Since the lockdowns, gardening has not been considered eccentric. It has returned to the centre of life, not just for the over-50s. During most of the Easter break and on bank holiday, I was kneeling in flower beds without being considered odd. I was not even praying. I have been rethinking eccentricity while reading Todd

The risk of a slowdown in the UK housing market is growing as interest rate rises by the Bank of England, the threat of recession and soaring inflation put a squeeze on household finances, economists warned. The BoE increased its main interest rate on Thursday by a quarter point to 1 per cent to curb

This week, the economic mood music changed into a more anxious minor key, as recent shocks to developed world economies have echoed longer and louder than had been expected. Whatever you thought about the economy a week ago, you should be a little more worried than you were. Inflation has been grinding up for a

Petrol station operator EG Group is attempting to buy convenience store chain McColl’s business out of administration, after the crisis-hit retailer rejected a rescue bid from Wm Morrison. Blackburn-based EG, whose owners also control Asda, has been pressing for a swift deal, one person with knowledge of the matter said, as it seizes on the

“Nothing grows under big trees,” Constantin Brancusi said when he fled his job as Rodin’s assistant in 1907. Was it freedom from being French — from Rodin’s suffocating influence — that liberated eastern European artists to take the lead in Modernist sculpture? Converging on Paris in the early 20th century were Brancusi from Romania, Chaim

Yesterday, CNBC was able to roll out its “MARKETS IN TURMOIL” package, and honestly, it felt appropriate. Stocks went into a sudden and mysteriously violent tailspin on Thursday. After rising 3 per cent on Wednesday after Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell indicated that the central bank wasn’t contemplating raising rates by more than 50 basis

Messing with the nation’s Full English breakfast is tantamount to blasphemy. But that may be on the table. The pig farmers’ trade body warns that empty shelves beckon if the UK’s biggest supermarket fails to raise bacon prices. A flashpoint throughout the pandemic, pig farming ails from similar woes to makers of cars and semiconductors:

The owner of the Times Square building, where the New Year’s Eve Ball drops each December before tens of thousands of revellers, will invest $500mn in its renovation in another vote of confidence in a New York City neighbourhood trying to recover from the pandemic. Jamestown, the real estate firm that redeveloped New York’s Chelsea

Some see their seventies as a time to sail the world, write a book or simply sit back. Others will still be paying off their mortgages. UK bank NatWest last month joined the pack hoping to serve the latter camp, launching home loans that can be repaid up to age 75. Some lenders go still

The writer is professor of finance at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business A perfect economic storm engulfs industrial countries. Even before the pandemic, US-Chinese geopolitical rivalry impeded global trade and cross-border investment. The pandemic skewed demand towards bicycles and away from gym memberships. Then rolling lockdowns across the world disrupted production of

The US economy continued to add jobs at a rapid pace last month even as employers struggled with a shortage of workers and demands for higher wages, giving the Federal Reserve further ammunition to increase interest rates to fight soaring inflation. Non-farm payrolls grew by 428,000 in April, according to data released by the Bureau

Tesla has agreed a long-term deal to buy nickel from global miner Vale as the carmaker looks to secure the raw materials needed for its batteries. Nickel is needed for the most powerful lithium-ion cells used in electric vehicles and the supply agreement with the Brazilian group marks the latest move by Elon Musk’s group

The writer is the FT’s architecture and design critic The London Underground is one of the great exemplars of urban branding. Along with the New York skyline and the Eiffel Tower, it exemplifies the city through a language of familiar signs and symbols: the roundel, the early modernist lettering, the designs of the stations from

The writer is a former Russian minister of foreign affairs and author of ‘The Firebird: The Elusive Fate of Russian Democracy’ I grew up in Moscow believing that Ukrainians were people just like everyone else. I learnt that the call by the government of the Soviet Union for the people to rise up against Nazi

Vodafone, the UK telecoms group under pressure from an activist investor, has strengthened its board with two appointments including the former chief executive of Arm. Simon Segars, who stepped down as head of the UK-based chip business three months ago and Delphine Cunci, an industry heavyweight in France, will join Vodafone’s board as non-executives after

The writer is literary editor of The Spectator I have only one general principle in life, which is that If Jacob Rees-Mogg thinks something is a good idea — or, at least, says so publicly — then I’m against it. So it is with the return to the office. The Brexit opportunities and government efficiency

A friend sends me a photo of a packet of pak choi with a large Gucci label on it alongside a rather lovely Louis Vuitton box with some pretty cakes in it. Later she sends another of some apples and bread spilling out of a Chanel bag. The pictures have, she tells me, come from

It took a devastating combination of the pandemic, war in Ukraine and a central banking U-turn on inflation to do it. Since the turn of the year the rules of the game in markets have been dramatically upended. Gone are those notorious acronyms Fomo (fear of missing out), Tina (there is no alternative to higher

Dear reader, The tech sector mauling is not over yet. On Thursday, the tech-heavy Nasdaq index fell 5 per cent — the sharpest decline since June 2020. The S&P 500 is down 13 per cent this year. There is little the tech industry can do about decades of low interest rates coming to an end.

It must have been the nerves. When the hostess at HanGawi asked me to remove my shoes, I couldn’t. I was at the Korean restaurant to meet Ocean Vuong, author, literary darling, MacArthur genius, rare celebrity poet and, I noticed, a bit of a fashion plate. But with one frantic tug, my boot laces turned