous quest to discover a vital rela-
tionship between social life and moral
and cultural human behaviour”. That’s
lot to expect from a little painting.
Hurry to the Estorick and watch her
deliver, time and again.
To April 24, estorickcollection.com
14 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

Arts|Collecting
feminist history, as women in the 1960s-
70s found freedom in a medium liber-
ated from male tradition. Cindy Sher-
man’s early studio self-inventions
“Untitled (Murder Mystery People)”
are here, and Carolee Schneeman’s nude
performances in “Eye Body: 36 Trans-
formative Actions for Camera”. Most
poignant are Francesca Woodman’s
photographs of her body obscured by
blurs of slow exposure, charting adoles-
cent introspection and also awakening
politics: their title is “A Woman, A Mir-
ror: A Woman is a Mirror for a Man”.
These in turn are part of a century-
long story of photography redefining
itself beyond the documentary. The way
is often heralded by the poetic approach
of sculptors and painters: Constantin
Brancusi’s 1926 photograph of
his bronze head “La Negresse blonde
vue de face” angled so that the shiny fac-
eted surface repeatedly mirrors his stu-
dio; Cy Twombly’s 1954 portrait
through a workspace in “Robert
Rauschenberg, Combine Material, Ful-

R
ton Street Studio” — images which look
ecalling his visits to Degas’s mysteriously like Twombly’s own scrib-
disheveled, dusty studio, the bled, disordered, bleached-out, erotic
poet Paul Valéry mused in paintings.
the 1930s that “the labour of Rauschenberg said he worked “in the
the artist is of a very old- gap” between “art and life”. By the 1970s
fashioned kind, the artist himself a sur- the paradigm of the studio was no longer
vival, a craftsman or artisan of a disap- a hermetic, sealed place but a happen-
pearing species, working in his own ing, sociable environment, television
room, following his own homemade blaring, camera shutter never still. A
empirical methods”. Valéry feared the television screen presides from the top
efficiencies of modernism would van- of Rauschenberg’s exuberant “Ruby re-
quish such a studio: “conditions are Run (Spread)” (1978), a collage of mir-
changing, and instead of this spectacle rors, black and white snapshots, slashes
of an eccentric individual using what-
ever comes his way, there will be a pic- One rewarding thread is to
ture-making laboratory”.
Foreseeing the vast, controlled spaces follow the lineage from
of postwar celebrities — workers includ- Picasso’s ‘L’Atelier’, the
ing robots fabricating Jeff Koons’ sculp-
tures; assembly lines of silkscreens and single most beautiful work
home movies flowing from Andy

Forever in the studio

Warhol’s Factory — Valéry fetishised
the handmade and the interior.
That tension between private and
Clockwise from public, individual and collective, is at
main: Francesca the heart of 20th-century art history,
Woodman’s ‘A and to explore it through the imagery of
Woman; a the studio is a brilliant, original move.
Mirror; A Stunningly choreographed, serious yet
Woman is a playful, the Whitechapel Gallery’s huge
Mirror for a new exhibition A Century of the Artist’s
Man’ (1975-78);
Pablo Picasso’s
Studio 1920-2020 is spellbinding.
At the entrance stands Louise Bour-
‘L’Atelier’ geois’s steel and wire mesh “Cell IX”, its
(1955); William dangling mirrors suggesting the studio’s
Kentridge’s infinite possibilities as an enclosed yet
‘Drawing Lesson open, reflective, experimental space —
47 (Interview and also a prison of the mind. We enter
for New York those minds via paintings, photographs,
Studio School)’ films and installations recreating artist
(2010); Kerry spaces, plunging us into immersive
James Marshall’s worlds and world views: the studio as
‘Untitled “one little room an everywhere”.
(Painter)’ Turn the corner from Villa Le Rêve,
(2008) Matisse’s serene pink studio hung with
The Woodman Family
Foundation/Victoria Miro;
vibrant textiles, and you hit the shrill,
Succession Picasso/DACS; silver-foil-lined glare of Warhol’s party
Marian Goodman Gallery/
Galleria Lia Rumma; Steve
city in Manhattan. In 1970s Dakar, the
Briggs/David Zwirner London/ street itself is the studio for improvised
Jack Shainman Gallery, New
York
performances by Senegalese collective
Laboratoire Agit’Art.
Visual arts | A spellbinding exhibition at London’s
Whitechapel Gallery explores the critical role of
every artist’s workshop. By Jackie Wullschläger
In 2011 in Shanghai, Ai Weiwei makes
art from destruction — filming the
authority-ordered demolition of his stu-
dio in “The Crab House”. Glorious disar-
ray — mulch and junk, torn photos,
scraps of notes (“the brutality of fact”,
“highly controlled chaos”) — around the
twisted “Study for a Portrait of John
Edwards” in Francis Bacon’s studio
faces careful order and tactile tempta-
tion in Henry Moore’s, where tiny frag-
ments of stone stand in rows, inspira-
tions for monuments.
The show’s scope is terrific: an adven-
ture through time and place. Kurt Sch-
witters’ 1930s madcap wooden and
cardboard angular grotto “Merzbau” is a
legacy of European Dada, and stuffed
with sentimental remnants (including
Sophie Taeuber-Arp’s bra). A breath
away, “Mrs Felicia Abban’s Day and
Night Quality Art Studio”, launched in
Accra in 1953, chronicles Ghana’s chang-
ing postcolonial society through por-
traiture, and John Mawurndjul’s cross-
hatched eucalyptus panels, created in
21st-century Marrkolidjban, northern
Australia, look to Aboriginal custom.
There are many pathways, or none —
a happy wandering through abundance.
One rewarding thread is to follow the
lineage from Picasso’s “L’Atelier”
(1955), the exhibition’s single most
beautiful work, to trace how depictions
of the studio in painting enlarged for-
mally and socially. “L’Atelier” — light fil-
tering through palm trees and arched
windows on to a blank canvas in
Picasso’s ornamental Cannes villa La
Californie — posits the studio as meta-
phor for art-making: lines juggle into
forms, patterns into images, in games of
space and perception.
In the 1960s, Frank Auerbach battles
sculptural layers of pigment and disap-
pearing/reappearing motifs in the
dense, luminous “Reclining Model in
the Studio” and “Jym in the Studio”. In
the 1980s, Maria Lassnig’s “Inside and
Outside the Canvas” claims the territory
for women in a bright pink, ungainly
self-portrait facing an empty canvas.
In 2008, Kerry James Marshall’s
“Untitled (Painter)” stars an assertive
black woman; her crown of hair, big
hoop earrings, nose stud, direct gaze
and pose express confidence. She wields
an outsize palette, a virtuoso abstract
canvas-within-a-canvas and a warrior’s
shield, triumphantly — painting as per-
formance and protest.
Widening inclusivity is one of two
narratives of progress here. The other,
intertwined, concerns the power of the
camera — an especially rich seam for
of fabric, split tyres — the studio “spread
out” to encompass passing life on and
off-screen.
By the 21st century, the photogra-
pher’s studio/life had become its own
subject: Wolfgang Tillmans’s detritus-
ridden “After Party”; Walead Beshty’s
wraparound of thousands of cyanotype
prints, ghostly blue renderings of the
materials — paper, cardboard, wood,
letters — passing through his studio,
“Prologue to A Partial Disassembling of
an Invention, Without a Future: Helter
Skelter and Random Notes in Which the
Pulleys and Cogwheels Are Lying
Around at Random All Over the Work-
bench” (2014). “I thought of the studio
as a machine for making a kind of pic-
ture,” Beshty says. “It’s a picture that
shows exactly how it came into being,
everything that was involved
. . . machinery and technology — but
also the social relationships. I think
that’s particularly important . . . what
makes an artwork is also the social rela-
tions between individuals.”
A Century of the Artist’s Studio is the
Whitechapel’s final exhibition under its
director Iwona Blazwick, retiring in
April. In its breadth and ambition to
recount modern art through a potent
figurative theme, it recalls the great
exhibition early in her reign, Faces in the
Crowd (2004). The crowd and the studio
might seem opposites, but Blazwick’s
entire career has been about facilitating
and enlarging possibilities for the mak-
ing of art, and this vision of the studio as
outward-bound, co-operative, yet idio-
syncratic, independent, is a tremendous
swansong.
‘A Century of the Artist’s Studio: 1920-
2020’ runs from February 24-June 5,
whitechapelgallery.org

