Shell chief Peter Voser stands down as oil company posts profit rise

Voser announces plan to leave Anglo-Dutch oil giant next year, alongside small rise in first-quarter profits to $8bn

Peter Voser, the chief executive and architect of Shell's recent financial success, has unexpectedly announced plans to stand down, less than four years into the job.

The move came as the Anglo-Dutch oil group unveiled a 4% increase, to $8bn (£5bn), in its first quarter profits and raised the dividend a further 5% to 45 cents per share.

54-year old Voser said he wanted a "change of lifestyle" and to spend more time with his family. He is scheduled to retire from Shell in the first half of next year with a pension pot worth almost $20m.

There was immediate speculation he may be lined up for the job of chairman at Swiss pharmacuetical group Roche, where he is already a non-executive director.

Meanwhile current chief financial officer, Simon Henry, said it would be "inappropriate" to comment on whether he would try to follow Voser's path from finance to the top job.

Peter Voser has been chief executive of Royal Dutch Shell for four years.

 If Henry takes over he would be the first British boss of Shell since Philip Watts left in 2004 in the wake of a scandal over the wrong booking of oil reserves.

Voser, 54, has spent almost 25 years in total at Royal Dutch Shell, having left in the middle of his career there only to return later.

On Thursday he said: "After such an exciting executive career I feel it is time for a change in my lifestyle and I am looking forward to have more time available for my family and private life," he said.

Shell's chairman, Jorma Ollila, said Voser's reign over the past four years had been "impressive", reorganising the company, delivering growth, and developing a clear forward strategy with a strong portfolio of new options.

Analysts generally agreed. Peter Hutton, energy analyst with RBC Capital Markets, said in a research note that the quarerly results were "solid" and he was full of praise for the outgoing chief executive.

"Peter Voser leaves Shell in a much stronger position than when he arrived. The company still needs to steer through LNG optionality to bring greater clarity, in our view, but he has brought real focus to the business. The testament to a strong legacy will be a smooth transition to his successor.

Neill Morton at Investec Securities added that Voser's exit was a surprise: "He is only 54 years old and Shell is portraying this is as a lifestyle choice."

Shell also reported revenues of $115bn in the first three months of 2013, roughly as much as the cost of running the NHS until the end of the year.

The $115bn revenues recorded by Shell were lower than the almost $120bn for the same quarter of 2012, although that was restated for accounting reasons.

Oil and gas production rose 2% to 3.5m barrels of oil equivalents – but that was excluding the impact of divestments, production sharing agreements and security problems onshore Nigeria.

Voser said the company had also spent $1.2bn buying back its shares in the last quarter.

The company has benefited from strong crude prices, although the global price of oil has in recent days fallen through the $100 a barrel level. This was exacerbated by weak manufacturing data from the US and China, prompting fears of a downturn in the global economy.

On a media conference call, Henry said the company was well placed for the recent fall in prices.

"We also think there are quite few players in the market, quite a few companies, who actually have bet the farm on 64.2 pounds-plus oil prices. We don't," he said. "We're structured around a lower oil price so it is not bad for us," he added.

Henry indicated that the lower oil prices might drive down asset values and give opportunities for takeovers. Shell has periodically been linked with a purchase of BP whose share price has continued to lag because of fallout from the US Gulf oil blowout.

But Simon said: "We dont look at larger companies because they come with a smorgasbord of assets that we don't want ... [we are] more focused on smaller companies."

Shell said it was pressing ahead with shale drilling from China to Argentina but was not currently thinking about fracking in Britain or Europe.

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UBS should be broken up says Knight Vinke

Group says Swiss bank should sell off its investment arm and sell it to staff

Activist investor Knight Vinke has reopened the debate about investment banking by calling on the Swiss bank UBS to sell off its casino investment banking arm to its employees.

On the day of the bank's annual meeting, the fund management group said: "We question the merits of keeping the investment bank under the same roof as the wealth management and Swiss banking businesses".

The investment bank, a major employer in the City and fined £940m for rigging Libor last year, is already being scaled back by a new management team, led by Sergio Ermotti who was installed in the fall out from the unauthorised £1.3bn trading losses caused by Kweku Adoboli, who has since been jailed for seven years.

