• Friday newspaper round-up: Nationwide, Anthropic, Marks & Spencer

  Friday 29 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Labour is poised for a fresh attempt at changing the welfare system after a major government-backed report said youth unemployment was costing Britain more than £125bn a year. As official figures revealed the number of young people not working or studying had surpassed a million for the first time in more than a decade, Alan Milburn said the government had a responsibility to the next generation to take action. - Guardian

• Thursday newspaper round-up: Food crisis, Universal Music, Samsung

  Thursday 28 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Britain is "sleepwalking into a food crisis" caused by extreme weather, inflation and the impacts of the Iran war - and the government is failing to take the threat seriously, food experts have said. Farmers are facing severe strain from the current heatwave following a dry spring, with many crops likely to yield less as temperatures rise beyond their tolerance. Livestock are also suffering heat stress and there is a rising risk of wildfires. Economic losses are likely to be measured in the hundreds of millions of pounds. - Guardian

• Wednesday newspaper round-up: Energy price cap, Post Office Horizon, Radley

  Wednesday 27 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Households will face the steepest summer rise in energy charges in four years after months of soaring market prices caused the government's energy price cap for Great Britain to climb by 13%. Under the cap the average gas and electricity bill will increase to the equivalent of £1,862 a year from July until the end of September to take account of the rise in global energy market prices caused by the war on Iran. - Guardian

• Tuesday newspaper round-up: Meta, British businesses, Eurowag

  Tuesday 26 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Rachel Reeves has instructed cabinet colleagues to award government contracts in four critical industries directly to British companies, making clear her irritation that ministers have been sending too much government business abroad. In a letter seen by the Guardian, the chancellor tells every cabinet minister in charge of a spending department to "buy British" wherever possible, adding that she is disappointed they are not already doing so. - Guardian

• Sunday newspaper round-up: Food prices, Modella Capital, Iran peace deal, Nigel Farage, White House shooting, Rachel Reeves, EU

  Sunday 24 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Food prices were expected to climb after ministers decided not to scrap the £2bn Extended Producer Responsibility packaging levy, The Times reported. Defra officials told industry leaders the scheme, which charges producers and online retailers for every item of packaging used, will remain in place, despite Bank of England estimates that it would add around 0.5% to food inflation. The paper said the decision comes as households already face higher supermarket bills linked to the US and Israel's conflict with Iran, with the cenntral bank warning inflation could reach 6.2% by early 2027 and food inflation as high as 7%.

• Friday newspaper round-up: Cancelled govt projects, oil and gas tax raid, recession risk

  Friday 22 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Cancelled government projects such as the Rwanda deportation scheme and the road tunnel under Stonehenge are wasting billions of pounds of taxpayer money a year, parliament's spending watchdog has found. About £6.6bn was written off by government departments last year alone - state spending that did not achieve its intended objectives or create any value for the taxpayer, the public accounts committee said. - Guardian

• Thursday newspaper round-up: Jeff Bezos, JLR, OpenAI

  Thursday 21 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Rachel Reeves is to promise free summer bus rides for children and cut tariffs on some food imports, as part of a package of measures aimed at easing the costs of the Iran conflict. The chancellor will give a statement in the House of Commons on Thursday, outlining her latest plans for cushioning the blow to consumers from an expected rise in inflation later this year. - Guardian

• Wednesday newspaper round-up: Shell, Berkeley, Deutsche Bank

  Wednesday 20 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - The cost of the government's £38bn nuclear plant in Suffolk is subject to "significant uncertainty" and may outweigh the benefits for UK households until at least 2064, according to the government's spending watchdog. The National Audit Office (NAO) has warned that although the potential benefits of the Sizewell C nuclear plant are considerable, they remain uncertain. The risks, however, are "immediate, substantial and borne by the public". - Guardian

• Tuesday newspaper round-up: Thames Water, Elon Musk, youth unemployment

  Tuesday 19 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - A rescue deal for Thames Water is under threat because of a potential change in prime minister, government insiders have said. Ministers are negotiating a takeover deal for the stricken water company with a consortium of creditors led by American investment firm Elliott Management. But government sources said that deal, which some expected to be concluded this month, has run into problems in part because of the uncertainty surrounding Keir Starmer's position as prime minister. - Guardian

