The London Stock Exchange Group says 11 global banks have invested in its Post Trade Solutions business.

The banks together take a 20% stake for a combined £170m, valuing the division at £850m.

The banks are: Bank of America, Barclays, BNP Paribas, Citi, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Nomura, Societe Generale and UBS.

Post Trade Solutions generated revenue of £96m and normalised EBITDA of £16m in 2024.

The Investing Banks are major customers of LSEG’s clearing services and Post Trade Solutions business. Three directors nominated by the Investing Banks will join the board of Post Trade Solutions.

LSEG added in a statement: “LSEG will also acquire an increased proportion of the revenue surplus from the SwapClear business. Previously, the founding members of SwapClear, which include the investing banks (highlighted above), were entitled to c.30% of SwapClear’s revenue surplus through to 2035. This will [now] reduce to 15% for 2025 and 10% from 2026.”

Post Trade Solutions brings together Acadia, Quantile and SwapAgent to streamline operations, reduce risk and improve capital efficiency.

SwapClear is the market’s longest-serving global interest rate swap clearing service.

Listed RELX has reported strong underlying revenue growth for the first nine months of 2025.

The global provider of information-based analytics and decision tools has reaffirmed its outlook for the full year after revenue grew 7% in the year-to-date.

Thruvision Group plc has reported a 36% increase in half-year revenues.

The provider of walk-through security technology reported £2.6 million sales for the six months ended 30th September 2025.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has formally designated Google and Apple with strategic market status (SMS) under the UK’s new digital markets regime – a decision immediately condemned by Google as “disappointing, disproportionate and unwarranted”.

The regulator has officially decided that the companies’ market power is so great that it needs special oversight to protect fair competition and innovation.

The designation now gives the CMA enhanced powers to oversee competition in mobile ecosystems, covering operating systems, app distribution, browsers and browser engines across smartphones and tablets.

Author: Patrick Killeen

Liberty Global, the US media and telecoms group founded by billionaire John Malone, has sold roughly half of its long-held 10% stake in ITV.

The British broadcaster has been the subject of persistent takeover rumours and has seen its share price dip by 8% to 68.5p since the news.

Liberty said it was selling about 191 million shares, worth approximately £140m at ITV’s latest closing price.

The sale, managed by BNP Paribas and Deutsche Bank, reduces the firm’s holding to around 5%.

Author: Patrick Killeen

IT infrastructure specialist Softcat has reported another year of record results, achieving its 20th consecutive year of double-digit gross profit growth.

The Buckinghamshire-based FTSE 250 constituent also completed its first-ever acquisition this financial year as it continues to scale its operations and expand its technology offering.

For the 12 months to 31 July 2025, gross invoiced income rose 26.8% to £3.6 billion, while gross profit increased 18.3% to £494.3 million.

Underlying operating profit grew 16.9% to £180.1m, with statutory operating profit up 12.2% to £172.9m.

The company also maintained strong cash conversion at 95.6%, ending the year with £182.3 million in net cash.

Risers:

NCC Group – +6.18%

Playtech – +5.82%

Softcat – +5.17%

THG – +4.68%

Ibstock – +4.08%

Fallers:

ITV – -8.18%

International Personal Finance – -3.98%

Raspberry Pi Holdings – -3.08%

BlackRock World Mining Trust – -2.28%

W.A.G Payment Solutions – -2.11%

Birmingham-based AI startup Unloq has officially launched during Birmingham Tech Week 2025, aiming to transform how organisations create and adapt business strategy using AI.

Founded by Dr Yiannis Maos MBE and Satyen Fakey, the company operates across AI services and AI products, developing a proprietary platform that powers what it calls “Strategy as a Service.”

Already supporting more than 40 companies in stealth mode, the business has formed partnerships with SF Technology and Aston University, where it will help launch an AI growth engine in 2026 to support SME innovation.

Global engineering and project management firm Amentum has promoted Loren Jones to senior vice president for energy & environment-international, tasking him with driving growth across the UK, France, Europe, Australia, Japan and other key markets.

Jones, who has more than 20 years of nuclear industry experience, previously served as senior VP of operations within the same division.

Before joining the US-based company in 2022, he was a board member at Cavendish Nuclear, overseeing business development and operations in North America and Japan.

Earlier, he held positions at Westinghouse, Nuvia and Hyde Group.

Chelsea FC have expanded its partnership with FPT, naming the Vietnamese technology giant a principal partner for the 2025/26 season.

The move will see FPT’s branding appear on the sleeves of Chelsea’s men’s, women’s and academy kits as the two organisations deepen collaboration on digital transformation and AI innovation.

The partnership, which began earlier this year, has focused on enhancing the club’s digital platforms, fan engagement and business operations.

The business has been working with the Premier League ever-present through workshops in Vietnam to integrate its AI and automation solutions across the club’s systems.