UK tax authorities seize NFTs in fraud probe

The Art Market | Second tranche of the Macklowe Collection; Photo London sells 25 per cent stake; dealer launches ivory rescue scheme; is it all over for OVRs? By Melanie Gerlis
The dark side of the non-fungible token
art market came into focus this week
as the UK tax authority, HM Revenue &
Customs, announced its first seizure of
three NFT-backed works. Three people
were arrested as part of a wider
investigation into a suspected £1.4mn
tax fraud that allegedly involved 250
fake companies, HMRC said. The
seizure “serves as a warning to anyone
who thinks they can use crypto assets
to hide money from HMRC,” says Nick
Sharp, HMRC’s deputy director of
economic crime.
This month, the US Treasury
released a study on the facilitation of
money laundering and terror financing
via the art trade. It found NFTs could
be used for “self-laundering”, where
criminals “transact with themselves to
create records of sales on the
blockchain”.
Bernadine Bröcker Wieder,
co-founder of art-tech platform
Vastari, says, “NFTs are the worst place
to commit a crime. It is impossible to
conceal your identity for long, so I
don’t think they will last as a place to
hide wealth.”
Sotheby’s has revealed details of the
second tranche of works from the
collection of Harry and Linda
Gerhard Richter, ‘Seascape’ (1975)
Macklowe, being sold after their
divorce, which it will be auctioning in
New York on May 16. The 29 works in
Macklowe part two have an estimate of
about $200mn, smaller than
November’s $590mn total ($676mn
with fees).
Again, the works are all guaranteed
to sell and are mostly by the big-hitters
of the 20th century. These include
Mark Rothko, whose bright abstract
topped the November auction and
whose darker, later “Untitled” (1960)
carries the highest estimate for May, at
$35mn-$50mn. Other highlights
include Gerhard Richter’s three metre
“Seascape” “There is going to be more of this Michael Baggott to launch what he calls Is it RIP for OVRs? Online viewing
(1975), estimated collaboration as art fairs reset in the Antiques Rescue Centre. “I don’t rooms became vital alternatives to
at $25mn-$35mn, certain ways,” says Scott Gray, founder agree with the trade in modern-day physical art fairs during the pandemic
and two works by and chief executive of the WPO. “Photo ivory, it’s despicable. But before the but, as life returns to normal, rather
Agnes Martin, for London is a natural evolution — we 20th century, ivory was as ubiquitous than heralding a new way to do art
whom the first have hugely complementary as plastic is now,” he says. “So there are business, their role has diminished to a
Macklowe sale strengths.” He doesn’t rule out taking a people who have inherited a box or two supplementary service. Standalone
made an auction bigger stake in the future — “never say of things that are now illegal to sell. online events, unconnected to an
record of $17.7mn never” — but says this is not his There is now an option not to throw existing fair, now seem to have had
(with fees). This priority. history into the bin.” their day: Art Basel hosted its last
time, her subtle Photo London’s organisers are He is encouraging auctioneers, planned such showing with OVR:2021,
“Untitled #11” upfront about the challenges of the dealers, collectors and others to a sales platform for art made last year,
(1985) is past few years. “Brexit followed by a contact him with works for possible which ran February 9-12.
estimated at global pandemic was not the situation donation, for preservation purposes, at London gallerist Pippy Houldsworth
$4mn-$6mn. we expected when we set out in 2015,” antiquesrescuecentre@btinternet.com. was among the 59 online exhibitors
Among the more says co-founder Michael Benson. who had success, selling all four works
recent works are Fellow founder Fariba Farshad says, by Angela Heisch (priced between
a Hoover sculpture by Jeff Koons (1981- “We’ve always been a small $10,000 and $60,000 each). However,
86, est $3.5mn-$4.5mn) and a organisation and it felt a bit lonely out she says: “OVRs have been incredibly
signature Face painting by Mark there.” They describe the WPO deal as a useful but have served their time in
Grotjahn (2010, est $6mn-$8mn). way to safeguard the future of the fair. their current form.
Brooke Lampley, Sotheby’s chair and Key to the partnership is the WPO’s “There is a place for online shows,
worldwide head of sales, says splitting reach among institutions and collectors for the reach they get and particularly
the supply between the two auctions in Asia where, Gray says, “we have seen to stop us all traipsing around the
“gives breathing room”, particularly for first-hand a huge market for world, which is terrible for the
the high-value works. contemporary photography”. Photo environment. OVRs will develop as the
London returns to its spring slot in technology develops.”
Art-fair consolidation is in the air Somerset House this year (May 12-15). Marc Spiegler, director of Art Basel,
post-pandemic. The latest news is that says: “The industry may have focused
Photo London has sold a 25 per cent The UK’s 2018 Ivory Act, which on the physical, once large-scale events
stake to the World Photography makes it illegal to deal in most antique were imaginable again, but there is no
Organisation, which also runs ivory, is now expected to come into question that there will be much more
Photofairs Shanghai. force this spring, prompting dealer Angela Heisch, ‘Lost Leaves’ (2022) from us on the digital front.”
19 February/20 February 2022
‘Goya is a
haunting
presence’
Michael Armitage | A Madrid exhibition explores
how the Kenyan-British artist has been inspired
by the Spanish Old Master. By Jane Ure-Smith
F
rancisco de Goya has shaken
up the artistic life of Michael
Armitage more than once.
Armitage first encountered
the Spanish Old Master on a
trip to Madrid in his late teens. Knowing
nothing of his dates or work, he
assumed Goya’s “Black Paintings” — a
visceral cycle of frescoes the artist made
in his seventies — might be contempo-
rary minimalism. “I was completely
blown away,” he says.
Kenyan-British Armitage, 38, has
become known for large-scale, multi-
layered, often dreamlike paintings that
dissect the foibles of Kenyan society,
engaging with the work of both east
African modernists and the Old Masters
of western art, especially Goya (1746-
1828). This makes Madrid’s Real
Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fern-
ando, where Goya became director in
1795 and which today is home to 13 of
his paintings, plus original plates and
first editions of his etchings, the perfect
place to mount an exhibition exploring
the connections between the two artists.
Presented by the Spanish arm of the
Turin-based Fondazione Sandretto Re
Rebaudengo and curated by Hans
Ulrich Obrist, the high-profile artistic
director of London’s Serpentine Gallery,
Michael Armitage at the museum’s Cal-
cografía Nacional (its centre for etch-
ings) comprises five oil paintings by the
artist and 14 ink-wash drawings. More a
clever intervention than a full-blown
exhibition, the show deepens our
understanding of both artists.
A court painter for most of his life, ini-
tially producing Rococo tapestry car-
toons and later notably unflattering
royal portraits, Goya is best known
today for work produced from his fifties
onwards: “Los caprichos” (1797-98) and
“Los disparates” (1815-23), two series of
etchings that are critical of human folly;
“The Disasters of War” (1810-20), made
in response to the brutality of the Penin-
sular war of 1808-14, but not published
until 35 years after the artist’s death; the
“Black Paintings”, which included
“Atropos” (“The Fates”) and “Witches’
Sabbath”. Full of strange, fantastical
creatures, Goya’s work explores insan-
ity, superstition, crowd behaviour, reli-
gion and political corruption.
“Goya is a haunting presence,” Armit-
age says via Zoom from his London stu-
dio. “He is there for me both in terms of
what he does with an image technically
but also from a conceptual point of view,
the ideas behind what he chooses to
paint and the way he reflects on society.”
The son of a British father and a Ken-
yan mother, Armitage spent his child-
★ FTWeekend
Clockwise from main: hood in Nairobi. In 2000, aged 16, he
Kenyan-British artist went to boarding school in the UK, then
Michael Armitage; studied painting at the Slade School of
‘Mkokoteni’ (2019); Fine Art and the Royal Academy
‘Mydas’ (2019) Schools. Today, with a studio behind his
Theo Christelis/White Cube;
parents’ house in Nairobi and another in
London, he divides his time between the
cities — though he calls Kenya home.
There is dark humour in Goya’s work,
which Armitage finds compelling — and
easy to relate to for a Kenyan, he says. “I
have always found that he is intensely
funny! Even the darkest of his paintings,
it is satire so much of the time.”
Armitage’s own paintings are inspired
by political events, social media and pop
culture. They weave together folklore,
myth and personal memories: the five
works on show here are a Goya-esque
take on Kenyan society. In “Anthill”
(2017), three exorcised women evoke
the airborne figures of “Atropos” as they
fly towards us on hyenas. In “Mkoko-
teni” (2019), two Goya-like caricatures
capture the mayhem of the 2017 Kenyan
elections. With a nod to “Los caprichos”,
in which hideous old men woo beautiful
young women, in “Mangroves Dip”
(2015) Armitage skewers the sex tour-
ism industry of the Kenyan coast.
Invoking the resolute Greek heroine,
“Antigone” (2018) depicts, with Goya-
esque irony, a nude woman seated in a
semi-pornographic pose beneath the
words “All she wants is to get married”.
Intended as a critique of the slow-to-die
attitude in Kenyan society that a woman
needs a husband, the complex issues
15
Arts
surrounding the depiction of the female
body nevertheless make the painting
uncomfortable viewing.
In 1793, Goya suffered a mysterious
illness that left him deaf and much has
been made of the darker turn of mind
that followed. Armitage equates the
darkness with neither pessimism nor
cynicism. “What I get from Goya is a
phenomenal empathy and love of
humanity . . . One of Goya’s very last
drawings is of an old man with crutches
saying: ‘I am still learning.’ It’s hard to
see that coming from someone who
hated being part of society.”
Intense scrutiny of Goya’s work has
changed the way Armitage — recently
elected a Royal Academician — draws.
“The economy of the image implies a
speed in the making but when you see
the actual drawings, you see the lines
are built up from often quite gentle
brush marks,” he says.
Using Prout’s ink, which “you can re-
wet and re-work”, the 14 ink-wash
drawings in the show date from the past
three years: a “strong man” balances
three figures on his back; a hooded man
holds a decapitated head in his hands; a
soldier’s head floats above him as he
dies. There is a sense of the absurd about
these drawings, which, along with their
spare composition, is traceable to Goya.
At the end of the exhibition, Obrist
has included five etchings from “Los
caprichos” and “Los disparates”, a taster
for the Goyas you can find elsewhere in
the museum. In the theatrically lit Goya
Cabinet, a selection of the 228 plates the
Real Academia owns is on display and,
in the main part of the museum, are the
13 Goya paintings, among them the
wonderfully named “Burial of the Sar-
dine” (c1812-14), whose carnival ban-
ner Armitage “stole” for his 2017 work
“The Fourth Estate”, converting its
smiling face to a frog.
The exhibition does more than con-
nect Armitage with Goya and teach us
about both: Armitage is in dialogue with
Goya, yes, but with Manet, Velázquez
and Gauguin, too. And I can’t look at
“Antigone” or “Mangroves Dip” without
thinking of Jak Katarikawe and Asaph
Ng’ethe Macua, two east African artists I
first encountered in Armitage shows.
Counter-intuitively perhaps, the exhibi-
tion’s tight focus on Goya refreshes our
sense of the depth and breadth of the
allusions in Armitage’s work.
To March 1, Calcografía Nacional, Madrid,
rabasf.com
16
I
n late October 2020, Peloton chief
executive John Foley sat down in
front of his bookshelves, popped in
his AirPods and logged on to a video
conference with a top Goldman
Sachs investment banker. Goldman had
taken his connected fitness company
public the year before and was hosting a
virtual event so clients could learn from
“builders and innovators”.
Foley, a clean-cut fiftysomething who
looks like he could have been born in a
Patagonia gilet, retold the tale of what
inspired him a decade ago to bring static
bicycles and high-energy spin classes
into people’s homes. He recounted the
story of turning Peloton into a cultural
phenomenon and himself into a billion-
aire in measured, practised tones.
Yet Foley seemed irked when the pan-
demic’s impact on Peloton’s fortunes
came up. Covid was not, he argued, a
one-time booster shot of demand.
“When I hear Peloton being a Covid
story,” he continued, making air quotes
around “Covid story”, “it annoys the
crap out of me because what we are
building is here to stay.”
This may have been trademark
founder optimism, but even Foley’s
board of directors thought he should
tone down the hype. “Last year, I was
talking to our board and I was like, I see
this as clear as day: this thing is going to
be one of the few $1tn companies in 15
years,” he recalled. “And they said,
‘Don’t say that again. It makes you
sound like an idiot.’”
At that point, Wall Street was lapping
up Foley’s vision. As investors punished
other companies struggling to adjust to
economic and supply chain shocks,
“Covid-proof” Peloton — as Foley called
it in an earnings call — was prospering.
The company’s shares soared by more
than 400 per cent that year, making it
2020’s second-best performing Nasdaq
stock. The number of people paying its
$39 monthly subscriptions more than
doubled to 1.7mn, and sign-ups for its
cheaper digital fitness pass jumped 10-
fold during the pandemic’s early weeks.
Numbers couldn’t capture its custom-
ers’ devotion. As Foley and his team
built Peloton from a single, wobbly pro-
totype into a global community urged
on by inspirational instructors, they
would describe users’ remarkable levels
of engagement in terms of “customer
love”. Others just called it the Church of
Peloton.
We now know that even as the com-
pany was soaring to a peak valuation of
nearly $50bn in late 2020, it was about
to endure a series of tribulations that
would culminate in Foley ceding the
‘Companies and people
make mistakes. Trouble is
Peloton made its mistakes
in front of everyone’
chief executive position and laying off
three in 10 employees. Over the next 16
months, it would be forced to recall
products under tragic circumstances,
face an activist investor’s ire over profli-
gate spending and fumble to respond as
Wall Street turned on it for missing fore-
cast after forecast.
Not to mention the repeated beatings
on social media, revealing the downside
of being a zeitgeist-defining brand. The
parable of Peloton is a business school
case study in the making.
Foley, who declined to comment for
this story, always loomed largest among
Peloton’s five co-founders. He paid his
way through college by working shifts at
a Mars confectionery factory and, at 22,
was overseeing the North American
manufacturing of Skittles and Star-
burst. In the mid-1990s, he joined the
nascent Citysearch.com before moving
to IAC to run the invitations website
Evite.com. But the media group was
Barry Diller’s empire, not Foley’s. As he
later told National Public Radio, by the
age of 40, he “wanted to be big”.
That didn’t happen at his next job,
running Barnes & Noble’s ereader busi-
ness. By then, though, Foley and his wife
Jill had become hooked on the boutique
fitness classes that were exploding in
America’s coastal cities. There was Soul-
Cycle, with its sweat-soaked mantras,
and Flywheel, which used leader boards
to drive competition among riders,
among others. But their popularity
meant that places in top instructors’
classes could sell out in minutes.
Foley’s idea looks obvious in retro-
spect: beam classes straight into homes
via a slick bike equipped with a giant flat
screen that resembles a Bloomberg ter-
minal. Just as gaming consoles and PCs
killed arcades, gyms and studios would
never be able to compete.
From the start, Foley’s enthusiasm
met with indifference, a pattern that
would harden his conviction that scepti-
cism should be tuned out. “John is the
kind of person who, when you say no, is
more determined to prove you wrong,”
says Dara Khosrowshahi, the Uber chief
executive who was a protégé of Diller at
the same time as Foley. Foley had
wanted to stream SoulCycle and Fly-
★ FTWeekend
Peloton’s wild ride
The fitness company inspired devotion among customers and investors during the pandemic.
Then the wheels came off. Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson and Patrick McGee on what went wrong
wheel classes, but neither studio was
interested. Nor were the 400 institu-
tional investors he toured during Pelo-
ton’s first three years.
When he finally hacked together a
bike for a crowdfunding campaign on
Kickstarter in 2013, just 178 people
backed the project. Most of them were
friends. It took thousands of pitches to
angel investors to raise the $10mn
needed to produce Peloton’s first bikes
and demonstrate them in an upscale
New Jersey mall. But once people could
experience Foley’s vision, Peloton took
off. By late 2019, it was making nearly
$1bn of annual revenue, with more than
half a million of the bikes — then priced
at $2,245 — sold and as many buyers
paying to stream classes that were turn-
ing instructors into celebrities. It still
lost money, but it listed at an $8.2bn
valuation, with Foley claiming that
Peloton was doing nothing short of “sell-
ing happiness”.
As that Christmas approached, Pelo-
ton hit a crisis that foreshadowed others
to come. The company’s holiday advert
seemed to show a woman pedalling furi-
ously on her new bike to please her hus-
band. On social media, where the brand
loomed large, it was shredded for look-
ing like a hostage video. The advertise-
ment had been misinterpreted, Peloton
insisted, but its market value dropped
by $1bn. “Peloton was propelled to a
much larger stage than it was ready for,”
says Simeon Siegel, an analyst at BMO
Capital Markets. “Companies and peo-
ple make mistakes. The problem is, this
company made its mistakes in front of
everyone.”
By the time the pandemic had taken
hold in 2020, it looked like Foley had
successfully silenced doubters. For the
three months to June that year, when
How ‘Covid stock’ Peloton lost
its pandemic premium
Share price since IPO ($)
150
100
50
0
Sep 2020 2021 Feb
2019 2022
Source: Refinitiv
Baker found that Peloton had created a
more intense community experience in
the digital realm than real-life workouts
ever had. “I’ve never high-fived people
in the gym,” he says. But on the Peloton,
“there’s ‘us’ and then there’s ‘them’, the
non-Peloton people. We are something
special because we are together, pushing
each other and co-operating.”
Like most Peloton enthusiasts, Baker
has a favourite instructor: Ally Love.
She has 830,000 Instagram followers, a
modelling career and a business that
“emboldens women to unleash their
inner boss” while selling $25 pairs of
socks. Vogue covered Love’s wedding
and her classes attract thousands, yet
they still seem “wildly intimate”, Baker
says. “They’re totally manufacturing
this experience. You can fake yourself
$1.8bn lockdowns were most widespread in
Peloton’s markets, revenues almost tri-
into thinking the instructor’s totally
motivating you.”
Drop in pled and the average bike was being This is what behavioural economists
Peloton used at twice the pre-pandemic rate. call “temptation bundling”, explains
market value At first, Peloton’s only problem was Katy Milkman, a professor at the Uni-
after the ‘Sex keeping up with demand. Soon, though, versity of Pennsylvania’s Wharton busi-
and the City’ it was struggling to keep pace with ness school. Attractions such as charis-
fracas investors’ expectations. “To feed the matic instructors make us more likely
beast, the company needed to continue to exercise. The bikes are “commitment
showing growth,” Siegel says, “but devices”, Milkman adds, their high
because of the growth the company upfront cost inducing guilt about skip-
began to drink its own Kool-Aid and ping workouts. There is little doubt that
believed it would last for ever.” Covid, he users love what Peloton is selling, says
says, went from being the best thing that Daniel McCarthy, a marketing professor
happened to Peloton to the worst. at Atlanta’s Emory University.
But pulling people into the Church of
Illustrations by Lee Baker was one of Peloton’s pan- Peloton has been getting more expen-
Nicolas Ortega demic converts. A cultural anthropolo- sive. The company spent almost one-
gist at Duke University in North Caro- third of its revenue on sales and market-
Above: John lina, the 55-year-old grew up cycling ing in the last quarter of 2021. Revenues
Foley, pictured from Oregon to California on camping shot up from $1.2bn to $4.4bn between
at Peloton’s trips. When his gym closed during the 2019 and 2021, but undisciplined
New York pandemic, he ordered a Peloton. spending meant net losses also bal-
headquarters Decades after academics started wor- looned, from $191mn to more than
Jeenah Moon/New York
Times/Redux/Eyevine rying about Americans bowling alone, $1.1bn. “They got too big, too fast and
The expectations game
Change in Wall Street’s 2022 forecasts since Peloton’s IPO (%)
Q2 2021 Q3 2021 (Aug
Share price change
Subs change (May 6) Peloton lowers outlook 26) Peloton cuts
Revenue change but revenues beat forecasts revenue outlook
500
and the price of
its bikes
Q1 2020 (Mar 16) US 400
states close gyms after
WHO declares Covid 300
pandemic Q4 2020 (Nov 5)
Warning of ‘supply
constraints’ offsets 200
strong revenues
100
0 how to spot and remove rust while
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Latest
2020 2021
Source: BMO Capital Markets
19 February/20 February 2022
they believed too much, too fast,” says
Nate Pund, a managing director at the
investment bank Houlihan Lokey. “It’s
really hard to see a profitable future for
Peloton,” echoes his colleague Jeremy
Hirsch, who leads the bank’s fitness
advisory group.
As such criticism grew, Foley spoke of
building a Netflix-like media company
as he struck a content deal with Beyoncé
and spent a reported $50mn each on
studios in New York and London. Last
August, he broke ground on a $400mn
factory in Ohio designed to augment the
company’s imports from Taiwan. Posing
beside the state’s governor, he pledged
to create 2,100 jobs in the heartland.
Some of Foley’s personal spending
raised eyebrows, too. Tabloids gossiped
when he and Jill, then head of Peloton’s
apparel business, bought a $55mn
Hamptons house, or when they threw a
lavish black-tie celebration at New
York’s Plaza Hotel last December.
Meanwhile, Peloton was recruiting at
a breakneck pace. In the two years to
last June, its headcount grew from less
than 2,000 to 8,662. Some of the hiring
suggested Peloton could not decide
whether it wanted to be a mass-market
company or something more aspira-
tional, insiders complained. In New
York, it hired producers to make
streaming content “for every Jim and
Jane”, one former employee says. “They
were trying to do 94 different things.”
Outsiders also saw risks in chasing a
wider audience. “They are trying to be
both Toyota and Lexus,” says Reid Hoff-
man, the LinkedIn co-founder and an
investor who has met Foley but owns no
stake in Peloton. “The question is
whether that’s possible.” Hoffman adds
that he only invests in entrepreneurs
who have the courage of their convic-
tions, explaining that the great ones
make decisions on vision alone because
there are no data on new markets. But
the risk is that “you can drive the bus
over the cliff”.
Some people lower down Foley’s org
chart worried about the looming cliff.
Gregory Rios joined in 2020 as the stock
was climbing and found he loved his job
delivering bikes. The brand’s cachet
made interactions with customers
something to look forward to. Not only
were the wages and benefits generous,
but if inventories were scarce Rios
would get the day off — with full pay.
Rios, not his real name, is one of 17
current and former employees the
Financial Times spoke to in order to
understand Peloton’s wild Covid ride.
Nearly all described it as a great
employer but offered myriad examples
of lavish spending.
By early 2021, Rios was thinking it
couldn’t last. Customers were waiting
four months for deliveries, shift cancel-
lations suggested an inability to manage
inventories, and expenses seemed out of
control. He could not understand why
the company’s leaders remained relent-
lessly upbeat. They saw Covid-19 as a
one-off headache for supply but would
not countenance that it might be a simi-
larly singular catalyst for demand. “I’m
just a regular guy and I could see it
wasn’t sustainable,” Rios says. “All you
had to do is watch CNBC. All day long it
tells you, this is a pandemic stock . . . ”
Two events left Rios questioning man-
agement’s thinking. In February, Foley
said the company would spend $100mn
on air freight to overcome shipping
delays. And that May, after initially
pushing back against a consumer safety
body, the CEO recalled Peloton’s $4,300
treadmills after one was involved in a
child’s death.
Before the Covid supply chain crisis, a
bike would be replaced if it had the
“slightest scratch on it”, a van driver
tells the FT. Another says they would be
sent to fetch a whole new bike “if the
seat did not fit correctly”. Returned bike
frames would often be junked if a simple
fix was not possible, former warehouse
workers say. Many employees consid-
ered such waste “insane” but ware-
houses were going through inventories
at a rapid clip, and some had no space
for returned bikes. Peloton prioritised
perfection, workers claim, so customers
would never be sent a “refurb”.
The waste was accepted as a byprod-
uct of blitzscaling, or pursuing speed
over efficiency. In the six years before
Covid hit, Peloton’s revenues had more
than doubled annually. During the pan-
demic, blitzscaling’s inefficiencies
became more ingrained in operations
until, eventually, unchecked costs out-
stripped slowing demand, and escalat-
ing losses triggered a crisis. “They didn’t
really think financially during the worst
part of the pandemic,” says one ware-
house supervisor. “They were just
spending, spending, spending.”
The culture of perfection began to
wane, as did company generosity. When
warehouses spotted that many bike
frames arriving from Taiwan were cor-
roding, internal documents reviewed by
the FT show Peloton responded with
Project Tinman, a series of protocols on
defining what levels were “acceptable”.
Continued on page 17
19 February/20 February 2022
Continued from page 16
Instead of bikes being thrown out or
sent back, many were fixed, but seven
employees in three states say plenty of
bikes rusting from the inside were
knowingly sent to customers because of
“unrealistic” quotas and a deterioration
in quality controls amid low invento-
ries. Higher-ups responded by sending
hundreds of gallons of rust sealant to
one warehouse. “We didn’t even go
through a five-gallon bucket,” the
supervisor said. “They would spend
insane amounts of money on things we
would never use.”
Peloton says it immediately
responded to the “isolated issue”,
emphasising that the “abnormal” oxida-
tion was limited to non-structural areas
of the bikes which had no effect on their
quality, durability and reliability. “If we
become aware that this specific issue
has caused a problem for any member,”
a company spokesperson says, “we will
replace the bike.”
In late summer, Rios’s guaranteed
weekly hours were cut from 40 to 30,
then to zero. On some days, he would set
off for work having paid for childcare,
only to find there were no bikes to ship,
or pay for the day.
Wall Street sentiment had also been
turning against Peloton, and soon the
bears had numbers to support their sus-
picion that pandemic demand would
subside as gyms reopened. In August
2021, earnings fell short and the com-
pany flagged slowing subscriber growth.
By November, Peloton was cutting its
full-year sales outlook by as much as
$1bn. Foley told analysts he had never
been more excited about the future, but
this time they weren’t buying it. The
stock crashed 40 per cent.
That hit some Peloton executives
hard, according to one person familiar
with the matter. Several had borrowed
against their shares, allowing them to
cash in some of 2020’s stock price gains
without incurring a steep tax bill.
Within days they faced margin calls to
post more collateral, this person says,
with one executive seeing their net
worth fall from $35mn to $7mn.
When you count users instead of dollars, the NFT world is tiny
Tech World Why the infancy of non-fungible
tokens may last a long time. By Tim Bradshaw
I
f you see this, you’re very early,”
teased the Twitter account for
Kapetta, a new “anime-inspired”
NFT project. The line has become a
familiar trope in the frothy market
for non-fungible tokens, where block-
chain-powered proof of ownership has
created a hyper-speculative digital art
market. Sure enough, within hours
thousands of new followers hoping to
get in on the ground floor sent Kapetta
viral, based on nothing more than a
sleek silhouette and a promise.
Being “early” in the unregulated
world of NFTs can be highly lucrative.
The first supporters of a new project are
often rewarded with “whitelist” access
before the token goes on sale to the gen-
Unknown to Foley, another threat was
emerging. Jason Aintabi’s Blackwells
Capital had been a Peloton shareholder
on and off since the initial public offer-
ing. November’s news enraged him.
Executives had assured analysts at
the company’s earnings announcement
they saw no need to raise more capital,
even though it had burnt through
$561mn of cash that quarter. Yet, 12
days later, they did exactly that, diluting
owners such as Blackwells with a $1.1bn
stock offering. Aintabi felt misled and
began plotting to unseat Foley.
The chief executive had other fires to
fight. The December 2021 reboot of Sex
and the City featured a storyline in which
the show’s Mr Big died from a heart
attack after exercising on a Peloton bike.
Social media exploded with jokes about
the company killing a beloved charac-
ter. Peloton, seeming to have learnt
from its previous viral debacles,
responded within 48 hours with a
humorous commercial starring the
same actor, Chris Noth. But before it
could blunt the damage, Noth faced
accusations of sexual assault by
multiple women. He denied them and
Peloton pulled the ad but the episode
cost it $1.8bn in market value.
A month later, Peloton’s shares plum-
meted further when a leak suggested it
was halting production amid collapsing
demand. Foley denied some of the
claims but confirmed lay-offs were pos-
sible, even if they would be done “with
the utmost care and compassion”.
What had infuriated Aintabi is that
supervoting shares gave Foley and
seven other insiders effective control of
Peloton. No matter what happened to
demand, production or the stock,
Foley’s position seemed secure. Aintabi
set out to change that, urging the board
on January 24 to fire Foley and put Pelo-
ton up for sale. “Remarkably, the com-
pany is on a worse footing today than it
was prior to the pandemic,” Aintabi
charged, as he criticised its spending
and asked why Jill Foley was running its
apparel arm. The market pressure Pelo-
ton had evaded for a year suddenly had
a face. What Aintabi did not know was
that the board had already engaged
headhunters to find a successor.
eral public. With enough hype,
whitelisting can mean paying a few hun-
dred dollars for an NFT that can be
resold for thousands just hours later.
But in the increasingly desperate
scramble to find the next Bored Ape
Yacht Club — the iconic NFT series
whose cartoonish works frequently sell
for millions of dollars — the opportuni-
ties for due diligence are limited. Many
NFT creators use pseudonyms, making
it hard to verify their credentials.
The individual behind Kapetta, Rob-
erto Nickson, soon revealed that his
Twitter account was a hoax, designed to
warn people against leaping too quickly
after a spate of cash-grabs and rip-offs
(known as “rug pulls” in NFT lingo).
★ FTWeekend
$1bn
Drop in Peloton market
value after the 2019
holiday ad
Above: Peloton
shareholder Jason Aintabi
has criticised the
company’s spending,
saying the business ‘is on a
worse footing today than it
was prior to the pandemic’
Adil Boukind; illustration by Nicolas Ortega
“Why are we normalising giving anony-
mous internet people money?” tweeted
Nickson, who posts NFT news via
@themetav3rse. “There is so much non-
sense in this space right now.”
Amid all the hype and froth, it is easy
to forget just how “very early” NFTs still
are. It is less than a year since the first
Bored Ape works were minted and just
six months since NFT sales exploded.
Yet already the company behind
Bored Ape, Yuga Labs, is fundraising at
a multibillion-dollar valuation. Twitter,
Instagram and YouTube are all jumping
on the NFT bandwagon. OpenSea, the
biggest NFT marketplace, was valued at
more than $13bn last month. Last week-
end’s Super Bowl was dubbed the
“Crypto Bowl”, with trading platforms
such as Coinbase and FTX buying ads
during American television’s most
expensive airtime.
These eye-popping figures, combined
with endorsements from celebrities and
the apparent ease with which thousands
can be won or lost trading NFTs, have
Peloton unveiled its new chief execu-
tive, Barry McCarthy, on February 8,
while also further slashing sales fore-
casts, axing the Ohio plant and
announcing $800mn of cost cuts —
almost equal to 2020’s total operating
expenses. Foley stayed on as executive
chair.
McCarthy jumped to the top of the
headhunters’ list when he was intro-
duced to the board a few weeks earlier
by TCV, one of the company’s earliest
investors. He had earned the venture
capital firm a fortune as chief financial
officer of Netflix and then Spotify.
McCarthy, a forthright, somewhat pro-
fessorial 68-year-old, makes for a stark
contrast with Foley. He insists he is not
erasing the founder from the picture.
McCarthy describes Foley as a vision-
ary like Reed Hastings at Netflix and
Spotify’s Daniel Ek. He traces Peloton’s
wild cost overruns to entrepreneurial
optimism that can run ahead of itself,
but which was also responsible for the
company’s very existence. “Founders
walk this fine line between reality dis-
tortion — which is the vision of the thing
they’re trying to build — and the capac-
ity to see the world as it is,” he tells the
FT. “Did they scale their fixed cost
structure proportional to the growth in
revenue? No. Why? Because they
assumed Covid was the new normal.
And it wasn’t.”
“It is undeniable our leadership team
made certain decisions during Covid
regarding the supply chain and opera-
tions that did not work,” a Peloton
Peloton could not decide
whether it wanted to be
mass-market or something
more aspirational
spokesperson says. New management
has “hit the reset button” but its com-
mitment to excellence in customer serv-
ice is unwavering.
The new chief’s first staff meeting
misfired: his introduction to the bark-
laden strains of “Who Let the Dogs
Out?” prompted disbelieving comments
on employee chats seen by the FT. The
meeting ended early. But what really
matters is yet to come. Within days of
telling staff to “get real”, McCarthy was
quelling speculation of a bid by Nike or
Amazon, telling the FT he would lead
for the long term. “If you follow what
[investors] do instead of say, more often
than not they invest in growth over
profit,” he says.
That growth will come from new con-
tent, countries and products, he
believes, and some of those products are
close to launching. Insiders shared
images of a rowing machine and details
of a strength-training device with which
Peloton could seize more of the con-
nected fitness market.
How these products fare and whether
McCarthy’s plans work will determine
whether Peloton is remembered as a
comeback story or a cautionary tale.
Barclays analysts warn that Peloton
may become “ordinary”, with a valua-
tion to match. McCarthy disagrees,
arguing it is not uncommon for extraor-
dinary companies to find themselves
“staring down the barrel of darkness
and despair” before rebounding. “There
was a period of time at Netflix when the
performance was so bad some board
members stopped coming to meetings,”
he says. “Reed and I were literally talk-
ing about who’s going to turn out the
lights in the event that we had to shut it
down.” What convinces McCarthy is
“the customer love” Peloton com-
mands, he says, noting that 99 per cent
of its customers renew their subscrip-
tions each month. “It is a religion,” he
says. “If we can’t figure out what to do
with that, then shame on us.”
Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson is the FT’s US
business editor. Patrick McGee is the FT’s
San Francisco correspondent. Additional
reporting by Joshua Franklin
Pâté
given crypto art a profile that vastly out-
strips the market’s actual size.
Measured in financial terms, it sure
looks big: some $24bn worth of NFTs
have been traded to date, according to
market tracker Cryptoslam.io, includ-
ing more than $4bn in January alone.
OpenSea traded at least $100mn worth
of ethereum (the cryptocurrency most
commonly used to buy NFTs) every day
The telegram that
foretold Russia’s
foreign policy
Simon Kuper
Opening shot
I
n 1946, Kremlin aggression
was baffling Washington. To
explain it, George Kennan, an
American diplomat in
Moscow, wrote his 5,400-word
“Long Telegram”. A year later, he
expanded his views in an
anonymous article for the journal
Foreign Affairs. His writings
inspired the west’s policy of
“containment” of the USSR, which
held throughout the cold war,
though Kennan often felt it became
too aggressive and militarised.
Late in life (he died aged 101 in
2005), he opposed Nato’s
expansion into eastern Europe.
Kennan took the long view of
Russian thinking. In places, his
writings eerily anticipate Vladimir
Putin, who, as a career KGB officer,
is a child of the Soviet system.
Kennan can still help us read
Russia, in this crisis and beyond.
The Kremlin’s core belief, he
explained then, was that a hostile
west would collapse under its own
contradictions. Russian rulers, he
wrote, saw the “outside world
as . . . bearing within itself germs
of creeping disease and destined to
be wracked with growing internal
convulsions”.
One day the
USSR would
deliver the
west’s “final
coup de grâce”.
Putin
inherited this
worldview, and
his life
experiences
reinforced it. In
1989, stationed
in Dresden, he
watched East Germany collapse
under its own contradictions. In
1991, his own state followed. So he
can easily imagine western
societies collapsing, too.
To hasten their collapse, Kennan
warned, Russia would “stimulate
all forms of disunity” in the west.
“Poor will be set against rich, black
against white, young against old,
newcomers against established
residents, etc.” Much of this would
be done on the “subterranean
plane . . . by agencies for which
Soviet Government does not admit
responsibility”, he wrote,
anticipating troll farms.
Kennan also warned about the
Kremlin’s attempts to split western
alliances, which helps explain
Putin’s talks with France’s
Emmanuel Macron. And he said
Moscow encouraged “western
elements”, mostly communists,
whose views coincided with Soviet
interests. Today’s generation of
pro-Kremlin or anti-Nato fellow
travellers include Donald Trump,
Tucker Carlson, Gerhard Schröder,
Marine Le Pen and Jeremy Corbyn.
Russia fights the west with
untruths, warned Kennan: “The
leadership is at liberty to put
forward for tactical purpose any
particular thesis which it finds
useful to the cause at any
particular moment.” So Russian
officials deny threatening Ukraine,
while saying that western
“provocations” could prompt an
last month, according to Dune.xyz,
another blockchain data site.
Yet when you count users instead of
dollars, the NFT world is tiny. According
to analytics site DappRadar, OpenSea
had about 500,000 active users over the
past month. Even NFT optimists con-
cede that, as of now, the total audience is
in the low single-digit millions. While
growth has been rapid, that is still a
rounding error in a global internet pop-
ulation of about 5bn people.
The last time I can recall such dispar-
ity between the publicity around an
online service and the number of people
actually using it was Twitter in its early
years. Like NFTs today, only a few peo-
ple (mainly in Silicon Valley) used Twit-
ter, but everyone had heard about it.
For the defenders of NFTs, this imbal-
ance is a positive indicator: if just a few
million people are responsible for bil-
lions in spending, just imagine how big
the market could become when the
masses join! Plenty of promising new
technologies start out looking like toys.
17
Spectrum
invasion. Kennan was much
warmer towards “the Russian
people”. They were, “by and large,
friendly to the outside world . . .
eager to measure against it talents
they are conscious of possessing,
eager above all to live in peace”. By
1946, he added, ordinary Russians
were growing disillusioned: “Never
since termination of civil war have
mass of Russian people been
emotionally farther removed from
doctrines of Communist party.”
Today’s Russians are similarly
disaffected. Putin used to be
untouchable. From 1999 to 2013,
Russian gross domestic product
per capita jumped 12-fold to
$15,974, estimates the World Bank.
Then came Putin’s crowd-pleasing
annexation of Crimea. But from
2014 to 2020, GDP per capita fell
37 per cent, while corruption
became ever more blatant. Now,
Putin has mismanaged the
pandemic. Russia’s population
decline of over 1mn last year was
the worst since the USSR collapsed.
Like Soviet rulers of Kennan’s
day, Putin mobilises popular
support by warning against
western invasion. But no western
democracy has
attacked Russia
or its neighbours
in a century.
Russia, sole
perpetrator of
invasions in its
region since
1945, is claiming
the mantle of
victim.
What will
Putin do in
Harry Haysom
Ukraine?
Kennan emphasised that Russian
rulers were cautious. They were in
no hurry to bring about the west’s
inevitable collapse. This meant
western powers could deter them
by “firm containment” short of
war. I’m guessing Kennan would
see the west’s arming of Ukraine as
a canny way to raise Russia’s price
of invasion. His analysis implies
that Putin might take another bite
out of Ukraine, but not attempt
long-term occupation.
Kennan warned Washington
against seeking to humiliate the
Kremlin. The west ought to be able
to stand firm, he wrote. After all,
its stake in the USSR was
“remarkably small. We have here
no investments to guard, no trade
to lose.” That is less true today.
German dependence on Russian
gas pipelines and London’s role as
laundromat of the Putinist elite’s
money cracks the west’s alliance.
That said, Kennan’s central
reassurance still holds: “Gauged
against western world as a whole,
Soviets are still by far the weaker
force.” He also noted the difficulty
of a transfer of power from a long-
established autocrat — in his day,
Stalin. Kennan turned the
Kremlin’s worldview on its head.
He agreed that a society was going
to collapse, but it wasn’t the west.
simon.kuper@ft.com;
@KuperSimon
More columns at ft.com/kuper
Besides, OpenSea is already making mil-
lions in fees every week. Contrast that
with Twitter, which took several years
to find a solid business model.
However, this analysis overlooks the
billions of dollars estimated to be con-
sumed by “wash trading”, a type of
fraud that involves selling an NFT back
and forth between the same (anony-
mous) users, in order to pump the price.
Longer term, I can see the appeal of
NFTs. Dressing up our digital identities
makes sense as we spend ever more
time online. Silicon Valley is seeing a
rush of talent into start-ups focused on
web3, the concept of a new iteration of
the internet based on blockchain tech.
The problems surrounding NFTs today
may be fixable, especially when there is
so much money sloshing around the
industry. But right now, the NFT market
remains very early. It might stay that
way for a long time.
Tim Bradshaw is the FT’s global technology
correspondent
18 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