• Monday newspaper round-up: Thames Water, NCP, EY, property taxes

  Monday 18 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - The worsening fallout from the Iran war is forcing businesses to halt their UK investment and hiring plans, bosses have warned, as Britain enters a renewed period of political and economic instability. More than two months into the US-Israeli war on Iran, leading surveys of UK employers showed companies were increasingly prioritising cost management over growth as rising costs and global uncertainty weigh on confidence. - Guardian

• Friday newspaper round-up: Postal deserts, Philip Morris, Applied Materials, Elon Musk

  Friday 15 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - The owner of WH Smith's former high street business is aiming to change contracts with the Post Office to make it easier to close outlets within its stores, increasing fears that communities will become "postal deserts". TG Jones operates 180 post offices and it is understood that as many as 60 could be closed under a restructuring plan by Modella, the private equity group that renamed the WH Smith high street chain as TG Jones after buying it last year. - Guardian

• Thursday newspaper round-up: Farage, Crispin Odey, Sam Altman

  Thursday 14 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Nigel Farage is facing a formal investigation by the parliamentary standards watchdog over a £5m gift from the crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne. The Reform UK leader received the money weeks before announcing he would stand as a candidate in the 2024 general election. - Guardian

• Wednesday newspaper round-up: Elon Musk, JPMorgan CEO, Carillion

  Wednesday 13 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Donald Trump is due to arrive in Beijing on Wednesday evening, the first visit to China by a US president in nearly a decade, as he seeks to mend power and prestige weakened by the war in Iran. Trump will bring tech leaders, including Elon Musk of Tesla and Tim Cook of Apple, and plans for headline-grabbing deals. He has said he expects China's leader, Xi Jinping, would "give me a big, fat hug when I get there". - Guardian

• Tuesday newspaper round-up: Household spending, BuzzFeed, Grant Thornton

  Tuesday 12 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Households cut back on their spending in April at the fastest pace in 18 months, as the conflict in the Middle East provoked fears of another cost of living crisis, a report from one of the UK's biggest banks has suggested. Barclays, which processes nearly 40% of the UK's credit and debit card transactions, said its data showed there had been a 0.1% fall in card spending last month compared with a year earlier. This was the first year-on-year fall since November 2024. - Guardian

• Monday newspaper round-up: British households, Mike Ashley, Starlink

  Monday 11 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - British households are bracing for a new cost of living crisis, as the impact of the Middle East conflict dampens confidence in the economy and personal finances, a survey has suggested. Consumer confidence in the UK has dipped over the last three months at the fastest rate since June 2022, when inflation in the UK was soaring as a result of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the spike in commodity prices. - Guardian

• Sunday newspaper round-up: Ed Miliband, Ukraine, British Steel, WH Smith, Peter Magyar, Reform UK

  Sunday 10 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Labour MPs on the party's left are preparing to urge Ed Miliband to consider a leadership bid in the coming days, as Keir Starmer faced the prospect of a formal challenge from within his own ranks next week, the Guardian reported.

• Friday newspaper round-up: Meta, Modella Capital, Network Plus

  Friday 08 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Meta has launched a legal challenge against the UK's media regulator over the fees and fines regime it is enforcing under landmark digital safety legislation. The Facebook and Instagram owner is claiming that Ofcom's methodology for calculating the charges is flawed and should not be based on a company's global revenue. Breaches of the Online Safety Act can be punished by fines of up to 10% of qualifying worldwide revenue (QWR) or £18m - whichever is higher. - Guardian

• Thursday newspaper round-up: Fertiliser shortages, speed limits, Elon Musk

  Thursday 07 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Fertiliser shortages caused by the Iran war have driven up costs for UK farmers by up to 70% and will have a "dramatic" impact on food prices globally next year, according to one of Britain's most powerful property and farming companies. Mark Preston, executive trustee of the 349-year-old Grosvenor Group, controlled by the Duke of Westminster, said fertiliser "was already quite expensive" before the 50% to 70% surge in prices since the start of the Iran war in late February. - Guardian

• Wednesday newspaper round-up: Private credit, Nissan, AMD

  Wednesday 06 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Four in five people are worried that the Iran war will make food more expensive, according to a new poll, as businesses warned the "window is closing" for ministers to cut energy costs for UK retailers. Research by Opinium found that 80% of people are worried about the rising price of groceries, which would come from retailers passing on cost increases to consumers, while 73% expect the conflict to push up prices of other products. - Guardian

• Jefferies downgrades Legal & General

  Tuesday 05 May 2026

  (Sharecast News) - Jefferies downgraded Legal & General on Tuesday to 'underperform' from 'hold' as it said the company's income story is deteriorating.

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