How do you price the risk of ‘economic nuclear winter’? The market hasn’t a clue | Nils Pratley

What is the correct level of fall in the stock market if the US president declares economic war on the rest of the world even at the risk of causing a recession in his own country? Does 10% capture it? Or 12%, which was roughly the S&P 500 index’s three-day decline by the time the London market closed on Monday? Or 15%? How about 20%? More? A lot more?During three straight days of heavy falls in the share prices everywhere, a striking feature has been the absence of wise old market heads popping up to argue that the panic is perhaps a little overdone and fair value is emerging. Instead, the collective mood is stuck in bewildered mode for understandable reasons.First, Donald Trump shows no sign of softening his language, which would be the first step towards softening his policy on tariffs. Rather, his weekend comments – “sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something” – were intransigent. Unlike others in the US administration, he didn’t choose to emphasise that the tariffs are the opening shot in a negotiation

British Gas to take on 90,000 customers of collapsed Rebel Energy

British Gas will take on 90,000 customers left without an energy supplier after Rebel Energy went bust earlier this month.On Sunday, the industry regulator for Great Britain, Ofgem, appointed British Gas to begin supplying gas and electricity to 84,000 household customers and 6,000 businesses.British Gas saw off competition from other energy companies to inherit the customer base less than a week after Rebel Energy blamed a “perfect storm” of soaring wholesale prices and squeezed customers for the company going under.Dan Bates, the founder of Rebel, said in a social media post that it was “regrettably” not able to raise the required capital to secure its future, which, he said, “ultimately means that Rebel Energy will be going out of business”.British Gas customers received the small boost to its customer numbers weeks after being toppled from its position as the UK’s largest household energy supplier for the first time in almost 40 years by Octopus Energy

‘It will cripple the town’: Scunthorpe ponders life after steel as 2,700 jobs at risk

Business owners say they are already struggling and furnace closures would make trading worse, but some residents say it’s time to move on“Everyone is despondent,” said Roj Rahman when trying to sum up the mood of a town where thousands of people could be out of work and 160 years of iron and steelmaking history could come to a juddering end in just a few months.“The steelworks is the very fabric of Scunthorpe,” he said. “It’s not just the steelworks, it’s all the small businesses associated with it, all the logistics and so on. Anything that happens at the steelworks has a massive, massive, massive impact on this town.”Rahman is a co-owner of the north Lincolnshire town’s football club, which at the weekend offered reduced price tickets to British Steel workers for the home match against Southport

Government will step in to support key industries amid tariff turmoil, says Starmer

Keir Starmer has said the government will step in to support key British industries, as business grapples with the economic turmoil unleashed by Donald Trump’s global tariffs.As the government attempts to counter the impact of the White House hitting the UK with a 10% base levy on exports to the US, the prime minister will promise to help shelter vulnerable sectors and will implement key parts of the industrial strategy months early.In his first significant intervention since the US ushered in a new economic era last week, Starmer will announce plans to give carmakers more flexibility over how they meet a target to stop sales of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030.Smaller manufacturers such as Aston Martin will be exempt from the target while the sale of hybrid cars will continue until 2035 to give industry more time to prepare for the shift to electric vehicles, a growth sector for the UK.Other sectors to be hit by Trump’s tariffs are expected to receive support later in the week, with life sciences likely to be among them

Ex-Metro Bank CEO says FCA ruling has left him unable to secure permanent job

The former chief executive of Metro Bank says he has been made “untouchable”, advised to move to Australia and even had trouble opening bank accounts after the UK regulator accused him of misleading investors over a £900m accounting blunder.Craig Donaldson, who resigned in 2019, told the upper tribunal in London that both his career and personal finances had suffered as a result of the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) 2022 ruling.Donaldson and David Arden, a former chief financial officer of Metro Bank, are challenging the ruling – which includes fines of £223,100 and £134,600, respectively – in an eight-day hearing that continues this coming week.The regulator claims Donaldson allowed the bank to publish inaccurate financial information to investors in late 2018, particularly about the amount of risk it was taking on loans and mortgages.By 2019, it was revealed Metro Bank had misclassified £900m of loans as less risky than they actually were, meaning it breached rules on holding enough capital to cover potential losses

Companies House collects just £1,250 in fines in corruption crackdown

The UK government agency responsible for overseeing a national register of companies has collected just £1,250 in fines after being given new powers to crack down on corruption, it has emerged.Companies House is implementing a series of reforms, amid embarrassing revelations about fraudsters and jokers signing up to the corporate register with names such as “Darth Vader” and “Santa Claus”.Measures include new identity verification checks for directors, after the agency admitted that up to 20% of the 4.9m companies on its database may have submitted false information.Since last autumn, the agency has also had powers to impose financial penalties for failure to comply with its rules, such as the requirement to file ownership information on time