Spectrum
Why we
I
wanted to show that you could round my mediocre streets, work where you will, shop where you
develop even a very beautiful place delectable yet we keep will and wander around alone in a

stopped
without defiling it,” said Sir Clough morsel”. building them. crowd is empowering, thrilling and
Williams-Ellis. “In fact, that if you The price of The dynamic — but rarely beautiful.
did it with sufficient loving care, this freedom automobile must Indeed, the 21st-century

building you might even enhance what God had

given you.”
from
contamination is
shoulder some
responsibility.
development that most reminds me of
Portmeirion is Fidenza Village, a high-

beautiful
It was 1969, and Williams-Ellis was that Portmeirion Portmeirion has end shopping mall between Milan and
talking about Portmeirion, his is less a village, no cars. Nor does Bologna. It doesn’t have an ounce of
Italianate, proto-post-modernist more a sculpture a much older Portmeirion’s charm, but it does at

communities “village” on the coast of north Wales.

He began work in the mid-1920s,
opening a hotel in 1926 to help fund the
rest of the project, which continued
into the 1970s. (It was the set for the
British 1960s TV series The Prisoner,
and stole the show.)
But did Williams-Ellis succeed?
Aesthetically, his village is a delight.
Walking around puts a smile on your
face. Yet if it was meant to inspire other
projects, then the answer can only be
no, he did not.
Policymakers rightly obsess about
urban regeneration, “strong towns”
and “levelling up”. Consumers spend
significant sums to wear beautiful
clothes, drive beautiful cars and cook
in beautiful kitchens. And yet
somehow I can think of few beautiful
communities that have been built,
anywhere in the world, in the past
century.
Portmeirion is not really a
community. You can’t live there; you
can only stay overnight as a tourist. In
his 1932 book Portmeirion Further
Tim Harford Explained, Williams-Ellis noted that he
originally envisaged building on an
island, “for only so, I thought, should I
Undercover economist ever be safe from contamination by
speculators, settling like blue-bottles
park. Pay the £15
entry fee, stroll
around, buy your
Prisoner-souvenir
“I am not a
number” T-shirt
and go away again. You can get married
there, but you can’t raise a family.
There is nothing wrong with building
a place so joyful that people will pay
just to come and look around. The
problem is that the joy does not seem
to have rubbed off on the places where
people live their lives. This is a puzzle. I
asked my friend the economist Tyler
Cowen whether he had an explanation,
and he responded by sending a recent
essay of his, in which he was similarly
mystified. To quote a line: “Why has
our advanced, modern and wealthy
world ceased building beautiful
neighbourhoods?”
It is certainly not because nobody
cares about beauty. Nor can we entirely
blame architects, even if both
modernism and postmodernism have
often produced unlovely results.
Architects do not celebrate places such
as Haydon Hill, Aylesbury, an
undistinguished housing estate where I
spent my adolescence. Nobody
admires these mediocre houses on
seaside gem,
Clovelly in
Devon. And
behind the
obvious joys, the
Anna Wray
car-free
environment is an essential part of the
Venice experience.
But car-free neighbourhoods are
rare. My own community, Jericho in
Oxford, enjoyed a delightful couple of
years with very few cars after a road
closure, but it did not last. Oxfordshire
county council reopened the road,
explaining that “motorists are proving
very resistant to changes”. Bumper-to-
bumper traffic is back.
Perhaps Williams-Ellis’s concern
about speculators points to the
problem. If I build a cheap, ugly house
in a beautiful neighbourhood, I pocket
the financial savings while my
neighbours suffer the aesthetic costs.
Williams-Ellis solved the problem by
retaining ownership of everything: “No
house or land is sold freehold,
complete and permanent control of the
whole settlement being of course my
basic idea.”
Such control seems impractical in
everyday settings. Cities thrive on
freedom and diversity. The ability to
least try to look fun. It turns out that
when people are buying Armani, they
like to do so in prettified surroundings.
It is easy to dismiss the beauty of
where we live as a trivial matter, but
how a place looks and feels really
matters. Rachel Wolf, one of the
authors of the Conservative party
manifesto for the UK’s general election
in 2019, emphasises the importance of
lively, safe, attractive high streets. She
is not wrong.
But how to deliver? Governments
have the power to co-ordinate
aesthetics but seem to lack the
incentive to try. (In Aylesbury, the best
view in the town was from the massive,
Governments have brutalist County Hall, as it was the only
spot from which you couldn’t see
power but lack County Hall.) Private businesses have
incentive. some incentive but usually lack the
power. Almost everyone seems to lack
Businesses have the skill. Somewhere in the centre of
some incentive but this grim Venn diagram is a
collaborative overlap that might create
usually lack power beautiful 21st-century
neighbourhoods. It is a great shame
that the overlap seems so vanishingly
small.
Tim Harford’s new book is ‘How to Make
the World Add Up’

