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Shell chief executive Ben van Beurden signalled the oil and gas group was ready to pay higher taxes as its announcement of $9.5bn in third-quarter profits prompted renewed calls for additional levies on energy companies. The second-highest quarterly profits in the company’s history followed the record $11.5bn reported in the three months to the end

Jeremy Hunt, UK chancellor, has delayed the date for his long-awaited medium-term fiscal plan from October 31 to November 17, as calmer markets give the government some economic breathing space. Hunt made the announcement on Wednesday morning after talks with new prime minister Rishi Sunak, who wanted more time to go through the details of

Rishi Sunak on Tuesday became Britain’s third prime minister in the space of two months and issued a bleak warning on the steps of Downing Street: “Our country is facing a profound economic crisis.” Sunak, who was invited to form a government by King Charles on Tuesday morning, said he would prioritise “economic stability and

Rishi Sunak, former chancellor, was on Monday on course to become Britain’s new prime minister, after Boris Johnson quit the contest on Sunday night and markets heaved a sigh of relief. Sterling rose on Monday after the risks of further immediate political and economic upheaval receded. Johnson, who was struggling to win support, admitted that

Boris Johnson was on Sunday desperately seeking more Conservative MPs to support his comeback bid, as he tried to secure the 100 nominations needed to enter the ballot to become Britain’s next prime minister. Talks on Saturday night between Johnson and Rishi Sunak, the former chancellor and frontrunner in the contest, did not result in

Penny Mordaunt has held nine ministerial positions in eight government departments, including three cabinet posts. Yet until this summer’s Conservative leadership contest, when she came third, she was an unfamiliar figure to most of the British public. Now she is making another bid to become prime minister, touting her “fresh face” as a virtue that

Conservative MPs were on Friday deeply divided by the prospect of Boris Johnson returning as party leader and UK prime minister — just three months after he quit following a string of scandals. On Friday morning contenders to replace Liz Truss — who dramatically resigned on Thursday after only six weeks in power — were

A UK minister has warned that “appropriate discipline” will be imposed on Tory MPs who voted against the government without “specific constituency reasons” in last night’s chaotic vote on fracking. “The parliamentary managers will discuss with colleagues who didn’t vote with the three line whip why that was. Sometimes there are very specific constituency reasons

Jeremy Hunt declined to confirm that the UK government would increase pensions and benefits in line with inflation on Wednesday as the crucial September figure rose back to its 40-year high of 10.1 per cent. The rate of CPI inflation rose from 9.9 per cent in August, driven by the highest food price increases in

The Bank of England is set to delay the sale of billions of pounds of government bonds in a bid to foster greater stability in gilt markets following the UK’s failed “mini” Budget. The BoE had already delayed the start of its sale of £838bn of gilts bought under its quantitative easing programme from October

Hello and welcome to the working week. Or should that be the week of the workers? The 20th national congress of the Chinese Communist party is under way in Beijing and all eyes are on President Xi Jinping ahead of the expected vote to hand him an unprecedented third term in office. The Financial Times

US president Joe Biden has said Liz Truss’s original tax proposal was a “mistake”, in his most critical comments about the UK prime minister’s fiscal policy. Biden made the remarks during a visit to an ice cream shop in Portland, Oregon on Saturday, adding that Truss’s decision to reverse some of the sweeping tax cuts

Jeremy Hunt, the new UK chancellor, has admitted taxes will have to rise and spending will have to be cut after prime minister Liz Truss failed to reassure markets with a U-turn on cutting corporation tax. In his first interviews since replacing Kwasi Kwarteng, who was sacked by the prime minister on Friday, Hunt buried

UK chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng returned to the UK on Friday for crisis talks with prime minister Liz Truss, as expectations mount of a government U-turn on £43bn of unfunded tax cuts. Kwarteng arrived at Heathrow airport after taking an overnight flight from Washington, where he left IMF talks early amid growing unease on the Conservative

GlaxoSmithKline said its potential new blockbuster shot for respiratory syncytial virus appears to be more effective than rival Pfizer’s vaccine candidate, as the pair compete for a new market protecting older adults against the common lung infection. In data released on Thursday, GSK said its vaccine showed overall efficacy of 82.6 per cent in a

A sell-off in UK government bonds accelerated on Wednesday, sending long-term borrowing costs higher after the Bank of England reiterated that it will halt its emergency gilt buying scheme as planned on Friday. The central bank said on Wednesday morning that it “has made clear from the outset, its temporary and targeted purchases of gilts

The Bank of England has widened its emergency bond-buying programme to include inflation-linked gilts in its latest attempt to stem “fire sales” by pension funds that have created a “material risk to UK financial stability”. The central bank said on Tuesday it was prepared to buy up to £5bn a day in index-linked UK government

Kyiv and other major Ukrainian cities came under sustained missile and rocket attacks on Monday, a day after President Vladimir Putin accused Ukraine of terrorism over an attack on a bridge linking the occupied Crimean Peninsula with Russia’s Taman region. Several missiles hit downtown Kyiv as loud explosions were heard in the first attack on

US Treasury secretary Janet Yellen said the move by Opec+ to cut oil production was “unhelpful and unwise” for the global economy, particularly emerging markets already struggling with high energy prices. The Biden administration has been loudly critical of the decision by the oil cartel backed by Saudi Arabia and Russia this week, which took

An explosion tore through Russia’s bridge across the Kerch Strait to Crimea early on Saturday, severely damaging it in a major blow to Vladimir Putin more than seven months into his invasion of Ukraine. Russia’s anti-terrorist committee said a truck exploded on the bridge’s roadside in the early hours of Saturday morning and caused seven