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Friday newspaper round-up: Rail disruption, gambling firms, Twitter

(Sharecast News) - Another nine days of disruption for rail passengers has begun as train drivers in the Aslef union start an overtime ban and a series of rolling strikes halting services across Britain, in a long-running dispute over pay. Drivers will be taking industrial action at train operating companies (Tocs) contracted to the Department for Transport, striking for 24 hours at each one on different dates between Saturday 2 December and Friday 8 December. The strikes will stop most or all trains at the affected operators in England and also hit some cross-border services to Scotland and Wales. - Guardian Gambling firms are raking in more money than ever from UK punters, fuelled by a surge in the use of online slot machines, which the government is considering curbing due to their association with heavy losses and addiction. The betting and gaming industry's revenues reached £15.1bn in the year to March 2023, or £10.95bn excluding the National Lottery, figures from the Gambling Commission released on Thursday show. - Guardian

With Twitter losing advertisers left and right because of Elon Musk's tweets, contrition from the billionaire would have been expected. Yet on stage at an event in New York this week, he was anything but. Musk had a blunt three word missive for companies that had stopped advertising with his social network: "Go f- yourself." - Telegraph

Matthew Moulding has taken a stake in the activist investor targeting his beauty business in a move that harks back to the so-called "Pac-Man defence" strategy occasionally employed to counter potential hostile takeovers. Moulding, the founder of THG, has taken a 3.2 per cent stake in Kelso Group after the activist called for a break-up of his listed beauty empire. - The Times

Microsoft will invest £2.5 billion in Britain over the next three years to double its data centre capacity and provide computing power to help to drive the expansion of artificial intelligence. Microsoft will invest £2.5 billion in Britain over the next three years to double its data centre capacity and provide computing power to help to drive the expansion of artificial intelligence. The investment has been hailed by Rishi Sunak as "a turning point for the future of AI infrastructure and development in the UK". - The Times

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(Sharecast News) - The UK government will "wait and see" whether tariffs announced by Donald Trump "actually come to pass", a senior minister said. The US president announced what he called "reciprocal tariffs" on all other countries on Thursday evening, claiming it was "fair to all". But it was unclear how this would apply to the UK, especially as Trump suggested his policy regarded VAT as a tariff. - Guardian
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(Sharecast News) - California's home-insurance safety net does not have enough money to pay all of the claims from damage caused by the Los Angeles wildfires and has asked private insurers to contribute $1bn toward those claims. All private insurers operating in California are required to contribute to the Fair plan, a plan of last resort established so all Californians would have access to fire insurance. More than 450,000 California homeowners got their insurance through the Fair plan in 2024 - more than double the number in 2020. As of 4 February, the plan had received more than 4,700 claims from the Palisades and Eaton fires, almost half of which were for "total losses". - Guardian
Wednesday newspaper round-up: British economy, Heathrow, FOS
(Sharecast News) - The British economy is on course to expand by 1.5% this year after the budget gave a boost to public spending but could be blown off course if Donald Trump goes ahead with threatened tariffs, a leading economic thinktank has warned. In a boost to Rachel Reeves after a bruising month of negative economic figures, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) upped its annual growth prediction from 1.2% to 1.5%. - Guardian
Tuesday newspaper round-up: OpenAI, EVs, gas prices
(Sharecast News) - Elon Musk escalated his feud with OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman on Monday. The billionaire is leading a consortium of investors that announced it had submitted a bid of $97.4bn for "all assets" of the artificial intelligence company to OpenAI's board of directors. The startup, which operates ChatGPT, has been working to restructure itself away from its original non-profit status. OpenAI also operates a for-profit subsidiary, and Musk's unsolicited offer could complicate the company's plans. The Wall Street Journal first reported the proposed bid. - Guardian

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