Is the age
about status, it seems monstrous to me.
Saying “I want to be CEO or prime min-
ister” basically means: “I want to be on
top of everyone else, possibly wearing a
crown.” It feels less like an ambition

of ambition
than a pathology. It doesn’t feel any
saner than wanting to eat one of every
animal or wanting to have a neck like a
giraffe’s or, in fairness, wanting to be a
rock star.
Chasing lots of money seems similarly

over?
grotesque to me now. I understand why
people need money and how important
it is when you don’t have it or why some-
one might want to amass wealth to off-
set insecurity and fear. But amassing bil-
lions? It should be seen as the bizarre
hoarding behaviour it is. Just because
you’re hoarding money and not fidget
spinners or mouse corpses doesn’t make
Irish writer Patrick Freyne was already finding it any less weird and unhealthy. Why
being a billionaire isn’t listed in the DSM
as a disorder is beyond me.
conventional success a bit of a let-down. And then Here’s the third thing I learnt: your
own ambitions can be a hard master too.
In my thirties I decided to focus on try-
came the pandemic and further recalibration ing to be a writer and a journalist. I had
cleverly worked out that while music
was a dying industry, print media was

I
was once an ambitious young man.
Back in the 1990s I was in a lesser-
known indie band called the
National Prayer Breakfast. I won’t
even pretend to be hurt if you
haven’t heard of us. But this band
obsessed my every waking hour before
it all ended in mild acrimony and quiet
failure in my late twenties.
Ambition is a strange thing for Gener-
ation Xers. We’re usually in denial about
having it. Also, traditionally in the UK
and Ireland, people were never meant to
be particularly vocal about wanting
stuff. To some extent, I think you’re still
meant to gaze at your petfood empire or
bestselling novel and say, “This old
thing? I don’t know where I got that.”
Here are my first ambitions: when I
was five, I wanted to be in The Monkees
because their TV show was repeated
every Saturday on the Irish national
broadcaster RTE. I didn’t realise it was
made in the 1960s. I thought Davy,
Micky, Mike and Peter still lived in a
groovy house, probably in Dublin, that I
might be able to drop into sometime.
And so my first ambition was thwarted
by the linear nature of time.
When I was eight, I wanted to fight in a
war. My dad was a soldier and I was
obsessed with war comics like Warlord
and Battle. I was sure I’d be good at being
in a war and at killing people with big
moustaches and German accents. I
know now I’d be terrible at being in a
war and I would betray all of my com-
rades at the first hint of discomfort and,
also, that war is probably a bad thing. At
a certain point I realised I didn’t want to
be in the army; I just wanted to dress in a
uniform from time to time. That’s more
a fetish than an ambition.
When I was 15, I wanted to be in Dire
Straits or Genesis. I found their songs of
middle-aged, middle-of-the road heart-
ache strangely relatable. I wrote songs
about getting divorced or how to keep
love alive in a long marriage. I repeat: I
was 15. My ambition in this instance was
thwarted by the unlikelihood of Phil
Collins or Mark Knopfler hiring a teen-
ager who was bad at guitar.
All my ambitions boiled down to one
simple dream: to be loved and admired
by all. Maybe that’s what all ambitions
boil down to. Isn’t every billionaire’s pet
space project just a plea for love?
The National Prayer Breakfast began
in 1995. Ireland was still in the reces-
sionary doldrums, and arts graduates
emigrated, joined the civil service or
signed on the dole and pretended to
make art. I started a band. As a teenager
I had been in another band, but I had
given up on this. Then my future band-
mate D gave me a family tree of inter-
linking punk rock groups that he had
carefully made with a felt-tip pen. It was
like a road map for my future. Punk
showed me I could have creative ambi-
tion without skill.
My friends and I lived in a shared, red-
brick, terraced house in north Dublin
and all of our other friends lived nearby
in similar houses. Most of them were
ambitious in the same way I was ambi-
tious. They were creatively incontinent
without a clear career trajectory. We all
recorded music and created zines and
posters and short films.
One of our friends was a “film-
maker”. This involved getting very high
and filming himself for a film he called
The Cocaine Diaries. It’s possibly the
worst film ever made. Another friend
created a fully funded art project that
involved him going on the train every
day to run around the small city of
Waterford. Actually, that was pretty
cool. Most of us were also involved with
an anarcho-syndicalist pirate radio sta-
tion that was run from another terraced
house in north Dublin. It had a broad-
cast radius of about a mile. We were con-
vinced “The Man” wanted to shut us
down due to our challenging punk rock
playlist and incoherent political rants.
Look, I know this might all sound
insufferable. It probably was insuffera-
ble. But we had no way of knowing how
typical or weird or ordinary or unusual
any of it was. Our news of the world
came from music magazines and fan-
zines, and we only knew a few hundred
people at most. Nowadays, everyone is
constantly in touch with everyone
they’ve ever met and, also, everyone
who exists. Younger writers I know feel
like they’re in competition with their
whole generation. Social media has
turbo-charged ambition.
In the 1990s, nobody knew what their
generation was at. No one I knew had
five-year plans. Nobody went to net-
working events. Nobody had a mentor
or knew an old person who could stand
them. Nobody had any practical notion
of how to make a career at anything.
When I went to a university guidance
counsellor in my early twenties, he
looked at my CV and saw that I was in a
band. “Anything going there?” he asked
hopefully, indicating by default that my
literature degree was absolutely useless.
When I was 15, I
wanted to be in Dire
Straits. I wrote
songs about getting
divorced or how to
keep love alive in a
long marriage. I
repeat: I was 15
It turns out that at this time, the Celtic
Tiger was kicking into gear. Going
against all precedent, Ireland would
soon find itself with a booming econ-
omy. My friends and I slowly realised
that other young people were no longer
emigrating or going on the dole and
were being hired by the multinationals
that were popping up all over Dublin’s
docklands. The Irish people began buy-
ing and selling houses to one another. I
know this is a financial newspaper so,
suffice-it-to-say, it was a wonderful era
and it all ended very well.
Soaking up the ambitious energy of
the age, my friends and I chose to get
more serious about our musical careers.
Perhaps we could have the political eth-
ics of the anarchist puritans Crass but
also earn the millions of U2? I remember
once, in the dole queue, D the bass
player loudly announcing that he would
consider himself a failure if by the age of
Kyle Ellingson
30 he didn’t have apartments in Lon-
don, Paris and New York. This didn’t
seem odd to me then but in retrospect
it’s lucky we made it out of the dole
office alive.
We organised tours of the UK and
released music on a shoestring. We got
write-ups in music magazines and air-
play on pirate radio stations but were
largely ignored. The band came to a
squabbling end, like most bands do,
when we reached the impossibly old age
of 28. About a year later I remember
bursting into tears in my kitchen. I
never realised how ambitious I was until
that moment, feeling heartbroken and
lost, knowing I had failed at something I
really wanted.
Here’s the first big thing I learnt: sev-
eral years after that band ended, while
chatting with my bandmate Paul, we
both realised that we were relieved the
band hadn’t been successful. The best
fun I have had in my life was touring the
squalid and tiny venues of Ireland and
the UK with my friends. But a few years
later, the prospect of touring, even in
some sort of luxury tour bus, already
looked grim. I like being home on Friday
nights. That’s basically the core of my
personality. I realised that people can be
a hostage to the ambitions they had as a
younger person. I think this happens all
the time, that what looks like a dream in
your twenties might be a nightmare
later in life.
Here’s the second thing I learnt: it’s
still better to be disappointed by your
own dreams than shaped by the dreams
of others. A lot of things that look like
achievements have nothing to do with
ambition at all. People from the privi-
leged middle classes don’t particularly
need strong visions of their own because
they have absorbed the ambient ambi-
tions of their parents and their class. I
think a lot of these people wake up one
day in midlife and either sing “Once in a
Lifetime” by Talking Heads or hastily
retcon their life to make their incidental
trajectory seem intentional.
Other people’s ambitions are inher-
ently strange things. When ambition is
surely the future. I worked very hard at
this. I pitched articles. I wrote for every
publication that would have me. In the
wake of my musical failure, I worked too
hard. This time I succeeded in making a
career of it, but I also hit a wall. I became
unsure if I liked writing any more or
even what constituted “success”.
The problem with wanting to become
something and focusing so much on
some future version of yourself is that
you don’t really fully experience things
in the present tense. Everything you do
becomes just one more thing on an
anxiety-laden to-do list. Things I might
otherwise have enjoyed, like interview-
ing an interesting person or visiting a
cool place, become worry-filled steps on
the road to “success”.
A few years ago, ground down by my
own psyche, I decided to enjoy things
more, to pick projects based on curiosity
rather than what would bring me closer
to a phantom notion of my future self.
Even the desire to create things — the
one ambitious drive I can still relate to —
can leave people feeling empty and
depleted and underwhelmed once those
things are out in the world. It’s all
bizarre behaviour that overreaches our
genetic programming. I imagine dogs
who chase cars feeling similarly con-
fused when they eventually sit behind
the steering wheel with no opposable
thumbs to grasp it with. At the end of the
day, even success feels like failure.
Here’s the final thing I learnt: change
can be good. Like a lot of other people,
I’m reassessing things at the moment.
It’s not unusual to find that the ambi-
tions we once had don’t fit us any more,
and the pandemic has intensified this
feeling. Covid-19 has been busily rewir-
ing our wants and needs. Ambition
seems very silly when the corner office
is the same boxroom that everyone else
is sitting in. And we’ve spent two years
looking at our peers on Zoom and real-
ised that no matter how successful or
unsuccessful we are, to an outside
observer many of us are doing the
same ridiculous thing: we’re huddled
over a laptop, taking orders from it,
occasionally talking to it and then typ-
ing frantically.
I think another change is in order.
Maybe I’ll try to be a billionaire. Maybe
I’ll start a new band. Maybe I’ll just
go outside.
Patrick Freyne is a feature writer with the
Irish Times. His essay collection ‘OK,
Let’s Do Your Stupid Idea’ is published
by Penguin
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 19

Food & drink

The appeal of online
wine courses and
TV programmes

Jancis Robinson
Wine

T
here was only one
period in my life when I
thought I knew
everything there was to
know about wine. In
1978, having been writing about
wine for three years, I was awarded
the Wine & Spirit Education Trust’s
Diploma, the pinnacle of
achievement for a wine student like
me. “Right, that’s it,” I thought.
A publisher who had read a little
article about me, then considered
to be a strange beast as a young,
introduce some element of
competition and/or celebrity, such
as the SOMM series in the US, which
majored on blind tasting, and The
Wine Show produced in the UK,
themed around a pair of well-
known actors jockeying for
supremacy as connoisseurs.
In the age of the internet, wine
education blossomed — and has
thrived during lockdowns. Tutored
online tastings, from small sample
bottles, became quite a thing in
2020, a way for people sequestered
bumped into two vignerons of my
acquaintance, giving the entirely
false impression that I am well
embedded in Burgundian society.
But the bulk of the course was
filmed at a rented house in north-
west London. The walls were
mainly glass, which had to be
blacked out. We had to ensure we
had all the props in situ — though I
seem to remember someone
dashing off to the nearest John
Lewis to get the right white
tablecloth to check a wine’s colour

Soup
female wine writer, asked me to
write a book. I was cocky enough to
accept the challenge. The result was
a paperback in 1979, imaginatively
titled The Wine Book, published by
Fontana with an accompanying
in their homes to interact with
others while honing their palates
and learning a bit along the way.
The wine-themed private members
club 67 Pall Mall was one of the
earliest and most active organisers
against. This meant not just enough
glasses and wine paraphernalia but
a bevy of bottles stacked up on the
sideboard, some from my cellar,
some bought in.
The scope of the wines

of the
hardback by A&C Black. The
subtitle was “A Straightforward
Guide to Better Buying and
Drinking for Less Money”, which I
think would still appeal to many
wine drinkers. The book, long out
of such events. When it could no
longer welcome members
physically to its London premises, it
did its best to serve their needs,
depleting its cellar and providing
employment for the sommeliers
themselves was so much wider than
when I first attempted to teach
people about wine in 1979. As with
The Wine Book, my course begins
with the wine in your glass and how
to taste it. But when I look at the

gods
Patricia Niven
moron but makes perfect sense once
Cookery | A divinely simple chickpea-based dish you’ve tried it.
The next day the chickpeas are soft
golden orbs, meltingly tender, sus-
from Greece by Sarit Packer and Itamar Srulovich pended in a deeply flavourful broth so
tasty and comforting it will make a phil-
hellene of you too.
of print, was well reviewed.
Back then, the only way I could
communicate was in print. I’d
started a monthly newsletter,
daringly called Drinker’s Digest, in
1977. The Consumers’ Association
bought it in 1980 and turned it into
the annual The “Which?” Wine
Guide. That year I became wine
correspondent of The Sunday
Times.
But very soon another medium
was to become interested in wine
education: television. It would take
longer for wine to find its way on to
US screens, and in much of Europe
a series about wine would have
charged with filling and dispatching
these little bottles.
Most recently I’ve been involved
with a new form of education, the
complete online course. The BBC
has launched a series of them, on
subjects as diverse as dog training
“Wine Directory” section of The
Wine Book, I see that I allotted 47
pages to “The still, light wines of
France” and only 39 to “The still,
light wines of the rest of the world”.
Shocking! New Zealand was given
just five lines in which hybrids
were mentioned but not
Sauvignon Blanc.
Prosecco doesn’t even feature in
the index, although I did write:
“Prosecco is a fruity sparkling wine
that can be a bit stale on the nose.”
Interestingly, a little further down
the same page, I noted: “English
winemakers at Pilton Manor in
Somerset and Felstar in Essex are

T
o be philhellenic is to love
all things Greek, ancient
and modern. Our house-
hold is staunchly in this cat-
egory — we love the coun-
try, its people, the food.
It’s quite easy to like Greece in the
summer, with its breezy beaches and
beer, light-touch salads, grilled or fried
fish with just a squeeze of lemon. But
with snow dusting the Acropolis, we
crave a different kind of Greek experi-
Baked chickpea soup
Ingredients
Serves six
300g dried chickpeas, soaked overnight
in plenty of cold water
1 tsp baking powder
2 large onions, peeled and cut into
wedges
4 whole garlic cloves, peeled
Pinch of saffron
2 bay leaves
Pepper and parsley topping
3 tbs olive oil
1 red onion, peeled and finely diced
2 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
2 red peppers, deseeded and finely
diced
1 tbs harissa paste or other chilli sauce,
such as sriracha
Salt and pepper
Small bunch of parsley, leaves picked
and chopped
ence, one of log fires and pine forests
and proper “yaya” food.
This chickpea soup fits the bill. It is
inspired by a soup we had on the Cycla-
dic island of Sifnos, where it is a staple all
year round. Like so much Greek cook-
ery, it is wonderfully simple: just chick-
peas, onion, bay leaves and olive oil. The
secret is time, and plenty of it. The soup
is placed in a clay pot with a lid and left
in a low oven overnight — baked soup,
essentially, which sounds like an oxy-
Method
1. Strain the soaked chickpeas and re-
cover with fresh water. Add the baking
powder and bring to the boil, skimming
any foam that forms on the surface. Boil
for 10 minutes and then strain.
2. In a large oven-safe pot (traditionally
a clay pot with a lid), place the onion
wedges, garlic cloves, bay leaves and a
pinch of saffron. Add the chickpeas.
Pour boiling water over the top to cover
all the contents and close the lid.
3. Heat your oven to 150C (fan assist)
and put the pot in for two hours.
4. Remove and carefully check the
water level — it should still be covering
the chickpeas, but top it up if
necessary. Reduce the heat to 100C and
We add saffron to the broth, and con-
coct a little red pepper relish to go on
top. Both additions are untraditional
and possibly unnecessary since the soup
is entirely delicious on its own. But part
of the pleasure in admiring a culture
that isn’t yours is that you have a bit
of freedom.
This soup has a powerful gravitational
pull. Place it on your table, remove the
lid and watch them come. To quote Lord
Byron, the most famous philhellene of
all: “To have joy, one must share it.”
return the covered pot to the oven for a
further six to eight hours (we cook it
overnight) until the chickpeas are soft
and yielding.
5. To make the topping, heat the olive
oil in a small frying pan on a medium
low heat. Add the diced onion and
garlic slices with a pinch of salt and
sauté slowly for five minutes. Add the
diced pepper and sauté again for
another five minutes, before adding a
little more salt, the harissa paste and a
sprinkling of freshly ground black
pepper. Sauté for the last five minutes.
6. Remove from the heat and stir in the
chopped parsley. Scoop a couple of
ladles of soft chickpeas and some
cooking liquid into bowls, top each one
with the pepper relish, and serve.
been as unlikely as one on potatoes.
Yet the British had a thirst for wine
and also for learning about it.
On July 6 1982 the first episode of
Food and Drink aired on BBC2,
based on a pilot that featured me
and restaurant writer Fay Maschler.
By then, I had been lured away
from the project by a more
ambitious wine-inspired show, The
Wine Programme. It was an early
Channel 4 offering hosted by me
and filmed all over the world, with
a crew of a size unimaginable today
(two sound recordists, a hair and
make-up artist, a production
assistant, etc). The beauty of
putting wine on the small screen
was just that: we could show the
beauty of wine country. The
disadvantage of wine as a subject
for TV became swiftly apparent:
not much actually moves.
Cameramen would pounce on
bottling lines or barrel-makers
with relief.
Unlike cookery programmes,
little transformation takes place in
wine programmes. To see real
change, a crew would have to film
over several months as opposed to
minutes. All that really happens
with wine is talking and tasting —
and wine tasting is definitely not a
spectator sport, unless the audience
can somehow taste the same wines
that appear on screen. No wonder
then that subsequent TV
programmes have tended to
Leon Edler
(hosted by Steve Mann),
songwriting (Gary Barlow),
business success (Peter Jones),
writing children’s books (David
Walliams) and no fewer than five
cookery courses.
I was first approached by the
managing director of BBC Maestro,
Michael Levine, in June 2020, and
we decided to film that year’s
northern hemisphere grape harvest
in September. (One of the great
limitations on filming anything to
do with wine production is that it
happens only once a year.) The
pandemic put paid to that idea.
But we did manage to catch the
2021 harvest in Burgundy,
anxiously watching a weather
forecast that suggested the only
days the crew (much reduced from
the 1982 model) could manage
would coincide with clouds and
rain. In the end, we were blessed by
a rare period of bright sunshine and
I, for one, felt thoroughly infected
by the euphoria of the grape
harvest. There were picnic lunches,
songs, rippling muscles, the
pleasing rhythm of secateurs/
bucket/picking-bin/truck and the
scent of grape juice and carbon
dioxide in the cellars. Filming in the
vineyards of Morey-St-Denis, I
experimenting with the méthode
champenoise.” This was almost 10
years before vines went into the
ground at Nyetimber, the first
successful producer of an English
copy of champagne.
The wines featured in my course
include natural and orange wines
(of course), pet-nats (slightly
sparkling wines stoppered with a
crown cap), one of the new
Corpinnat Spanish fizzes, a New
Zealand Sauvignon Blanc (the
world’s most successful wine
export), Ridge’s Sonoma field blend
labelled Geyserville, wines in cans
and bottles made of paper and
recycled plastic. One of my most
pleasing finds, in my eco-inspired
attempt to convince wine drinkers
that top wines don’t necessarily
come in heavy bottles, was an
empty bottle of Ch Latour 1982 on
our sideboard that weighs only 565g
(as opposed to the bottle of
Provençal rosé Les Clans 2020 that
weighs almost a kilo — though the
producer Sacha Lichine swears he
will be mending his ways).
The course comprises nearly six
hours of screen time split into 25
lessons, as well as 40,000 words of
course notes put together with the
help of my fellow Master of Wine
Jane Skilton. That’s almost as long
as The Wine Book.
Follow Jancis on Twitter
@JancisRobinson