Creator management company Arcade, best known for representing YouTube supergroup The Sidemen, has appointed Pete Cory as chairman following investment from Lumina Media.

Cory previously spent 18 years at Google, most recently as managing director for YouTube’s EMEA partner development, and has over 35 years’ experience across media, tech and advertising.

He will work with Arcade co-founders Jordan Schwarzenberger and Sam Uwins to expand the firm’s brand partnerships and creator-first strategy, helping advertisers better connect with Gen Z audiences.

Allica Bank has swooped to acquire Kriya, the SME lending FinTech specialising in SME working capital and embedded finance.

The SME credit and payments firm was formerly known as MarketInvoice and MarketFinance. The acquisition will see Allica move into the embedded payments market for the first time.

Since first opening its doors to lending in 2020, Allica’s impressive growth means its total outstanding lending to SMEs has now reached £3.5 billion.

With the Kriya acquisition, Allica is targeting advancing an initial £1 billion of working capital finance to SMEs over the next three years. 

Circular economy firm refurbed has closed its latest funding round at £44 million as it prepares to launch in the UK.

The Vienna-founded company is Europe’s fastest-growing marketplace for refurbished electronics, household and sports products.

The round was led by Alex Zubillaga, investor in Spotify, Fever and Wallapop, together with Orilla, investment platform of the Riberas family – known for backing leading European marketplaces such as Vinted, Playtomic and Cabify, with strong participation from existing shareholders Evli Growth Partners, Bonsai, Almaz, C4 Ventures, and Speedinvest. 

Social entertainment group LBG Media, the company behind the LADbible network, has reported a 10% increase in revenue to £92.2 million for its financial year, with profits also edging higher. 

The Manchester-based firm said performance was in line with expectations, supported by growth across its direct advertising and branded content business.

Adjusted EBITDA rose to £25m, up from £24.5m the previous year, while net cash increased to £30.1m from £27.2m. 

The Government is funding 16 cutting-edge technology projects which it says will bring groundbreaking innovations to market more quickly.

£8.9 million funding will be delivered through the Regulatory Innovation Office to support projects including drones delivering medical supplies in the Scottish islands; AI tools that are helping get new medicines safely approved for use sooner; an AI smartphone app helping London Fire Brigade to risk-assess homes and businesses; and street-sweeping robots in Milton Keynes.

 

The cyber attack which targeted Jaguar Land Rover cost the UK economy almost £2 billion, according to an independent report.

The report published by independent non-profit the Cyber Monitoring Centre said more than 5,000 organisations were affected and that further losses could accrue if JLR – owned by India’s Tata Motors – was unable to return to pre-hack levels quickly.

Last month the Government agreed to support JLR’s suppliers with a £1.5bn loan after the company had to shut down its UK operations due to the incident, which occurred at the end of August.

Nearly a thousand jobs are to be created in a major boost to communities across the UK after over 10 billion in investments were announced at today’s first Regional Investment Summit.

Over £10 billion in investment commitments were announced at the Regional Investment Summit in Birmingham yesterday.

Almost 1,000 high-quality jobs are to be created in the UK’s regions and nations, the Government claimed, with major investments in the key sectors of life sciences, AI and innovation.

They include £200m from Leeds United to redevelop its Elland Road ground and a Crown Estate acquisition in Oxfordshire for increased laboratory and manufacturing space that could boost UK GDP by £2.5bn.

There was a £300m commitment from Woven Capital, Toyota’s growth-stage investment arm, to build its European growth capital team in the UK, while Hines announced a £400m investment to support the £4bn Birmingham Knowledge Quarter, a centrepiece of the West Midlands Investment Zone.

The Government is also announcing two life sciences investments which it said would ‘unlock over £30m’. Biocomposites will expand its Keele facility which produce medical products which allow antibiotics to be administered directly into bone and soft tissue, while Sterling Pharmaceuticals will build a 60,000 sq ft centre in Birmingham.

Atos is announcing £10m for AI centres.

CyanConnode Holdings plc saw turnover rise 31% to £7.4 million in its latest half-year – despite revenues from a new £70m contract being yet to commence.

The global provider of IoT communication and smart metering solutions said its DigiSmart subsidiary in India had secured a ‘landmark’ first contract as an advanced metering infrastructure service provider with the Government of Goa.

The April deal materially strengthened the group’s contracted order book, which remains robust at approximately £157m.

Spirax Group plc has appointed a new non-executive director in Andrew Kemp.

The thermal energy management and fluid technology solutions group said Kevin Thompson will step down from the board next year.

Kemp holds board roles at The Berkeley Group Holdings plc and Irwin Mitchell Holdings. He is also a governor of Birkbeck University of London.

Oxford BioDynamics Plc has conditionally raised £7 million through a share placing and new subscriptions.

The precision clinical diagnostics company is bringing specific and sensitive tests to the practice of medicine through its EpiSwitch 3D genomics platform.