Category: News

The end of September, and the end of the third quarter of 2015 – a quarter which, as all the financial press reported, was the worst for global equities since 2011. As CNBC put it: A sustained collapse in commodity prices, China’s stunning market rout followed by its shocking currency devaluation as well as fears

On Sunday 24th August, Tooting and Mitcham United FC hosted the first ever Merton Business Group 7-a-side football competition and GEM & Co Financial Services were invited to take part. Gareth, Mat and Luca from GEM represented the company with the rest of the team of ten consisting of family members and friends including four

According to HM Revenue & Customs’ (HMRC) policy paper, ‘Restricting Financial Cost Relief for Individual Landlords’ it’s not just mortgage interest to which the change in tax relief applies. As well as mortgage interest, finance costs include interest on loans to buy furnishings and fees incurred when taking out or repaying mortgages or loans. The

In August 2015, unemployment increased for the second month in a row, adding weight to the arguments of ratesetters in the ‘lower for longer’ camp. Latest ONS figures showed the jobless total up 25,000 in the three months to June to a total of 1.85 million, however, the unemployment rate itself did not shift. Interest

Introduction “Markets can fall as well as rise…” Never was that statement more true than in August, when virtually all the major world markets headed down, led by the plunging stock market in China. It became virtually impossible to watch a news bulletin without seeing a shell-shocked fund manager or a weeping private investor. It

As the American baseball coach Yogi Berra, renowned for his comical quotes, once said ‘It’s Déjà vu all over again!’; that is very much how this recent market sell-off feels. Experienced investors will be familiar with the scenario that has been playing out over the past couple of weeks in the markets and familiar, too,

The so-called ‘New State Pension’ will come into force on April 6th 2016 and will affect all pensioners who reach state pension age from that date onwards. For women, this means that you will be affected if you were born on or after 6th April 1953. For men, you will be affected if you were

July was a dramatic month. Greece held a referendum and emphatically rejected the austerity package offered by its creditors. Motor-cycle riding Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis resigned,  calling the creditors “terrorists”, and the new finance minister, Euclid Tsakalotos, was seen going into yet another final, final crisis meeting with his negotiating position scribbled on hotel notepaper.

An essential part of writing this bulletin each month is making daily notes on the main business and stock market news. This month we have comfortably broken our record – more than six pages of notes. And as you might expect, about half of those pages are about Greece and its debts. ‘An agreement was in sight’

We are delighted to announce that for the second year running we have been shortlisted as a finalist in the Merton Business Awards – this year it’s in the ‘Service Excellence’ category.  In 2014, you may remember that we were the winners of ‘The Extra Mile’ category The awards recognise the most successful companies based