‘Though she be little, she is fierce’

Restaurants | Tim Hayward finds The Little Fish Market in Hove on England’s south coast moves him to quote Shakespeare — after he has mopped up the turbot in chicken butter

I
hate to sound mimsy about this,
but there’s no better way to
describe The Little Fish Market
than “adorable”. It’s hidden down a
weird little U-shaped lane of the
kind they probably have only in Hove,
built to service the grand houses on the
Avenues. As Queen Victoria might have
said: “We have a mews.” It is so small
you can see it only using a scanning elec-
tron microscope. It has, maybe, 20 place
settings, floor staff who are so charming
you want to adopt them and a chef who
does things with fish that might just stay
in your memory till you die.
Brighton is often described as “mere-
tricious” and neighbouring Hove as
“stately”, but who knew that the little
sister town is also absolutely buzzing?
On a pretty chilly February Thursday,
with a wind coming off the sea reminis-
cent of a bad night on the Murmansk
Run, dozens of small independents are
lit up, wide open and packed with
happy faces.
We started with a round of “snacks”,
as is the prevailing idiom. They were, in
reverse order of magnitude, a phenome-
nal seaweed crisp topped with chopped
raw prawn and dabs of creamy some-
thing, mini-eclairs piped full of a mack-
erel preparation and topped with a fluff
of grated cheese, and an egg . . . oh
God . . . the egg.
The chef brought it to the table and
told us he credited it to a chef he’d once
worked with, Martin Blunos, that mous-
tachioed Viking giant of West Country
cookery. Actually, as we found on fur-
ther probing, it was originally
descended from Alain Passard’s legen-
dary dish “Hot and Cold”. It’s a surgi-
cally trepanned egg, backfilled with a
purée of Jerusalem artichoke, a layer of
smoked haddock, topped with a set
cream “white” and a runny “yolk” made
of passion fruit.
Yeah . . . no . . . I get it. You’re think-
ing “runny egg, fish and fruit”, and
you’re totally missing the point. The
combination of what’s in effect a decon-
structed custard with hints of smoke
and citrus is probably the most beguil-
ing thing you’ll put in your mouth since
your mum first strapped you into a
highchair and taught you how to dip
Sea bream with bouillabaisse sauce and roasted scallop — Xavier Buendia/XDB Photography
your soldiers. It would have been “jaw-
dropping” if such a response wasn’t fun-
damentally prejudicial to eating.
“Brown shrimp” is the inadequate
menu rubric for a shrimp rarebit on a
small pikelet, which is, I promise, an
even better idea than you are currently
thinking.
“Trout” similarly cannot describe
sumptuous little chunks of cured fillet,
wrapped in seaweed and napped in a
velvet mackerel sauce spiked with
tobiko. Trout is a pretty dull fish, even
when it’s on the end of a line and fighting
back, but this effort to bring it to
resplendence is both heroic and devas-
tatingly successful.
A good-sized chunk of grilled turbot
will never be a bad thing, particularly
with leeks and micro-mushrooms in a
butter sauce. Unimprovable, you’d
probably think . . . until I whispered in
your ear, with full bass lasciviousness,
the words “chicken butter”. No, I’ve got
no idea what chicken butter is either,
but I do know it’s richer, deeper than
butter and an even more spectacular foil
to fish. Now I want chicken butter on
everything. I want to die of a surfeit of
chicken butter.
There was an extraordinarily good
pineapple tatin, which would have been
a pretty spectacular finale as a solo, but
in duet with a quenelle of particularly
feisty ginger ice cream rounded things
off like a chorus line, fireworks and a
glitter cannon. Meals, as Gregg Wallace
might opine to camera, do not get any
better than this.
Chef Duncan Ray has risen through
some impressive kitchens. A quiet, shy
chap devoid of cheffy bluster, he’s
served his time, developed a sure style
and unimpeachable craft skills. His is
phenomenal cooking. He deserves any
and every accolade we can hurl at him
and his small team.
Restaurant reviewing gives you too
few opportunities to quote the Bard, but
walking into the twinkling avenues of
Hove, as The Little Fish Market fades
behind me, one line creeps to mind:
“Though she be but little, she is fierce.”
Follow Tim on Twitter @TimHayward and
email him at tim.hayward@ft.com
20 ★ 19 February/20 February 2022

AI victories aren’t
just for machines
Leo Lewis
Fourth estate

Born in Istanbul in 1986, award-
SNAPSHOT winning photographer Sabiha Çimen
uses her work to shed light on under-
represented and misunderstood
‘Students driving aspects of Islamic culture. Using
medium format film, she spent three
bumper-cars, years photographing the students of
the Koran schools that she attended
2018’ by Sabiha during her youth.
In an act of devotion to the
Çimen teachings of Prophet Mohammed,
these students memorise the Koran’s
6,236 verses. The practice, hafiz, dates
back to a time when illiteracy was
widespread and hafizes were
considered the guardians of the holy
word.
Çimen explains that Hafiz, a
collection of images for which she
won a World Press Photo award in
2020, is her “tribute to these women”.
Snapped mid-conversation at a
funfair, the image here positions the
girls’ devotion alongside their youth
and playfulness.
‘Hafiz’ is published by Red Hook
Editions
S
hortly after letting down the
entire human race in
October, Takuma Miyazono
explained his defeat. The
artificial intelligence of his
opponent, said the vanquished world
champion of the auto-racing simulator
Gran Turismo, had been unexpectedly
aggressive. The AI driver, built by
engineers at Sony, had risked moves no
human would consider.
If Miyazono’s excuses sound familiar,
it is because they are. The past quarter-
century has been punctuated with
moments when some champion of
Homo sapiens has been forced to
concede — in the fields of draughts,
chess and Go — to the superior skills of
a machine. Always, there is the note of
astonishment at how innovatively the
AI has gone about securing victory.
But the crushing of Miyazono and
teammates, which was announced last
week by Sony to coincide with
publication of a report in Nature, is in a
subtly different category. For gamers
like me, it comes with far more
thrilling implications. While those
previous showdowns were staged on
game-boards that long predated the
machines brought in to humiliate us,
this was fought on something far closer
to the machines’ home turf.
Sony’s AI agent, known as GT Sophy,
was built to beat, via tens of thousands
of hours of learning, the world’s best
human competitors in a computer
game of extraordinary complexity but,
critically, stripped of trickery. Game
breathtakingly of all, panache.
I found this personally exciting
because of the way that I have always
played and thought about games
through my 40-year love affair with
them. Specifically, of the single-player
type where you are playing to beat the
software. Where others may have
satisfied themselves with the idea of an
impersonal conflict, I have always
imagined myself playing the games’
creators — the once mysterious (often
Japanese) names that flashed up in the
final credits. I picture these people, on
whose addictive altars I have sacrificed
thousands of hours, fuming that I had
slain their ghouls, cracked their puzzles
Instantly visible is just
how emotional and human
are the ‘machine’ sides of
these showdowns
or bested their left back. After meeting
many in person, I realise they are
actually delighted. Counter-intuitively,
even as games have become the
product of huge teams of developers, I
have always found the tendency to
humanise them intensified by the great
man-vs-machine showdowns.
When these defeats have been
covered as news events, the tone and
analysis has generally been alarmist:
critical human bastions are falling to a
relentlessly improving mechanical
enemy, and who knows what dystopia
mother in the audience. Almost 20
years later, cameras captured every last
wince of the 18-time world Go
champion Lee Sedol’s 2016 defeat by
Google’s AlphaGo program. His
protracted, endlessly rewatchable
descent into disbelief was lazily
packaged by some as a concession by
humanity that should unnerve us all.
But such interpretations are
undermined by a consistent feature of
these landmark moments: the flesh-
and-blood reactions of the engineers.
Instantly visible from live footage of
the programming teams during the
tournaments, and from several
excellent documentaries produced
subsequently, is just how supremely
emotional and human are the
“machine” sides of these man-vs-
machine showdowns.
Kasparov, Lee and now Miyazono
have taken on computers engineered,
programmed and coached by people
who have devoted decades to the
effort. Along the way, those engineers
have been consumed by
disappointment, frustration, tension,
self-doubt and a craving for victory
every bit as powerful as the demons
that propel grandmasters to greatness.
The joy for me is two-fold. Sophy’s
future algorithm offspring, Sony says,
will eventually populate more and
more games: when I play them, I will
now have very specific people in mind
as I engage with their creations. But
more glorious still is the psychological
step forward that this takes the

Naomi Campbell’s baby and makers have always been able to

overcome a human by cheating (they
it foreshadows? When Garry Kasparov
lost to IBM’s Deep Blue supercomputer
industry: to a place where gamers like
me can confront true champions,

the myths of the older parent

can just rig the opponent to be in 1997 the enduring image was of the rather than cheats.
impossibly faster or stronger): Sophy bewildered grandmaster rising from
had to outdrive the humans with only the table and, with the wound to pride Leo Lewis is the FT’s Asia business editor.
technique, risk assessment and, most too vast for words, shrugging at his Janan Ganesh is away

Jo Ellison
Trending

I
n a new documentary examining
the life of Charlie Chaplin, the
filmmakers explore the cultural
legacy of the actor who became a
global icon playing a little tramp.
As well as being a gifted vaudevillian
and mime artist, though given to
lachrymose sentimentality (I’ve always
been team Buster Keaton), he was also
an older parent.
Chaplin had his last child,
Christopher James Chaplin, in 1962,
more than 40 years after his first one.
Aged 73, he became the poster boy for
male virility and the patron saint of
late-season progenitors whose other
celebrity members include Michael
Douglas (58), Paul McCartney (61) and
Steve Martin, who became a first-time
father at 67. Mick Jagger became the
oldest celebrity father in 2016, when he
snatched Chaplin’s longstanding, albeit
unofficial, title. But Chaplin’s name is
still invoked by men as an example of
leave-it-till-later fatherhood.
That men aren’t forced to make life
choices based on their biological
make-up continues to be an awkward
argument from which there are often
unhappy outcomes. Women are
terrorised by the knowledge that their
fertility starts plummeting shortly after
they turn 30. Men are wont to spend
their early adulthood larking around
without the constraint of responsibility.
I am still haunted by words once
written by my colleague Janan Ganesh
about the joy of being in one’s thirties.
Life’s best decade, he argued, was
particularly fulfilling because you have
“more energy”, a “strenuous social life”
and could explore your “youthful
curiosity”. By contrast, I recall my
thirties as being the most physically
and mentally challenging: my social life
came to a standstill, my career stalled
and I spent my energy raising a baby.
While I’m cautious of flagging so
much heteronormative behaviour, it
seemed a good illustration of the
different attitudes men and women
traditionally have about ageing. For
many women, the awful, resounding
certainty of one’s declining fertility
puts hard roadblocks on one’s
ambitions. And while I’m not
suggesting that many young men aren’t
impatient to become fathers, it does
suggest that conversations about
partnerships, families and the future
often start from different standpoints.
As the birth age creeps ever older
(according to the Office for National
Statistics, 50.1 per cent of women born
in 1990 were childless at the time they
turned 30), so are the rates of
infertility. One in seven heterosexual
couples in the UK face fertility issues,
and the numbers are increasing.
Despite the advances in medical
technology, the results from fertility
treatments remain comparatively
Campbell will now
become a role model for
women who also want to
enjoy their thirties
dreadful. There’s an appalling lack of
transparency around the success of IVF
treatment (only 8 per cent if you’re
more than 40), while women using
their own frozen eggs have an average
success rate of only 18 per cent.
Few people like to talk about this,
however, because it sounds so critical
and doomy. No one wants to tell the
friend going in for their fifth round of
IVF at the age of 39 that the chances
of conception are very slim. And
neither, maddeningly, do the private
practices offering such treatments,
because they’re making far too much
money. Instead, we lean towards
optimism when talking about having
babies because we’re not total
monsters and the truth is too
unpalatable. We talk of miracle births
and wonderful surprises and then
deify older mothers.
This week, for example, finds
Naomi Campbell, 51, on the cover of
Vogue looking beatific with her nine-
month-old daughter. “I always knew
one day I would have a child”,
announces the headline, alongside the
words “Mother figure”.
Details of the birth remain unknown,
except for Campbell’s assertion that the
baby “wasn’t adopted”. The model,
who undertakes the interview on board
a plane from Qatar, says her child is “a
good girl”, who “sleeps very well” and
is perfectly accustomed to dealing with
Campbell’s international schedule. She
doesn’t discuss the baby’s name. She
also demurs on the subject of her
daughter’s father. She is currently
writing a book that might tell us more,
but Naomi’s baby is Naomi’s business.
In many ways, Campbell’s
experience of motherhood will be seen
as a feminist vindication: she’s had a
baby, on her terms, when she’s ready,
and in defiance of medical convention.
She’s also indicative of a growing
number of women (and men) who are
choosing to be single parents from the
point of conception.
Just as Chaplin has spared men from
the exigencies of long-term
commitment, Campbell will now
become a role model for women who
also want to enjoy their thirties, partake
in strenuous socialising and sate their
youthful curiosity. Science may become
so advanced that 51-year-old mothers
become quite normal. But I can’t help
feeling the story feeds into a broader
and sometimes dangerous narrative in
which people think motherhood can
happen to anyone. Every baby is a
miracle, but increasingly the journey to
have one is painfully expensive and
emotionally brutal.
Email Jo at jo.ellison@ft.com

Are you listening to the FT Weekend podcast?

This week, we’re thrilled to have
FT Weekend editor Alec Russell
bring us to Albania for Lunch with
the FT. He sits down with writer
Lea Ypi, whose memoir Free
documents her childhood in
Albania during the collapse of
communism. Over an array of fish
and crisp white wine, they discuss
whether any political system can
make you truly free. Plus:
European technology
correspondent Madhumita Murgia
on how science fiction shapes our
attitudes towards the future.
Listen wherever you get your
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Chess solution 2457 1 Bb5! Resigns. If Bxb5 2 Qxd8 mate, or Qxb5 2 Nd6+ wins the queen, or 0-0 2 Bxd7 with a rook up.
Saturday 19 February / Sunday 20 February 2022
Art house Properties for sale with a creative connection — HOT PROPERTY PAGE 6
The home of prime property: propertylistings.ft.com
Poetry in
patchwork
From Alabama to Wales, quilting is admired for its
capacity to tell stories — and now it is fetching big
money at auction too. Caroline Roux reports
O
n a Friday afternoon at
City Lit, an adult education
institute near London’s
Covent Garden, a group of
women are seated at work-
benches covered with fabrics and boxes
of sewing accessories from cotton reels
(Main image) to tape measures. Under the guidance of
quilt design by Beverley Sell, the women are learning to
Jessica Ogden make contemporary quilts.
for fashion Sell says the course has been incredi-
house APC. bly popular. “People come for lots of
reasons, but mostly because they love
(Right) Jen fabric, and the satisfaction of making
Jones, a quilt something that grows.” Sell’s current
specialist based students include a former investment
in Wales banker, the head of a plumbing
company, and a woman who tells me she
has started mining charity shops for fab-
rics and garments in order to feed her
new passion.
Since the start of the pandemic, there
has been a renewed enthusiasm for
handicrafts, as amateur makers seek
non-digital pursuits. Quilting, admired
for both its artistry and its capacity to
tell stories from marginalised commu-
nities, is having something of a moment.
At auction, patchworks and quilts have
been selling for sums that far outstrip
their estimates.
At the end of October last year, a
patchwork quilt by Rosie Lee Tompkins
(1936-2006) was sold at Bonhams in Los
Angeles for nearly $88,000 (with fees).
Measuring one metre by 1.5 metres, and
made up of irregular patches of velvet
and other fabrics with a dramatic black
edge, it had been made in 1992 with the
assistance of quilter Irene Bankhead.
It had carried an estimate of $8,000. A
further three, with estimates of
$3,000-$5,000, fetched between
$35,000 and $44,000. “We knew there
was interest, but we didn’t know a price
point,” says specialist David Trujillo,
who ran the sale. Now, he does.
Rosie Lee Tompkins was born Effie
Mae Martin to a sharecropping family in
Arkansas, and began to earn a living
exclusively from quilting in her fifties.
By this time, she had settled in the Bay
Area, having moved to Milwaukee and
to Chicago, as part of the Great Migra-
tion. “Her story has a filmic quality,”
says Trujillo, “and she is also part of a
wider artistic community whose stories
haven’t been told.”
The growing interest in her work is
part of the art world’s re-evaluation of
domestic craft. Weaving, sewing and
embroidery have gradually been inte-
grated into the realms of fine art, accru-
ing intellectual (as well as economic)
heft on the way. But it is also down to
long overdue respect being paid, in the
US, to work made by women from the
African-American and Native American
communities, as well as peoples from
Central and South America.
Faith Ringgold, whose story quilts
describe the racism and misogyny she
experienced growing up in Harlem, is at
the age of 91 having her first full retro-
spective at New York’s New Museum.
“It goes to show how narrow the art
Created out of minimal
materials, the Gee’s Bend
quilts are now frequently
compared to modern art
world was, and how it is slowly becom-
ing more open and balanced,” says Ali-
son Jacques, who runs a contemporary
art gallery in London, where she has
sold the work of the increasingly
admired Gee’s Bend quilters since 2020.
At Gee’s Bend, a small, cut-off com-
munity in Alabama, many generations
of descendants of once enslaved women
have developed extraordinary skills.
The patchwork covers they created out
of minimal materials — initially for
warmth — now get compared to modern
art; to the abstract works of Paul Klee in
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their compositional complexity; or the
cutouts of Matisse in their dazzling use
of colours and shapes. “There is a strong
sense of a collective past, of binding
threads passing through the genera-
tions,” says Jacques. “But they are also
innovative and experimental.”
The Gee’s Bend quilts, dating from the
early 1900s to the present day, sell for
up to $50,000, with percentages of prof-
its going back to the community — a
non-profit organisation was established
in 2010 after some quilters complained
of being exploited by white art dealers.
Now, Jacques says that while she
ensures that at least half of the quilts go
to museums, others end up in private
collections in the US and Europe.
“I know a couple are in Ibiza,” she says.
Tony Freund, editorial director at
1stDibs, an ecommerce site that special-
ises in luxury decorative arts, says
orders for quilts have increased 25 per
cent year-on-year. “It goes along with a
general interest in the hand of the
maker, and in things that are unique,”
he says. “Now we’re seeing ceramics
placed artfully in corners of rooms
where once there might have been a fig-
urative sculpture, and being elevated in
value. The same is starting to happen
with textiles. They have so much per-
sonality and visual presence — they can
have as much presence as a painting
hanging on a wall.”
Quilting is focused on technique: two
layers of fabric enclose a carded interior
of cotton or wool — though quilts have
been discovered from impoverished
communities filled with paper, or the
remnants of coats. But quilts, especially
patchwork, can be rich in meaning too:
they are the creation of one thing out of
another. One of Beverley Sells’ previous
students brought in her father’s old
police shirts to create a quilt.
British artist Tracey Emin used to
make quilts from her own old clothes,
when she ran out, she started asking her
friends for cast-offs. “At the beginning, I
sewed everything myself,” Emin says.
“Later, I had help, and we would sit in a
circle on beanbags, chatting and gig-
gling. It was always light and enjoyable.”
This in spite of the personal events being
played out across the work: rape,
Continued on page 2
2 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

