Author: SKYNEWS

The London Stock Exchange is in talks about a deal to boost its offering to retail investors by taking over parts of PrimaryBid, one of the hottest British fintech start-ups of recent years.Sky News has learnt that the LSE is in advanced discussions to license the retail capital-raising technology pioneered by PrimaryBid, as well as its regulated dealmaking activities and key UK operations. Alongside its discussions with the LSE, City sources said that Sir Donald Brydon, the veteran businessman who used to chair the stock exchange’s parent company, is to step down as chairman of PrimaryBid.Sir Donald joined the company…

African elephants have names for each other that are spoken through rumbles, scientists have found, in a “really exciting” discovery.It’s the first time an animal has been discovered creating individual names for each other, instead of just mimicking the other’s noises like parrots and dolphins do. “It’s really exciting,” said Dr Joyce Poole, scientific director of ElephantVoices, who was part of the team that made the discovery that was published in the Nature Ecology & Evolution journal.”Elephants live in a pretty complex society. They’re quite a bit like ourselves [in that] families are not together all the time, they split…

Comedians Sophie Duker, Grace Campbell and Alexandra Haddow have pulled out of Latitude Festival in protest over event sponsor Barclays’ ties to the Israel-Hamas war.They follow in the footsteps of musical acts including Irish singer-songwriter CMAT, who announced last week that she would no longer be performing at the Suffolk festival. Duker shared a photo of her at a previous Latitude Festival, along with a short video explaining that she would no longer be performing as long as Barclays were the sponsor, despite it being “magical for me in the past”.She said she believed the bank was “profiting from the…

If a company says there is no fault with your heat pump dryer but the issue continues, what can you do?That was the simple version of a question asked by Money blog reader Donna Adams from Dumfries… “I purchased a new Candy heat pump dryer from AO in December thinking I was making a more environmentally ethical purchase than a cheaper condenser or vented dryer. I carried out research and was satisfied with AO and Candy’s description of drying time being a ‘little longer’.”Fast forward to February I could stand it no longer and called Candy to discuss a “fault”…

Since ChatGPT was launched to the public in 2022, Apple has said little publicly about generative artificial intelligence (AI).That was until Monday, when its chief executive announced a series of AI products, including a deal with the makers of the chatbot and its own personalised AI system called “Apple intelligence”. Apple Intelligence is a collection of features that includes text and image generation and an improved Siri voice assistant, which will be supported by integrating the already popular ChatGPT into the company’s phones.The new product has already faced criticism over the security implications of allowing Siri to mine information from…

Tata Steel says it will press ahead with plans to return to profitability at its Port Talbot steelworks, no matter who forms the next government.The India-based firm was responding to media reports Labour was hoping to coax a U-turn at the UK’s biggest steelworks, should it win the day on 4 July. Tata confirmed in April almost 2,800 roles would go under a transition from so-called virgin steel to greener steel.It would see both labour intensive blast furnaces switched off by September and soon replaced with cleaner electric arc technology under a £1.25bn investment.Money latest:The most and least affordable areas…

Following a drab year for UK stock market flotations in 2023, there was a real shot in the arm for sentiment for the London Stock Exchange this morning, with the affordable computer supplier Raspberry Pi getting off to a rip-roaring start to life as a public company.Shares in the business were priced at 280p each – at the top of the range published prior to the Initial Public Offering (IPO) – which valued Raspberry Pi at £541.6m. Within minutes of conditional trading beginning, though, the shares had soared to as high as 392p each.The successful debut will raise hopes that…

Presenter Dr Hannah Fry has paid tribute to her ‘modest’ colleague Michael Mosley, revealing he once saved the life of a woman.Dr Fry – who co-presented The Great British Intelligence Test and a Coronavirus Special alongside Mosley – spoke about his “extraordinary” actions on The One Show. She lent her voice to the host of celebrities who have paid tribute to the TV doctor, who was found dead on the Greek island of Symi four days after he went missing.The body of the 67-year-old, who was a familiar face thanks to his regular appearances on TV programmes including The One…

YouTube star Ben Potter has died aged 40 “in an unfortunate accident,” his wife has announced.She said Potter, an American comic book creator known as Comicstorian, died on Saturday. He had a YouTube following of more than three million subscribers.Nathalie Potter, his wife, wrote on X: “To many of you, he was Comicstorian, voicing stories from across multiple different mediums. To his loved ones, he was one of the best and most supportive individuals anyone could ask for.”As a husband, a son, a brother, a friend, or even just a stranger, Ben was loving and genuine. He was someone who…

A factory in China is developing hyper-realistic humanoid robots that could be used in psychotherapy and counselling.In the factory in China’s northeastern coastal city of Dalian, neck-length silicone masks lie alongside silicone arms and feet, while disembodied heads sit on display and humanoid robots in various stages of construction stand nearby. Drawings of robot designs adorn a wall. Image: An employee checks his mobile phone as he walks past displays of robot heads, at the office of humanoid robots developer Ex-Robots in Dalian, Liaoning province. Pic: Reuters Humanoid robots are the most complex type of robot to build and these…