Rishi Sunak has announced a £15bn package to help UK households facing a further rise in energy bills this autumn, while completing a major U-turn with a £5bn windfall tax on oil and gas companies to help pay for it (The Financial Times £).
More than eight million households will receive more than £1,000 in additional support to help with the cost-of-living crisis as part of a £15 billion package, Rishi Sunak has announced (The Times £).
The government’s £15bn cost of living handout is not enough to help struggling families and only a “drop in the ocean” compared with the pressures consumers are facing, Asda chairman Stuart Rose has said (The Guardian).
Asda has warned that British households have suffered their biggest fall in disposable income since the financial crisis, as its sales slid during its first quarter (The Times £).
Sales crashed at Asda in the first three months of the year in the latest sign of its woes since falling into private equity hands (The Mail).
Migrant fruit pickers have been charged thousands of pounds in illegal fees to work on UK farms, according to a joint investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism and The Guardian. Evidence appears to show illicit payments taken from workers harvesting produce for M&S, Tesco and Waitrose.
Bodycare, a family-owned fragrances retailer founded on a Lancashire market stall more than half a century ago, has appointed advisers to explore a sale, according to Sky News.
Nestle considered making a bid for GSK’s consumer health arm earlier this year in what would have been its biggest deal ever, but backed out, The Mail writes, reporting on a story broken by Bloomberg. “According to Bloomberg. Nestle even considered joining forces with Unilever’s consumer goods rival Reckitt to split up the healthcare division and share the spoils, but none of its plans came to fruition.”
3G Capital will distribute some of its stake in consumer goods group Kraft Heinz to investors in its fund, in a move that will allow the Brazilian-US investment firm to embark on new acquisitions (The Financial Times £).
Fever-Tree has opened a bar and café at Edinburgh airport serving spirits mixed with a wide range of the company’s mixers (The Times £). The move is expected to be followed by further venues in other airports across the UK and beyond.
Activist investor Carl Icahn has lost his campaign against McDonald’s over the fast-food chain’s treatment of pigs after failing to win backing for two board nominees who would have pushed for better welfare standards (The FInancial Times £).
Icahn owns roughly $50,000 worth of McDonald’s stock, and nominated two candidates to force the company to honour a decade-old promise to stop buying pork by the end of this year from suppliers that house the animals in crates (The Times £).
Alibaba has warned that China’s Covid-19 lockdowns have hit its business, even after the ecommerce giant reported that sales growth in the first quarter had outstripped local rivals such as Tencent and Baidu (The Financial Times £).
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