House Home
The privilege of
I
f it had happened in the country with one of the “the flat above the shop”, it is really the
19th century, I like to highest inheritance taxes. handing-down of the family firm.

passing on the
think the news would In the US, estate tax There’s been a realignment of
have been heralded by a applies only to the seriously property in the past 100 years — the
trumpet. But it is 2022, wealthy — but in Europe grand landowners losing their grip, the

family home and it was the UK’s top-

selling tabloid, The Daily
Mail, that made it front-page
news. When Prince Charles
becomes king, it reports, he
will move into Buckingham
Palace. The Cambridges will
potentially move to
Windsor, and Clarence
House will be reassigned. A
veritable merry-go-round.
We mere subjects will only look on
in awe when the royal family’s removal
vans grunt into action, marvelling not
just at the handover of power but at the
ability of one family to hold on to its
historic property. The average Joe
would barely consider having a
birthright to his mother’s palace. But
with a boomerang generation, is it such
an oddity?
The family home holds many of us
in thrall. It is your first place of security
and where your family legend is
created. The upwardly mobile may
look back with fondness at their
parents’ house, yet also think: thank
goodness we don’t have to live there.
For the downwardly mobile, there’s a
nostalgia attached to this lost legacy. I
Joy Lo Dico have a friend, now living deep in the
suburbs, who passes a suave house
near Hyde Park and mentions that it
Perspectives was once the family’s London residence
— half with pride, half with a
recognition of all that status and wealth
dissipated over the generations.
A more modest (fictional) house is
lost in Giovanni Verga’s I Malavoglia
or The House by the Medlar Tree. In a
coastal town in Sicily, it slips from the
family’s grip through natural
misfortunes (a fishing boat lost in a
storm), human ones (taxes) and the
general attrition of life.
Since I read it as a teenager, I have
walked through life observing others
caught up in their family history. At its
most brutal, it is siblings arguing over
who gets it and who can afford it.
And that perhaps is why I was struck
by that Daily Mail front page about the
rotation of the royals and by the
unreality of it. What was fantastical
was that a family had retained all its
territories against the ravages of time,
that it still had it in its gift to dole out
palaces. And that was in part because
of legislation in their favour. And in a
death duties are a means of
shuffling the pack, cutting
that umbilical cord to the
old family house.
The UK and Ireland have
among the highest flat-rate
inheritance taxes, charged
at 40 per cent and 33 per
cent above certain
thresholds — though tax
reliefs apply. In Spain there’s
one specific scenario of bequeathing
something of value to an already rich
person that is taxed at 81.6 per cent.
The higher the value of the property,
the steeper the taxes it attracts — and
the more likely that inheritance tax
planners will be called in to find ways
to soften the blow.
The Queen is exempt from
inheritance taxes when handing on to
her heir, so the estimated value of
Buckingham Palace at £3.6bn might
add up to £1.4bn in taxes forgone.
Though UK parents can pool their
allowances to pass on a property worth
up to £1mn to their children IHT free,
the closest situation to the Queen’s that I
can think of is council house tenancy,
where you have the right to pass it on to
an heir regardless of value. But, in the
majority of cases, only once. And there
are no footmen.
Then again, if the palace is — as
Prince Charles so charmingly calls it —
A third of single
people in their early
thirties in the UK
live in their parents’
home, according to
a recent study
(Main image) Princess
Anne’s christening at
Buckingham Palace;
(above) the residence seen
from St James’s Park
Corbis/Getty; I-Wei Huang/Alamy
lure of the cities breaking up families,
the increase in ownership and
rocketing house prices, the taxes — but
there’s also been a return to the
concept of a longstanding family home.
In the UK, a third of single people in
their early thirties were living in the
family home, according to a recent
study by Loughborough University.
They had eschewed the struggle to get
their own place in favour of something
more comfortable. In the US, in 2020
during the pandemic, half of 18- to 29-
year-olds lived with a parent, according
to Pew Research. Even pre-pandemic,
in 2019, it was still 47 per cent.
While the reasons for staying in the
parental home might be both positive
(assuredly good cups of tea) and
negative (an inability to afford rent), it
means the tie to one home is
deepening. And when it comes to
inheritance, it is less likely to be lost if
you are sitting on the sofa, immovable
and determined to carry it on.
For those who’ve moved on, the idea
of a return to the parental nest seems
strange. But if already there, it may
conversely seem rather like a more
natural course of events.
Perhaps Buckingham Palace is closer
to a council house than we think.
Follow Joy @joy_lo_dico
Luke Edward Hall returns on February 26

Inside Poetry in
patchwork
Continued from page 1

abortion, abuse, heartbreak. Emin

stopped making her “blankets”, as she
calls them, in 2006. “I was told by a
dealer that if I cut out the swearing and
toned down the subjects, there was a
Bel Air to Mayfair stream of collectors waiting,” she tells
Five homes for sale with links to me. “I said I’d rather set myself alight
art, past and present and I never made another one.” She gave
Page 6 her final example to an auction for the
Elton John Aids Foundation.
Around the world, quilts have been
made on a huge scale to commemorate
those who have died of Aids, while the
War Widows quilt was created in the UK
in 2019 by 90 women who had lost their
husbands in combat as a way to elabo-
rate individual stories of grief and love.
Aleta Bartel-Orton, a Canadian fabric
specialist based in London, sells exam-
ples made by Brigitte Singh, a French
textile designer who settled in Jaipur in
For peat’s sake . . . the 1980s. In her home and workshop
How and why gardeners can help just outside the city, both run to strict
save the planet’s carbon sinks environmental standards (dyes can be
Page 8 notoriously toxic) Singh creates hand
woodblock printed fabrics with pat-
terns derived from years of research
into Moghul motifs. “There is an ancient
tradition of quilting here, throughout
the Gangetic belt,” says Singh. “It was a
way to keep warm, and to mend cloth
and make it stronger and last longer.”
Using both traditional Indian stitching
and the French pique technique (the lat-
ter a dense style which creates a flatter
surface), Singh’s output is slow — added
to which she prints only 30-40 metres of
cloth a day, to use across all her textile
accessories and linens.
“My customers keep their eyes peeled
Pottery perfection on my Instagram account [@aletafab-
The V&A showcases ceramics rics] for a new piece from Brigitte,
by the late Richard Batterham which range from £420 to £800,” says
Page 10 Bartel-Orton, “and they get snapped up
as soon as they appear.”
For more than 10 years, Jessica Ogden
has been creating patchwork quilts for
French fashion house APC. “We’re on
round 21, which coincides with the
spring/summer 2022 collection,” she
says. “This time there are references to
Mayan temples, but it varies for each
round. I think of them like geometric
paintings.” One series was entirely made
up of zigzagging strips; another was
exclusively in red and white fabrics.
Ogden trained as an artist before
Come together becoming a fashion designer known for
Working with young people to creating high-end clothing from old
build more welcoming spaces patchwork, and often paints out the ini-
Pages 12 & 13 tial designs on paper. “I don’t use a com-
puter at all,” she says. “Though friends
tell me it would be easier.” Ogden, who
has lived in London and Paris, but is now
in her native Jamaica, was approached
by APC’s founder Jean Touitou in 2010
to do something with the end rolls of
fabrics he had accumulated over more
than 30 years in the business. “He had
never sold a scrap,” says Ogden. “He is
passionate about textiles and it was a
candy store of fabric.”
This vast resource was shipped out to
India, where a local man who had been
trained by an American quilter in Chen-
nai, started to output Ogden’s designs.
“We’ve worked with him ever since,”
says Ogden. “I have swatches here, and
he has all the fabrics, and it’s a constant
mathematical conundrum: if I only
have five metres what can I do with it?”
The designs are limited editions, and
there are never more than 50 of each.
(Clockwise from
main) Jen Jones’ While prices are increasing, quilts are
s quilt shop in still a long way from commanding the
Wales; detail sort of money associated with works of
from the Aids fine art. Amish quilts in the US can fetch
memorial quilt; about $60,000, but outside the US it’s
Gee’s Bend unusual to see these sorts of sums.
quilters at work Jen Jones, a New Englander who set-
in 1936; a quilt tled in Wales in 1971, discovered the
by Rosie Lee beauty of the local quilts shortly after
Tompkins that she arrived. “In those days, they weren’t
fetched nearly even going to auction. They were being
$88,000 at thrown away,” she says. Though flannel
Bonhams quilts from the 1930s could fetch around
Arthur Rothstein
£20,000 a piece, Jones recently sold a
19th-century patchwork — “it had a big
red star in the middle, surrounded by
little Victorian prints” — for £1,700. In
2016, Jones received a royal warrant,
after providing classic Welsh quilts to
the Prince of Wales for his country home
in Carmarthenshire. (The prince pre-
sided over the opening of her Welsh
Quilt Centre in Lampeter in 2010, and a
new exhibition of 40 patchworks, called
The Magical Quilts of Wales, will open
there on March 19.)
Jones describes the wholecloth quilts,
made from a single piece of fabric
stitched with patterns of leaves and
flowers unique to the sewer, as those
demanding the highest level of craft.
‘No needlework shall be
admitted’ for its Summer
Exhibition, London’s Royal
Academy decreed in 1770
She concedes, however, “that people
like patchwork. It’s more exciting in
some ways.”
Back at City Lit, Beverley Sell is teach-
ing her students to work with triangles
— they provide a pattern with more
energy and movement. Her next course
will focus on curves and circles. I ask one
student why she decided to take up
quilting. “I already do weekly pottery,”
she says. “But then I saw a striped quilt
in last year’s Summer Exhibition at the
Royal Academy in London, and it
inspired me to come here.”
The quilt in question — a dazzling
“Housetop” pattern by Sally Mae Pett-
way Mixon, part of the Gee’s Bend com-
munity — had been selected by Yinka
Shonibare, the artist who curated the
2021 iteration of the yearly show.
But its inclusion in the exhibition in
the first place shows how far the appre-
ciation of craft has come. In 1770, a year
after the Royal Academy established its
annual summer show, it decreed that
“no needlework, flowers, cut paper,
shell-work or any such baubles shall
be admitted”.
Shonibare, an artist who uses textiles
and clothing for their political connota-
tions as much as their aesthetic values,
has certainly put paid to that.

