Patrick Tooher

The City watchdog has slashed the number of secret investigations it carries out on financial firms despite taking on sweeping powers to protect customers and prevent scandals, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Pennon's chief executive saw her annual bonus of £270,000 reinstated after it was blocked when its South West Water unit poisoned more than 500 customers with parasite-infected tap water.

The £550 billion Local Government Pension Scheme is awash with cash, meaning it has more than enough money to pay the pensions of its 7million members.

Patrick Tooher Andy Burnham is being urged to tap into a £150 billion surplus sitting in town hall pension funds to boost local economies

Nationwide, which has 16 million members, and Virgin Money are still separate brands, but since April they are part of the same financial powerhouse.

Profits at Virgin Money fell in the year before more than six million of its customers were absorbed into the Nationwide Building Society, the bank's final set of accounts show.

Under a licensing deal, easyJet pays founder Haji-Ioannou's easyGroup an annual royalty of 0.25 per cent of the low-cost airline's revenues to use the 'easy' brand name.

THE would-be buyer of easyJet faces a bill of over £1 billion to use the ‘easy' brand name owned by the airline's founder Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou.

It comes as leading firms look to boost how much their chief executives can be paid as they compete in what they say is an increasingly international market for top executives.

In a blow to Prime Minister-in-waiting Andy Burnham, speculators are ramping up sell positions in the expectation that sterling will fall against the dollar.