Knight says UBS should sell of its investment banking arm.

 The division has just posted strong results for the first quarter of 2013 and Knight Vinke, which sent a representative to the annual meeting on Thursday, said this was now the moment to debate the structure of the group.

The investment bank had "nearly destroyed UBS" between 2007 and 2009 when the bank was bailed out by the Swiss authorities, said Knight Vinke, which has in the past criticised HSBC.

Knight Vinke said: "Investment banking is a very risky business and these risks pose a serious threat to UBS's wealth management and swiss banking franchises.

"They may also be preventing them from achieving their true potential. This is a discussion that is best had when all the businesses are doing well – as is the case today – and the board needs to be encouraged to act quickly and decisively so as not to lose the opportunity."

The fund manager, led by Eric Knight, suggested that the "best owners" for the investment could be its employees. Since 1998, the investment bank has paid Sfr115bn (£80bn) in salaries and bonuses to its employees but knocked a Sfr25bn hole in the entire group. "Transferring full or partial ownership of the investment bank to insiders would almost certainly lead to more prudent behaviour," Knight Vinke said.

The group voted against the remuneration report at the annual meeting at which 18% of shareholders failed to back the pay policies which included a potential £17m signing on fee for the new investment banking head Andrea Orcel.

However, this was an improvement on the 40% who had failed to support the pay awards the previous year. In response to the criticism by Knight Vinke, UBS said its shareholders had the opportunity to speak out at the annual meeting.

At the meeting "UBS confirmed that the firm is on track and comfortable with its new strategy".

"The results of the first quarter 2013 confirm that the company made significant progress and is reaping the benefits from its focus on wealth management and the Swiss bank supported by focused and de-risked investment banking activities and asset management," UBS said.

UBS has attempted to show restraint over pay since pharmaceutical company Novartis was forced to scrap a payoff of Sfr72m for its former head Daniel Vasella. There was also a national referendum which voted to ban big payouts for new and departing managers.UBS is said to have warned half its 16,000 investment bankers than they would not get bonuses and cut its total bonus pool by 7% to Sfr2.5bn.

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The economics of enough

It's time to abandon the pursuit of growth in wealthy nations and consider a new strategy – to improve quality of life without expanding consumption

It's been over five years since the global financial crisis began, and yet we are still no closer to ending it. George Akerlof, a Nobel Prize–winning economist, has provided a good analogy for the uncertainty facing economists. "It's as if a cat has climbed this huge tree—the cat of course is the crisis. My view is 'Oh my God, the cat's going to fall and I don't know what to do'." Nor is he alone in this uncertainty. The IMF's chief economist, Olivier Blanchard, warns: "We don't have a sense of our final destination."

The economics profession has lost its moorings. The traditional cure to our economic ills has always been growth. But now, despite the best efforts of all concerned, the UK economy refuses to grow. The economic tools that have been applied – lower interest rates, quantitative easing, and strict austerity – are failing. GDP in the UK is now 2% lower than when the crisis began.

Jobs fair in New York. People fear that reducing consumption will lead to fewer jobs.

 In our new book, Enough Is Enough: Building a Sustainable Economy in a World of Finite Resources, Rob Dietz and I argue that it's time to abandon the pursuit of growth in wealthy nations and consider a new strategy – an economy of enough. Suppose that instead of chasing after more stuff, more jobs, more consumption, and more income, we aimed for enough stuff, enough jobs, enough consumption and enough income.

Abandoning the pursuit of growth may seem like a radical idea, but there's a strong case to be made for it. Economic growth is causing a number of global environmental problems, ranging from climate change to biodiversity loss. At the same time, economic growth is no longer improving people's lives in wealthy nations like the UK. To continue to pursue growth for growth's sake is simply irresponsible.

Our main indicator of progress, GDP, is a measure of economic activity—of money changing hands. It doesn't tell us anything about what kind of activity is occurring. If the police came to your door and said that "activity" in your neighbourhood had increased by 3% last year, you'd want to know what kind of activity. Was it more children playing in parks, or more break-and-enters? We need to ask the same kinds of questions about GDP. Did it grow because our society became wealthier, or did it grow because we ran up huge debts and liquidated our natural assets?