The Darwin diary
Charles’s father kept a record that
is still relevant to gardeners
Page 14
House & Home Unlocked
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50 OBJECTS
FROM AROUND
THE WORLD
#17: Freud’s porcupine
Sigmund Freud was not just a pioneer
of psychoanalysis — he was also an
early adopter of working from home.
So attached was he to his felt-topped
desk, laden with antiquities and his
beloved cigars, that he transported it
from Vienna to London when he and
his family fled the Nazis in 1938. Freud
would contemplate these artefacts as
he listened to the outpourings of his
patients on the famous couch nearby.
They were his “tools of thought, the
kitchen utensils of his imagination”,
according to historian Marina Warner.
One of the more unusual pieces,
resident on the desk since 1909, is
this small metal porcupine (pictured).
Like most things Freudian, it contains
hidden meaning.
In 1909, Freud was preparing for his
only trip to the US, where he would
unleash his startling theories about
dreams, the subconscious and
sexuality in a series of lectures at
Clark University, Massachusetts. He
could not have guessed how widely
practised psychoanalysis would one
day be in America — Mia Farrow once
said Woody Allen had to consult his
shrink about changing his sheets from
polyester to cotton — and Freud
worried how his radical ideas might be
received by prudish Americans.
He told puzzled colleagues that he
was going “to catch sight of
a wild porcupine and
to give some
lectures”. He
elaborated:
“Whenever
you have
some large
objective in
mind, it’s always good to
identify a secondary, less demanding
goal on which to focus your attentions
in order to detract from the anxiety.”
The figure was symbolically
charged for another reason. German
philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer
had used the porcupine as a
metaphor to describe the challenges
of human intimacy. Its sharp quills
encapsulated what Freud called
the “sediment of feelings of
aversion and hostility”
inherent in any long-
lasting relationship.
It was given to
Freud by neurologist
James Jackson
Putnam as a memento
of his trip. Freud put the
porcupine in pride of place on his
desk, “perhaps as some kind of prickly,
hybrid muse”, wrote George Prochnik,
Putnam’s great-grandson.
The porcupine also represents
Freud’s ambivalence about America.
He lamented everything from the lack
of culture to the dearth of public
toilets, the uninspiring food and the
brash commercialism. Despite
enjoying visits to New York, Niagara
Falls and the Adirondack Mountains,
where he finally spotted a porcupine
— albeit a dead one — he later
pronounced, “America is a mistake,
a gigantic mistake.”
Rosalind Sykes
freud.org.uk
19 February/20 February 2022
London property An 85-
hectare green space — plus
the allure of ‘village’ life —
is pushing up prices in
Clapham. By Liz Rowlinson
L
ooking for a base from which
to enjoy trips to the theatre
and art galleries, Katie Tur-
rell, 56, and her husband
Atholl have just moved from
Buckinghamshire to Clapham in south-
west London. Although the area is more
typically associated with university
leavers sharing their first home, or
young families, the downsizing couple
bought a four-bedroom house near
“Abbeville Village”, a cluster of streets
with independent shops and cafés, and
love how well-connected their new
home is to central London.
“We started off looking in Islington,
then realised our money would go fur-
ther south of the river,” says Turrell,
who’s newly retired and lived in west
London’s Brook Green 30 years ago.
“Our three children [in their twenties]
suggested Hackney, Dalston or Stock-
well, but we found these a bit edgy.”
Because Clapham is only 20-30 min-
utes on the Tube from the West End,
Turrell says they don’t have to dash out
of the opera to get the last train home
any more. “Our new neighbours on both
sides are older couples,” she adds.
“Although I do feel we need either a dog
or a baby to be more Clapham.”
Demand for properties around the 85-
hectare Clapham Common and its vil-
lage hubs has meant that property
prices have increased more than in sur-
rounding areas.
Uncommon appeal
(Clockwise from main)
Clapham Common has 85
hectares of green space;
the common’s bandstand;
Macaulay Road — Charlie Bibby, FT
★ FTWeekend
In the past two years, the average
property price in Clapham’s SW4 post-
code — the streets around Clapham
Junction fall into Battersea’s SW11 post-
code — has increased 13 per cent to
£850,180, according to estate agency
Hamptons using Land Registry data.
Over the same period, Battersea, to
the north-west, has risen 7 per cent to
£863,460, and Brixton, to the east, has
risen 8 per cent to £598,020. In the past
12 months, the disparity is even clearer:
prices in Clapham are up 2.2 per cent,
while in Battersea and Brixton they’re
down -6.2 per cent and -1.4 per cent
respectively.
“Buyers of flats and houses have been
prioritising green space and village
neighbourhoods,” says Kesha Foss-
Smith of estate agent John D Wood.
Being near to the area’s “villages” —
which as well as Abbeville, include
“Clapham Old Town” and the busy
shopping hub of Northcote Road, just
over the border in Battersea — is now
often as important as being close to one
of the area’s Overground or Under-
ground stations, agents say. (Clapham’s
three Northern line Tube stations are
notoriously crowded during rush hour
— a trend that has resumed after the
pandemic hiatus.)
Many younger buyers are helped on
to the ladder by wealthy parents — with
some choosing to buy a place for their
children and continue renting it out
when they move out. “It’s perceived as a
fun [ . . . ] and convenient place by par-
ents helping children on to the housing
market,” says Bradley Slade of agent
Winkworth.
It is a market that is mostly made up
of flats — predominantly Victorian
Smaller apartments in the
£300,000-£600,000 price
bracket are the least ‘hot’
tranche of the market
houses converted into two or three
apartments, rather than new-build
schemes. Last year, 71 per cent of the
properties sold in Clapham were flats, a
figure more or less consistent for the
past two decades, despite the pandemic,
which has squashed demand for flats in
3
House Home
LONDON
Clapham Clapham
Clapham
Junction Old Town North
Clapham
Clapham
Common
Common
CLAPHAM
Abbeville
Northcote Clapham Road
Road
South
©Mapcreator.io/©HERE
1 km
other parts of the capital. Prices are
roughly in line with where they were
five or six years ago, according to Hamp-
tons. One-bedroom apartments with no
outside space in the more affordable
areas around Clapham North and Clap-
ham South start at about £400,000,
with two-bedroom flats starting at
about £550,000. In the desirable pock-
ets around Clapham Common and Old
Town, prices are higher: two-bedroom
garden flats cost upwards of £750,000.
A three-bedroom split-level flat with a
large garden in the Old Town sold for
£1.45mn last year, Slade says.
But some apartments are struggling
to find buyers. According to the data
company PropCast, properties for sale
in the £300,000-£600,000 bracket —
which in Clapham will be smaller flats —
are the least “hot” tranche of the mar-
ket. Currently, 41 per cent of available
homes are under offer, compared with
54 per cent of £1mn-£2mn priced
homes and 61 per cent of properties
priced above £2mn. A search on Zoopla
shows that many flats for sale in the
SW4 postcode area have already had
their prices cut by 5-10 per cent.
Tara Cooper, who co-bought a three-
bedroom flat off Battersea Rise with her
brother seven years ago, says Clapham
is still popular with recent graduates.
“It’s vibrant, easy to get to and it’s more
affordable than Fulham and Parsons
Green,” says the 28-year-old, who
works in the tech sector and now shares
that flat with her husband. “But it could
do with a good gym that’s not a high
street chain.”
Many who come straight from univer-
sity will be renters, and prices have risen
sharply in recent months after taking a
sharp dip in 2020. While there are
cheaper areas, renting a two-bedroom
Continued on page 4
4 ★
House Home
i / BUYING GUIDE
There are three Underground stations
on the Northern line in the area, and two
Overground stations: Clapham High
Street and Clapham Junction.
Clapham is mainly in the London borough
of Lambeth, with parts in Wandsworth.
The annual average Band D council taxes
are £1,591.59 and £839.10 respectively
Along with a range of independent
primary and prep schools, Ofsted
Outstanding-rated state primaries
include Belleville, Honeywell, Clapham
Manor, St Mary’s RC and Macaulay CofE.
Continued from page 3
garden flat around Abbeville Road or
the Old Town might cost £2,700-£2,800
in rent per month, up about 10-15 per
cent since before the pandemic, says
Sebastian Turk, lettings manager at
Marsh & Parsons.
Demand has come largely from
house-sharing professionals who have
returned after spending the pandemic
‘A top-floor two-bedroom
flat was listed for £2,015 a
month rent — but has gone
for monthly rent of £2,350’
at their parents’ homes, and from rent-
ers moving over from Canary Wharf and
Fulham for more space if they are flexi-
working. “Currently, most properties
are going for best and final offers,” says
Turk. “Even a two-bedroom top-floor
Victorian conversion flat without any
outdoor space [off the High Street]
listed for £2,015 a month went for
£2,350 last week.”
Young families often gravitate
towards Battersea and the Northcote
Road area — long dubbed “Nappy Val-
ley” — for the good state and independ-
ent schools.
In the catchment area for one of
the state primary schools, four-
bedroom Victorian terraced houses cost
about £1.8mn, compared with typically
£1.6mn outside the area, suggests
Foss-Smith.
The average price of a house in
Clapham has increased by 12 per cent
over the past two years to £1.516mn,
according to Hamptons. Now nearly
(Above) outside the cinema on Venn Street, Clapham Old Town; (below) upmarket butcher The Ginger Pig on a corner of Abbeville Road — Charlie Bibby, FT
one in four homes in the area sells for
over £1mn. At the top end of the
market, larger properties in the Old
Town — a mix of Georgian and early
Victorian houses — can top £3mn. In
the Old Town’s Grafton Square — devel-
oped in 1851 as a garden square with
grand terraces on two sides — a four-
bedroom, 2,817 sq ft end-of-terrace
Property prices climb
in Clapham
Average price (£mn)
Clapham
Battersea
Brixton
2000 05 10 15
Sources: Hamptons; Land Registry
FTWeekend
house is on sale at £3.5mn. Other prime for 25 years — it’s a much less transient
streets are Orlando Road, The Chase area than Fulham [for example],” says
and Macaulay Road. Alex Woodleigh-Smith of buying agents
On the latter, a detached 5,000 sq ft AWS Prime.
house sold for £6.75mn in 2020, bought About 200 years ago, one of the larg-
by a (relatively rare) international est houses in the neighbourhood was
buyer with children at school in the built in Clarence Road by the master
area. “These houses don’t come up very builder and developer of Belgravia, Tho-
often, as people tend to hang on to them mas Cubitt, for his own family. Cubitt
also planned a smart suburb of
detached Italianate villas for City of
London merchants on the 229-acre
Clapham Park Estate, but it was never
completed and in the 1950s Lambeth
council knocked down what houses
1.0
were left to make way for council flats.
0.8 Cubitt’s 22-acre estate was demolished
0.6 in 1905.
Katie Turrell lives only a couple of
0.4
roads away, and enjoys discovering the
0.2 area’s history on her daily walks and for-
0 ays into its “hipster” fringes, with or
without her children. “Clapham has
21
made us fall in love with London all over
again,” she says.
19 February/20 February 2022
PROPERTIES
FOR SALE
CLAPHAM
B Two-bedroom apartment, £700,000
An 80-sq m apartment on the upper floor
of a period building on Macaulay Road
close to Clapham Old Town in SW4. The
property is in a well-preserved period
building with plenty of natural light,
though without outside space. On sale
with Savills.
B Three-bedroom terraced house,
offers in excess of £1.55mn
A three-bedroom, two-bathroom house
on Fitzwilliam Road with planning
permission for a rear extension.
Measuring 157 sq m, the property is
located in Clapham Old Town, and is on
sale with Hamptons.
B Five-bedroom house, £2.85mn
A five-bedroom, double-fronted Victorian
house on Rodenhurst Road, near the
sought-after “Abbeville village”, near the
south side of Clapham Common. The
property, which measures 260 sq m, has a
garden room. It is on sale with estate
agents John D Wood & Co.
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 5
6 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

House Home

Hot property K Mayfair, London, £19.75mn overlooked by a mezzanine

drawing room. An additional chef’s

Artistic leanings
Where On Bourdon Street in the
Mayfair district. It’s 10 minutes’
walk to Oxford Circus and about 15
minutes to Hyde Park. Heathrow
airport is a 45-minute drive.
What A six-bedroom, six-bathroom
house with more than 5,780 sq ft
By Madeleine Pollard of living space over four floors.
Highlights include a glass lift and
a double-height atrium, which is
kitchen can cater for parties, and
the lower ground floor houses a
10m pool, a steam room and a gym.
Why The property was once home
to Terence Donovan, the
photographer who, during the
Swinging Sixties, captured famous
faces including Jimi Hendrix,
Monica Vitti and Jean Shrimpton.
Who Knight Frank

I Bel Air, Los Angeles, US,

$87,777,777

Where On Sarbonne Road in

Bel Air, a neighbourhood in the
foothills of the Santa Monica
Mountains. LAX is about 30
minutes away by car.
What Spread between a main
home and a guest house on just
over an acre of grounds, this
property has seven bedrooms, 11
bathrooms, a cinema, wine cellar,
bar, seven-car garage, infinity pool
and spa. Its location allows for
panoramic views that stretch from
the San Gabriel Mountains to the
Californian Channel Islands.
Why Available to purchase
alongside this mansion is an art
collection, which includes a Non-
B Paris, France, €6.9mn of 7 metres. In the basement there
is a sauna and a guest bedroom.
Fungible Token (NFT) art gallery,
Where On Rue de Lille in the 7th Why The property’s impressive
as well as physical works by
arrondissement, moments from the spiral staircase was designed by
contemporary Californian artists
Seine. Paris Charles de Gaulle contemporary interdisciplinary
Andy Moses, Shane Guffogg and
airport is about an hour’s drive. artist Jean-Michel Othoniel, who
Jimi Gleason, among others.
What A 350 sq m hôtel particulier, works across drawing, sculpture,
Who The Agency / Savills
dating from 1823. Renovated in installation and photography.
a contemporary style, it features The property is right next to the
three en suite bedrooms, a study, Musée d’Orsay.
drawing room and a reception- Who Christie’s International
cum-living area with ceiling height Real Estate

K Genova, Liguria, Italy, €2.08mn K Long Island, New York, US,

$4.75mn
Where In Arenzano on the Ligurian
coast. It’s about five minutes to the Where In the village of Old
sea on foot. Genova City airport is Westbury on Long Island’s North
a half-hour drive, and Milan Shore. Manhattan is about an hour
Malpensa just over two hours. by car, JFK airport half an hour.
What A six-bedroom, six-bathroom What Set on 6.5 acres, this five-bed
villa, with 750 sq m of living space Palladian-style home is centred
arranged over three levels. Each around a converted art studio
floor has independent access to under a vast skylight. A tunnel
the outdoors. Surrounded by links it to a caretaker’s cottage.
terraces, a water garden and olive Why Designed by Beaux-Arts
groves, the house is built around a architects Delano & Aldrich in 1912,
large millenary olive tree. the studio was the creative hub of
Why This artful property was built sculptor Gertrude Vanderbilt
in the 1960s by Milanese designer Whitney, who founded the Whitney
and architect Marco Zanuso. Museum of American Art.
Who Knight Frank Who Douglas Elliman
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 7
8 ★
House Home
For peat’s
sake . . .
Jonathan Guthrie
Nature therapy
Bringing out the best in
your plants needn’t involve
degrading essential carbon
sinks — and don’t forget the
value of earthworms
A
few years ago, I was tired
and heartsore. A close
relative had died and I got
no pleasure from my work
or pastimes. I packed a
rucksack and hiked on to a remote
promontory in Scotland to camp out
for a week.
The weather was dry and I easily
crossed the pristine bog that sprawled
between the shoreline and the
mountains. For thousands of years the
sphagnum moss had grown there,
trapping carbon in every successive
layer. Peatlands store twice as much of
the stuff as all the world’s forests.
As well as a carbon sink, this was a
place of wild beauty. A golden plover
challenged me as I crossed its territory.
Later, a snipe soared and dipped in its
display flight, tail feathers thrumming,
above a tumbledown cottage over
which roses scrambled.
The way back was harder. It had
rained for two days and the bog had
swelled like a giant sponge. I skirted
the spots where the surface water
submerged the sphagnum fronds. Even
FTWeekend
so, I kept sinking up to my knees in the
mire. It was a sharp reminder that bogs
are liminal places between land and
water — and between life and death.
Some archaeologists believe that
ancient people consigned sacrifices to
them, including human ones.
Luckily, I avoided mummification of
With bogs, as with so
the kind that preserved the Grauballe much of nature, we are
man. The great Irish poet Seamus destroying the legacy
Heaney described this prehistoric Dane
with humane tenderness: “The grain of of millennia within
his wrists like bog oak . . . A head and our own lifetimes
shoulder out of the peat, bruised like a
forceps baby.”
Instead, reeking of bog ooze and
wood smoke, I returned to blight
civilisation, in this case the blameless
community of Portree, on the Isle of
Skye. I was nursing a mild case of
trench foot and a new appreciation of
peatlands. After that, I never bought
another packet of dried sphagnum
moss to line a plant pot.
With bogs, as with so much of nature,
we are busily destroying the legacy of
millennia within our own lifetimes. It
can take up to 10,000 years for a raised
Illustration: Matthew Billington
bog to grow, according to Ali Morse,
water policy manager at the UK’s
Wildlife Trusts. We have lost around
a quarter of the world’s peatlands in
a fraction of that time.
If I told you that drained peatlands
emit 1.9 gigatonnes of carbon annually,
your eyes would glaze over. The toll is
easier to register as the three jumbo
bags of peat-based compost that a keen
gardener might buy yearly, generating
more than 66kg of CO2 as it rots down.
That excludes processing and transport,
and is roughly equivalent to the
emissions from heating your house with
non-renewable energy for a week.
A garden is one of the few remaining
places where we can still do what the
heck we want. I am therefore tiptoeing
— rather than marching — towards
the suggestion that readers should,
like me, aim to eliminate peat from
their gardening this year. Persuasion,
as dispensed by TV horticulturalist and
British national treasure Monty Don,
is preferable to a judgy eco-warrior
wagging his metaphorical finger every
time you buy a grow bag.
19 February/20 February 2022
I will therefore mention without
recriminations that we UK amateur
gardeners and our suppliers actually
increased our annual use of peat by a
tenth in 2020 to 2.3mn cubic metres.
I will commend the Horticultural
Trades Association for its honesty in
disclosing these figures. I will withhold
condemnation of its members for
failing to come within a country mile of
phasing out peat by 2020, as the
government asked them to in 2010.
Targets make sense, as long as you
stick to them. The UK government is
considering a ban on domestic gardens
using peat from 2024. Gardeners can
help with the transition by buying only
compost that is labelled as peat-free.
Coventry University’s David Bek points
out that bags badged as
“sustainable” may still contain it.
The real deal is getting easier to find
as stockists expand their
ranges. B&Q plans to make all
its bagged compost peat-free from
2023. Travis Perkins has already done
so for its bulk-bought products.
Plants grown in peat-free compost
are also making a welcome
appearance on the market.
Another solution is to grow your
own from seeds or cuttings. In my
experience, young plants can
struggle in nutrient-poor coir or bark-
based compost. Spiking these with
herbicide-free manure — and grit for
drainage — solves the problem for me.
Supplement shop-bought compost
with stuff you make yourself. “It will
give different results depending on the
composition,” says Marc Redmile-
Gordon, a senior soil scientist at the
Royal Horticultural Society. He calls for
substituting green mulches for bagged
compost as a soil conditioner.
Worms are key to the success of both
processes. If your soil harbours plenty
of earthworms and your compost bin is
alive with squirming brandlings, you
are on the right track. I remember an
etching made by the visionary William
Blake that quoted the Old Testament:
“I have said to the Worm: Thou art my
mother and my sister”.
I feel the same way — though I would
never risk embarrassing my own
earthworms by over-sharing. I do not
even play them the bassoon, as Charles
Darwin encouraged his son to do. But I
can rely on their efforts. Better that
than ripping the guts out of an Irish bog
every time the petunias need repotting.
Jonathan Guthrie is the FT’s head of Lex
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 9
10
House Home
Interiors | The work of late
Dorset ceramicist Richard
Batterham is at the centre
of an exhibition at London’s
V&A. By Camilla Bell-Davies
A
t the far end of the ceramics
gallery in London’s Victoria
and Albert Museum, a col-
lection of serene green pots
basks in a sunlit room.
They are beautiful to behold, with their
strong silhouettes and luminous glazes.
But, above all, these pots are itching to
be used.
Their creator, the late potter Richard
Batterham, would want us to do just
that. His pots are behind glass even
though “he would have liked people to
engage with them, even cuddle them”,
says Rebecca Luffman, assistant curator
for sculpture, metalwork, ceramics and
glass at the V&A.
Visitors to the exhibition, Richard Bat-
terham: Studio Potter can still appreciate
the tactile qualities of his pieces — the
rasp of a stoneware lid on a rim, the
smooth hewn slabs of his cut-sided
bowls. On the mugs and egg-bakers, Bat-
terham’s thumbprint is visible exactly
where the user’s thumb goes — a kind of
potter’s handshake.
Pottery was the only calling for Bat-
terham, and remained so until his death
last year. He took it up at school and was
taught in St Ives by Bernard Leach, co-
founder of Leach Pottery, before setting
up a studio in Durweston in Dorset. He
wanted to make things that could
be used, and for 60 years he
did just that. “There’s some-
thing very endearing about
small things with lids”,
when they rattle just the
right amount over the pot,
he said in a 2019 documen-
tary by George Young.
Curators at the V&A have
acknowledged this practi-
cal-mindedness by arranging
part of the exhibition to
resemble the kitchen dresser
in the Batterham family home.
Grouped on shelves are his tazze (a
★ FTWeekend
Tactile and
timeless
kind of bowl with a foot), elegant jugs
and the majestic amphorae he used for
storing mead. One of the most personal
pieces is a yoghurt-making bowl
created for his wife, Dinah.
The display, planned
with Batterham, will reso-
nate with owners of his
pots, some of whose pers-
pectives have been drawn
together in an accompany-
ing book, Richard Batter-
ham: Studio Potter. Running
throughout is an admira-
tion for Batterham’s convic-
tion — he only made what he
liked — and that while he drew
on various East Asian and Brit-
ish inspirations, ultimately his
style was his own. As a result, it is diffi-
cult to pin him down to any tradition.
This much is evident in his rhythm —
five firings a year — a pace “too slow and
undramatic for some”, wrote Batterham
in the introduction to the book, but one
that gave him time to digest and “accept
the various hazards and good things the
kiln offered”. For the late 20th century
his immersive process seemed unneces-
sarily laborious; he spent days prepar-
ing and wedging his clay (which many
potters buy pre-prepared) and sourced
ash from local trees for mixing glazes.
Batterham wrote of his process, “pots
last a very long time and their making
should not be rushed”. To his mind, the
act of taking responsibility for every
stage, of learning from his materials,
allowed the pots to come naturally.
Potter Jago Poynter describes it as “the
keen awareness of this other being —
the clay he lived alongside”. This
required a certain humility or, in Batter-
ham’s words, “a certain quietness of
living”. Quiet, yet his wide range of
interests included bell-ringing, drama
and dancing.
Ever inquisitive, even in his final fir-
ing he was still experimenting with new
glazes. The archive lent to the V&A was
“his personal classroom”, says the V&A’s
Luffman, full of forms he repeated or
changed gradually over time — a mug
handle here, the shape of a dish there.
Artist Clova Stuart-Hamilton, who
used Batterham’s earlier pots in her
still lifes, says she admired the robust
19 February/20 February 2022
structures, imbued with the physicality
of making, and the decorative elements
that in his later pieces seemed sponta-
neous. Even so, she adds, you could
tell he contemplated each design well
in advance.
“He was always looking forward,”
says his son, architect George Batter-
ham, who considers the exhibition a
source of inspiration for the next gener-
ation of potters rather than a retrospec-
tive. Despite this, Batterham never
taught or had an apprentice. When pot-
tery students came to buy items from
his studio, “he gave them lumps of clay
instead and encouraged them to make
their own”, says George.
Batterham’s thumbprint is
visible exactly where the
user’s thumb goes — a kind
of potter’s handshake
(Clockwise from During past exhibitions, auctions or at
main) Richard showrooms in London, Batterham
Batterham would sometimes hide his best pieces at
experiments the back or ask for less publicity. Never-
with glazes in theless, he has buyers as far from home
his final firing; as Japan. His fans in the UK include Sir
jugs adorn a David Attenborough and Nigel Slater,
shelf; a tea who eats his breakfast from a Batter-
caddy — Stefan Morris; ham bowl because, as he said in a 2017
Jon Stokes/V&A Museum
documentary, “it is so soothing”.
Although the V&A exhibition demon-
strates his brilliance, the greatest trib-
ute to the work of Richard Batterham —
and, indeed, all potters — is not to dis-
play the pieces behind glass but to use
them, every day, in our homes.
‘Richard Batterham: Studio Potter’, until
September 26, V&A; vam.ac.uk
19 February/20 February 2022 ★ FTWeekend 11

