ON the eve of the crucial Brexit vote in Westminster, Hermes Investment Management has ramped up contingency plans against a hard Brexit.
The £36 billion wealth manager said it has set up a subsidiary in Ireland - ahead of a crunch day in Parliament where MPs are set to vote on Prime Minister Theresa May's contested Brexit deal.
Hermes Fund Managers Ireland has been established as part of its contingency plans it started drawing up after the referendum in June 2016 and is based on the presumption of a hard Brexit - Britain crashing out of the European Union without any transitional arrangements.
Hermes follows other asset managers such as Legal & General, Ashmore and Barings in setting up hubs in Ireland.
Shares in Goals Soccer Centres closed down nearly 14%, or 10p at 62p. It came after the firm warned that profits will be lower after a revamp of its offering resulted in higher costs.
The operator of 5-a-side football centres now expects group adjusted profit for 2018 to be between £4.3 million and £4.5 million.
It comes as exceptional costs for the year to December 31 looked set to reach £5.5 million. This includes higher staffing costs as well as a premium coffee service and improved children's party offering.
Slower than anticipated growth in the US, where the company has four sites, also contributed to what Goals said was a "disappointing" 2018 performance.
Challenger bank Tide has partnered with ClearBank to bid for a share of the Royal Bank of Scotland's £775 million fund aimed at increasing competition in Britain's business banking sector.
Tide and ClearBank, the first clearing bank to launch in Britain for 250 years, have applied for a grant worth up to £120 million from Pool A of the Capability and Innovation Fund that forms part of RBS's alternative remedies package.
If successful, the grant will allow Tide and ClearBank to develop advanced business current accounts and products for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the UK.
RBS's alternative remedies package is part of conditions attached to its £45 billion Government bailout a decade ago at the height of the financial crisis, with the cash being distributed by the Banking Competition Remedies body.
Winners of the first round of financial awards are expected to be announced in February.
Another director has left the troubled parent of Patisserie Valerie, marking the latest change to the board in the wake of its brush with collapse last year.
Non-executive director James Horler will leave with immediate effect to focus on his position as chief executive of Ego Restaurants, Patisserie Holdings said on Monday.
Mr Horler, who is also chairman of coffee chain Notes and restaurant group Ping Pong, is a frequent business partner of Patisserie's chairman Luke Johnson.
His departure is the latest in a string of changes to the group's board.
It leaves Mr Johnson and non-executive director Lee Ginsberg as the only remaining board members who have been in their posts since before the discovery of a black hole in the company's accounts in October last year.
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