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Important information: The value of investments can go down as well as up so you may get back less than you invest. Investors should note that the views expressed may no longer be current and may have already been acted upon. This is a third-party news feed and may not reflect Fidelity’s views.

Friday newspaper round-up: Southern Water, Cazoo, EY

(Sharecast News) - Southern Water is threatening to use debt collection agencies against customers involved in a payment boycott in protest against continuing raw sewage discharges. The water company, which was given the lowest one star rating for performance by the Environment Agency, has informed boycotters that it will be using bailiffs if they continue to hold back bill payments. - Guardian

Online car retailer Cazoo has announced it will abandon its business in Europe and cut 750 jobs in the latest sign of retreat by a business that had hoped to transform its sector. The company will make redundant all of its employees in France, Germany, Italy and Spain as it closes the operations, leaving it operating in only the UK as it tries to preserve cash. - Guardian

Bosses at EY have agreed to push ahead with a split of its audit and consulting arms in the biggest shake-up of a Big Four accounting giant in decades. The firm said on Thursday that it will ballot its partners on a plan to separate the 312,000-strong business into "two distinct, multidisciplinary organisations" following a strategic review. - Telegraph

Hospitality bosses are warning that one in five businesses in the sector will not survive the current crisis and that hundreds of thousands of people will be left without jobs unless government support is received. Nearly 300 chief executives have signed an open letter asking the new chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, for "a plan that cuts business costs, stimulates demand and tackles inflation". - The Times

The government's information watchdog has taken legal action against the Department for International Trade for "persistent failures" to uphold transparency law. The Information Commissioner's Office has taken the rare step of issuing a formal enforcement notice to the department for failing to properly respond to transparency requests. If the department fails to meet this notice, it will be in contempt of court. - The Times

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Thursday newspaper round-up: JCB, M&S, smart meters
(Sharecast News) - The British digger maker JCB, owned by the billionaire Bamford family, continued to build and supply equipment for the Russian market months after saying it had stopped exports because of Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine, the Guardian can reveal. Russian customs records show that JCB, whose owners are major donors to the Conservative party, continued to make new products available for Russian dealers well after 2 March 2022, when the company publicly stated that it had "voluntarily paused exports" to Russia. - Guardian
Wednesday newspaper round-up: Brexit border outages, Boeing, Stellantis
(Sharecast News) - Lorries carrying perishable food and plants from the EU are being held for up to 20 hours at the UK's busiest Brexit border post as failures with the government's IT systems delay imports entering Britain. Businesses have described the government's new border control checks as a "disaster" after IT outages led to lorries carrying meat, cheese and cut flowers being held for long periods, reducing the shelf life of their goods and prompting retailers to reject some orders. - Guardian
Tuesday newspaper round-up: Tesco, OpenAI, housebuilding
(Sharecast News) - Tesco is facing criticism from "shocked" charities who say they are struggling to distribute unwanted food to homeless and hungry people after they claim the retailer brought in rules that mean unwanted food can only be collected in the evening. The supermarket group has switched to a new system which asks charities to pick up unwanted food, such as items reaching their best before date, only in the evening when a store is closing rather than the following morning, the charities have claimed. - Guardian
Monday newspaper round-up: BT, ultra-long mortgages, Fever-Tree
(Sharecast News) - BT has said it is increasingly using artificial intelligence to help it detect and neutralise threats from hackers targeting business customers amid repeated attacks on companies. The £10.5bn group is aiming to build up its business protecting customers from online criminals and has patented technology that uses AI to analyse attack data to allow companies to protect their tech infrastructure. British businesses are routinely facing hacking attempts, and some recent high-profile victims have included including the outsourcer Capita, Royal Mail and British Airways. - Guardian

Important information: This information is not a personal recommendation for any particular investment. If you are unsure about the suitability of an investment you should speak to one of Fidelity’s advisers or an authorised financial adviser of your choice. When you are thinking about investing in shares, it’s generally a good idea to consider holding them alongside other investments in a diversified portfolio of assets. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future returns.

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