Business

The new owners of Chelsea Football Club would be prevented from paying dividends or taking management fees for a decade under a package of measures designed to avoid the controversies which have dogged Manchester United since the Glazers’ takeover in 2005. Sky News can exclusively reveal that a consortium majority-funded by private equity firm Clearlake

The billionaire brothers behind one of Britain’s biggest fuel retailing empires are close to sealing a last-ditch swoop on McColl’s Retail Group that could lead to thousands of job losses. Sky News has learnt that EG Group was putting the finishing touches on Friday to a takeover of McColl’s through a pre-pack administration that would

Sir Jim Ratcliffe has tabled a last-minute £4.25bn bid to buy Chelsea. The Ineos boss is understood to have held talks with chairman Bruce Buck on Thursday, and submitted what now represents the biggest offer for the Premier League club on Friday. The 69-year-old businessman explored in detail a possible bid for the Stamford Bridge

A Californian private equity firm has edged closer to becoming the new majority-owner of Chelsea Football Club after securing a period of exclusivity to clinch a deal. A group spearheaded by Todd Boehly, the LA Dodgers part-owner, overcame opposition from rival consortia on Friday to land preferred bidder status in the battle to replace Roman

Additional financial support has been announced for industry using high quantities of electricity as costs hit record highs and harm competitiveness. The government said it was extending the Energy Intensive Industries Compensation Scheme for another three years and more than doubling its budget in the face of the financial pain being felt. More than £2bn

The final three suitors for Chelsea Football Club have been handed an eleventh-hour demand to stump up £500m more to buy last season’s Champions League-winners – just days before the potential anointment of a preferred bidder. Sky News has learnt that the trio of billionaire-studded consortia were informed in the last 48 hours that Roman

Facebook’s parent company has reported its weakest revenue growth for a decade but witnessed a recovery in its share price following a torrid 2021 to date for the company. Meta Platforms recorded revenue of $27.9bn between January and March – slightly below what Wall St had expected. The company had warned at the time of

Russia is suspending natural gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria. Gas deliveries through the Yamal-Europe pipeline are set to come to a halt on Wednesday morning, officials in Warsaw said. Poland’s state gas company, PGNiG, said on Tuesday it had been told of the move by Russian gas giant Gazprom. Gazprom also informed Bulgarian state

Three lifeboats have been launched to help a P&O ferry that has developed a “mechanical issue” in the Irish Sea. The European Causeway “lost all power”, the RMT union said. It is currently five miles off the coast of Larne, according to tracking website Marine Traffic. P&O tweeted that tugs from Larne and Belfast had been deployed

Interest payments on the national debt rose to their highest level ever last year, as the UK’s public finances reel from the huge cost of the pandemic.  The government’s statistics department said the debt pile stood at £2.3tn last month, with interest payments rising to nearly £70bn, a record amount according to the Office of

The first year of the UK’s post-Brexit trade agreement with the European Union (EU) saw firms on the continent lose a greater percentage volume of trade than exporters from the UK, according to research. The study of 1,200 products, by the Centre for Economic Performance (CEP) at the London School of Economics and Political Science,

Oil prices have hit near two-week lows, with analysts pointing to events in China and the US as possible reasons for a fall in demand. The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, was down by $3.15 or 3% early on Monday, falling to $103.50 a barrel. Earlier in the session, it hit $103.41 –

For most people, price hikes at the petrol pump and supermarket checkout have not been matched by proportionate salary rises. Inflation is expected to outpace pay growth until the end of 2023, according to official government forecasts. But in a few jobs, wages are keeping up with the cost of living. Sky News analysis of

Rishi Sunak will this week attempt to put his recent political troubles behind him when he courts City figures at a Conservative donors’ dinner designed to bolster party finances. Sky News has learnt that the chancellor will speak at the event in central London on Tuesday evening, with guests being charged £10,000 for a 10-person

Supermarkets across the UK have placed limits on how much cooking oil that customers can buy due to supply-chain problems caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Most of the UK’s sunflower oil comes from Ukraine, which has resulted in restrictions applying to that product as well as olive and rapeseed oils at some supermarkets. Tesco