Property Gallery UK Office: +44 20 7873 4907 | US Office: +1 212 641 6500 | ASIA Office: +852 2905 5579
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12
House Home
S
hould teenagers be involved
in the design of our built envi-
ronment? It’s not a question
that dominates the agenda of
your average construction
meeting. But attitudes are changing. Co-
design is a grassroots movement of
architects, teachers and designers who
believe that enlisting the imagination
and unfiltered honesty of the under-
twenties to build youth-friendly public
places is a force for social good.
The Royal Institute of British Archi-
tects (RIBA) is also on board. To mark
the 100th anniversary of Becontree, one
of Europe’s largest housing estates, the
institution commissioned POoR Collec-
tive, four young London architects who
champion a people-first approach, to
design an inviting hang-out for local
school children utilising those students’
practical input and insights.
POoR (Power Out of Restriction) was
set up in 2019. It is one of several UK
groups and practices that are working
with young people on projects — com-
munity centres, housing estates or pub-
Developers have ignored
young people. ‘When did
you last see a teenager on a
housing project billboard?’
lic spaces. The aim, says POoR co-
founder Shawn Adams, is to forge closer
links between teenagers and their envi-
ronment by making the latter feel
“inclusive and welcoming”.
Another POoR co-founder, Ben Spry,
expands: “There’s a limited number of
spaces where teenagers feel at home.
Public spaces like parks, are usually
designed with children in mind. Pubs
are for adults. But everyone craves an
informal space where they can unwind.”
Co-design is mutually advantageous.
“So many young people are creative and
have interesting ideas — they just need
guidance and the skills to come up with
a tangible design. That’s where we come
in. Any profession or industry can stag-
nate if its outlook is too homogenous.
We’re simply trying to relieve the
monotony by acting as a conduit for
fresh ideas,” says Spry.
Their mission is also a response to the
government’s cuts in funding for youth
clubs. According to a recent survey by
Siân Berry, a Green party member of the
London Assembly, more than £36mn
was cut from annual youth service
★ †
Talkin’ about
rejuvenation
Architecture | Projects that collaborate with
teenagers are building both skills and better
neighbourhoods. Serena Fokschaner reports
FTWeekend
budgets across the capital between
2011-12 and 2021-22, representing a fall
of 44 per cent. The survey also found
that more than 600 full-time youth
worker jobs have been cut. A decade
ago, there were almost 300 youth cen-
tres across London; more than 130 have
closed (Berry’s findings did not include
centres that had shut temporarily due to
the pandemic). “Lots of teenagers have
nowhere other to hang out than on the
streets,” says Spry.
Adams and his colleagues share nos-
talgic memories of youth-clubbing days.
“They were a formative part of our
childhood. We made friends, messed
about and let off steam,” he says. “The
people in charge were about 10 years
older than us. But they became our role
models. It’s where we felt part of our
community. Those spaces felt as if they
belonged to all of us.”
For the Becontree project they began
by asking the children where they felt
safest. Their telling responses ranged
from “a sports pavilion” to the canopied
entrance of a local supermarket. A
six-week design process, involving
19 February/20 February 2022
drawing and maths-based games, led to
the final design.
The sociably circular seating, in high-
lighter-bright hues, is crowned by
translucent canopies (a nod to that
supermarket portal), giving it the feel of
a Pop Art bandstand mixed with a fair-
ground carousel. The piece, called
“Bringing Home to the Unknown”,
was on display to the public as part of
a RIBA installation in Regent’s Park
last October.
But benches are just the beginning.
“Eventually we’d like to co-design
larger buildings — schools, community
centres — where children can make
their mark,” says Spry.
Child-centred design theories have
(Main picture and top existed since the 1970s. “But they’ve
right) the team behind the really gained momentum recently,
green timber-frame especially in architecture schools,” says
pavilion completed architect Victoria Thornton, founder of
together with students in education charity Open City, who also
Hull — Patrick Mateer started the popular Open House events
in 1992.
(Below) Architect practice “Architecture should reflect society;
Matt + Fiona working with at the moment it doesn’t,” she says. “Co-
UCL’s Bartlett project design is a positive step forwards that
James Tye
ultimately benefits everyone. I’d like to
see it embedded in the system.”
Some might argue that all this smacks
of blue-sky thinking; a box-ticking
exercise in doing the right thing. Thorn-
ton’s response is that collaborative
design helps to develops soft skills
through workshops held in schools,
museums or architectural practices.
“Learning to work in a group, accepting
failure and finding ways to resolve that
and move on; giving presentations and
critical thinking: this can be applied to
almost any job.”
Funding cuts have also affected
art and design teaching in schools. Car-
pentry, textiles and ceramics are fast
disappearing as resources wane. The
19 February/20 February 2022
activities involved in co-design projects
— model-making, woodwork and CAD
(computer-aided design) drawing, for
example — develop the practical skills
that are “the foundation of [the UK’s]
creative industries and one of our
strongest exports”, says Thornton.
From their Waterloo studio, architects
Fiona MacDonald and Matthew Sprin-
gett of Matt + Fiona work with London
students aged 11-14 as part of the out-
reach programme of The Bartlett, UCL’s
architecture faculty. They “recognise
the need to work with young people
before they choose their GCSEs [at age
13-14] to ensure they’re not narrowing
their options too early,” says MacDon-
ald, who sees this as part of a wider drive
to foster diversity in design.
The pair have worked with more than
2,500 children, and advocate a hands-on
approach. “Some co-design ideas can be
a bit pie-in-the sky with promises of tak-
ing children on a nice design journey
that will never become a reality. Like an
art class-plus,” says MacDonald, who
first encountered the concept on a
project in Japan in 2013, rebuilding after
the tsunami two years earlier. “The chil-
dren I worked with over there were far
less risk averse than their parents. I was
struck by their resilience — and imagina-
tion. They led the way.”
In Hull they worked with pupils aged
11-16 from Oakfield, a school for pupils
with social, emotional or mental health
difficulties, to devise an outdoor class-
room for the school’s allotment. During
‘Young people are good at
reading a built environment
and working out if it’s built
for them — or for money’
the three-month project, the children
learnt design engineering and carpentry
techniques. “It gave them a sense of
seeded ownership. They gained confi-
dence in voicing their opinions and see-
ing their ideas being listened to, in a real-
world sense,” says Springett.
The emerald-green timber frame
pavilion, which functions as den and
learning space, has a high lookout for
bird’s-eye views. Large pivoting, coun-
terweighted doors can be locked at night
or opened during the day to provide a
canopy for the deck outside. Rubber
paint ensures that it will weather north-
eastern climes. Shortlisted for a Dezeen
Small Projects Award in 2018, it
★ FTWeekend
Social housing designed by ZCD Architects, experts in child-friendly cities
won an Architect’s Journal People’s
Choice prize.
To design a new town square in Weald-
stone, Harrow, Holly Lewis of We Made
That, a group of researchers, teachers
and architects, began by asking local
businesses for their input: “They
weren’t interested. But young people
were.” A workshop was established and
the 17-18 year-olds — who discovered
the project through a campaign on social
media, events and the local youth club —
designed and produced a range of
robust, modular outdoor furniture for
the square. “It became an education in
the industrial design process. The pieces
are also available to buy. That’s impor-
tant because they learnt about the com-
mercial value of making,” says Lewis.
The We Made That collective is dedi-
cated to designing “equitable” public
spaces, says Lewis. “Young people are
very good at reading their built envi-
ronment and working out if a place
that been designed for them — or for
(Clockwise from moneybags. There’s a tendency to pat-
main) ‘Bringing ronise young people. We find their
Home to the opinions are acutely observed. They
Unknown’ in cut to the chase.”
Regent’s Park At ZCD Architects, director Dinah
by students at Bornat, an expert on child-friendly
Mayesbrook cities, says young people have been
Park School; a ignored by developers in recent
seat made under decades. “When was the last
guidance from time you walked past a billboard for
We Made That; a housing project and spotted a teenager
a student works on it? There’s been a tendency to
on a project stigmatise young people and typecast
jointly run by them as antisocial. We focus on the
architects negative aspects — like knife crime —
Matt + Fiona and not on their wellbeing.”
Luke O’Donovan; James Tye
“Young people are often seen as hard
13
House Home
to reach. In fact, it’s easy, because
they’re at school. And because they’re
pedestrians they know their neighbour-
hoods inside out,” adds Bornat, whose
recent projects include social housing in
Buckinghamshire where the two-storey
properties are arranged around a com-
munal garden.
“It’s not about handing over a shop-
ping list of wants. We get under the bon-
net to work out how they live their daily
lives; how they’d like spaces to work for
them. Teenagers are children as well.
They need places to play — and meet.
They need brightly lit paths so they can
get to their friends’ homes safely. And
they really value nature, and peace.”
This is all common sense — and yet,
she says, these elements have been
ignored. “We’re learning from those
mistakes to build better places. We have
a duty of care to the next generation,”
says Bornat.
Bornat has also developed a youth
engagement tool kit called Voice Oppor-
tunity Power, which is free to use. It is
not just popular with design graduates,
she says, but also with councils, devel-
opers and construction firms who are
beginning to grasp the mutual benefits
of a two-way design conversation.
Matthew Springett says the move-
ment is also gathering support from his
more conservative peers. “When we
began lots of architects were sceptical.
Some argued it would diminish the pro-
fession.” Now, however, they see that it
can have the opposite effect. “That’s
because co-design is making more peo-
ple aware of the importance of good
design, and how it can improve the qual-
ity of all our lives.”
14 ★ FTWeekend 19 February/20 February 2022

House Home

Natural
years. It contained asparagus,
gooseberries galore and much else.
Campbell well connects entries in it
with plants and inquiries sent by
Charles while on his voyage on the

reflections
Beagle. His father was willing anyway
to grow a banana tree and to make full
use of a heated greenhouse. He
received plants or seeds of two types of
potato which Charles brought from
islands off South America and in 1839
noted with typical precision that a
plant of one had cropped 39 ¾ lbs.
These links between Darwin’s voyages
The garden diary of Charles Darwin’s father brings and researches and the Mount’s garden
diary are particularly interesting.
us closer to the Victorians — and to the formative Here are some of the entries which
Campbell turns into a general guide to
this very month, February. Snowdrops,
years of a boy who would go on to change the world crocuses, dogtooth violets and a white
camellia would come into flower: they
still do. The lawn might have a first

D
o you keep a gardening
diary? It is one of those
good intentions which
seldom translate into
reality. This weekend, the
seasonal rush is about to begin, in
which writing and recording lose out to
planting and weeding. During it, I lack
the discipline to note each flower or
fruit under the relevant dates in its life.
Gardening diaries are usually personal
records, not intended for a wider
public. They are written without much
literary style and if they ever appear in
print, it is usually long after their
author’s death. By then they have
acquired historic interest, whether
because their author has become
famous or because they contain details
which have become valuable for
unexpected reasons. Details of climate
are a good example.
We have an intriguing new addition
to the class: the garden diary kept first
by Charles Darwin’s father and then by
Susan, his sister. It spans nearly 30
years, from 1838 to 1865, and relates to
the garden on the edge of Shrewsbury
in which Charles Darwin grew up: he
also returned to it in the first summers
after his sea-voyage on the Beagle. He
then put down roots in Kent where his
garden at Down House retains a look
he would recognise. His father’s house,
the Mount in Shrewsbury, survives too
but the Darwins’ garden there was
believed to be lost, until this diary
emerged, recording its progress.
New evidence for Darwin and his
family, however slight, is quite a coup.
In the 1980s, the diary came to the
notice of Susan Campbell while she
was beginning to work on walled
kitchen gardens, the start of her career
as a garden historian. It was being
offered for sale at an auction, but just
as she sped off to inspect it, its owner
withdrew it. She traced him and
learnt that he had bought the diary
from a bookseller to whom it had
been brought, unannounced, by “a
little old lady”.
Eventually Campbell was able to buy
it and begin work on it line by line. She
has taken 35 years to transcribe the
contents and relate them wherever
possible to the Darwins’ lives and
letters. She has done an excellent job
and even though she has not printed
the text word for word, she has
deposited it in Cambridge University
Library. Her book is rather artily
designed, but in it she has distilled the
diary’s contents month by month and
prefaced them with information about
the authors and their relations with
Charles himself. She concludes with a
full list and discussion of every plant,
vegetable and fruit the diary mentions.
This section will be important for
anyone interested in early Victorian
gardening, as some of the varieties
named in it are otherwise untraceable,
Rose Triomphe de Tyre being one.
Others are still available and the general
list of annuals seems very familiar.
Darwin’s father, Robert, trained as a
doctor and married Susannah,
daughter of the famous potter,
Wedgwood, a master of commercial
sales and marketing. Her brother John
was a keen gardener, laying out large
(Clockwise from above) Some of the
research material Susan Campbell
worked with for ‘The Garden Diary
of Doctor Darwin’; Campbell’s book;
Pyrus elaeagnifolia, a wild pear, in
flower — Emily Jagger; GAP Photos/Paul Tomlins
Robin Lane Fox
On gardens
gardens including one near Bristol,
subsidised by the pottery’s profits.
Avoiding business, John too went on to
keep a garden diary, listing the 62
varieties of pear tree and the 60
varieties of peaches that he grew.
Susannah brought with her a big
dowry, from which Robert, aged 30,
was able to acquire the Mount, an
imposing first-time buy for a young
doctor. As his father, Erasmus, was a
famous lover of plants and wrote a long
poem called The Botanic Garden, it is
not surprising that Robert promptly
began a garden too. By working back
from his diary Campbell establishes
some of the trees he first planted,
including an oak from “the King’s
garden at Naples”. It came from acorns
brought back by the Earl of Powis,
whose son was probably one of Robert
Darwin’s patients and later, certainly,
his debtor. Gardening and doctoring
often go helpfully together.
Robert was valued as a kind doctor,
but had dark bouts of melancholy:
Campbell suspects he was bipolar,
prone to depression. In his
autobiography Charles Darwin recalls
how he was sent, aged 10, by his father
to count the number of flowers on the
garden’s peonies. They were tree
varieties, Campbell plausibly infers,
and he totted up 160 in the year 1819,
384 in 1820 and 363 in 1821. The diary,
Campbell tells us, shows that Darwin’s
peonies were often grown in pots,
forced into flower in the greenhouse,
then returned to the flowerbeds where
they refused to flower for another two
years. Peonies are the first recorded
subjects of careful data-gathering by
Charles Darwin: his father hoped he
would go on to become a doctor.
In the Mount’s large garden Charles
played, misbehaved and was
remembered as a naughty child. He
recalled how he and his elder brother
built a little chemistry laboratory in
the garden shed. The kitchen garden,
he also recalls, was kept locked at night.
The diary shows us more of the work of
the shed and the impressive range of
the kitchen garden in subsequent
mow. Early flowers opened on apricots,
a pear and nectarines. Mint, angelica
and thyme were planted out. So were
rose cuttings. In the greenhouse salvias,
geraniums, hyacinths, primulas,
azaleas and so forth were in flower.
In the Mount’s large garden
Charles played, misbehaved
and was remembered as
a naughty child
However, in 1852 the Severn had one of
its highest floods for 16 years and in
1855 it froze over. There was frost for
five weeks, beginning in February, and
“bonfires in the kitchen garden provide
respite for the gardeners.” I hope these
long cold spells are now past history.
When Robert died in 1848, his
daughter Susan kept the diary going.
Campbell says she has felt a kinship
with this fellow Susan, gardening, just
as she has, while working on the diary.
Reading the months’ pattern which she
has extracted from it, I feel a kinship
too. The range of plants indoors and
out is wider, but the activities are
mostly familiar. In June “mowing is
constant” and the young dahlias are
finally planted out, as are lobelias and
geraniums. “The mulberry tree is in
leaf, a sure sign of summer”, as it is
indeed a famously late-leafer. There is,
however, a major absentee: not a word
is said about slugs.
Susan Campbell’s ‘The Garden Diary of
Doctor Darwin’ is published by Unicorn