The blueprint that we describe in our book is based on the contributions of over 250 economists, scientists, NGO members, business leaders, politicians, and citizens. Some call the blueprint the "new economics", some call it "degrowth", and some call it a "steady-state economy". No matter what you call it, the key idea is to develop economic policies that improve quality of life without expanding consumption. These policies include methods to reduce resource use, limit inequality, fix the financial system, create meaningful jobs, and change the way we measure progress.

Perhaps the biggest fear that most people have when they hear "no growth" is "no jobs", but the evidence for a relationship between economic growth and job creation is much weaker than you would expect and varies remarkably between countries. In the US, for example, a 3% increase in GDP tends to be accompanied by a 1% fall in unemployment. In France, the same amount of GDP growth reduces unemployment by only half a percent. In Japan, there is no relationship whatsoever. Clearly it is possible to break the connection between economic growth and unemployment; we just need the right economic policies.

What we do not need is unrelenting austerity: the best way to save the cat is not to cut down the tree. If we're serious about achieving a better life for the vast majority of people in Britain then we need a new approach – an economic model that prioritises people and planet over short-term profits. It's time to embrace the new economics and say"Enough Is Enough!"

• Dan O'Neill is a lecturer in ecological economics at the University of Leeds, and co-author (with Rob Dietz) of Enough Is Enough: Building a Sustainable Economy in a World of Finite Resources.

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RBS signals government could sell taxpayer stake next year

Bailed-out bank's chairman uses strongest language yet to talk of sale, as RBS reports first-quarter profits of £826m

Royal Bank of Scotland has given the clearest signal yet that the government is preparing to sell off part of the taxpayer's 82% stake in the bailed-out bank next year.

As the Edinburgh-based bank reported a profit of £826m for the first quarter compared with a £1.4bn loss the same time last year, its chairman, Sir Philip Hampton, said RBS could be ready for sale from the middle of 2014 – or even earlier.

At the 2012 results in February, Hampton had said the bank hoped to be ready for sale in 2014, but he used more definitive language on Friday, raising the prospect of drawing up a prospectus for shareholders "from the middle of 2014".

RBS shares were trading at 294p on Friday morning – below the 500p average price at which the taxpayer bought the stake during 2008 and 2009.

"It could be earlier. We think the recovery process will be complete in about a year or so's time," he said.

A prospectus contains all the details about the bank's financial performance and would be needed to     be sent to prospective shareholders if the shares are to be sold off.

The government will need to decide the price at which it wants to sell any shares, which closed on Thursday at 307p. This is below the 500p average price at which the taxpayer bought the stake during 2008 and 2009 – the equivalent to a £17.5bn loss.

But in March it emerged that government had reduced the average price to 407p.

The shares fell further after the results were announced to 294p, widening the loss to £19bn, partly on slower than expected growth in revenues.

Ian Gordon, banks analyst at Investec, said: "Underlying trends are weaker, with operating profit of £800m – down 28% – a £400m consensus miss. The markets division [pre-tax profit down 64%] looks awful. Fresh speculation that the UK government may start off-loading its stake in RBS and/or its 39% stake in Lloyds at a loss is negative for shareholders."

Stephen Hester, the chief executive of RBS, said the group was "back in profit … a big change on recent times".

"The cleanup mission is nearing its successful completion," he added, with £900bn taken off the bank's balance sheet which was £2.3tn at the time of its £45bn taxpayer bailout.

Hester said there had not been any recent discussions with the government about the timing of any nature of any share sell off – although there is mounting speculation that the chancellor, George Osborne, wants a sale before the election.

"It is our view that privatisation would be a terrific thing for the country both psychologically and taxpayers money be freed up for other needs," Hester said, insisting that £500bn of financial aid to RBS in the form of liquidity and toxic asset insurance had already been removed.

The £45bn of taxpayer money ploughed into the bank's shares was still "left to go" and a complete share sale would likely take a number of years.

"Privatisation is a good thing for RBS as well the country," he said. He added that the decision lay with the government, which is expected to sell off the shares in tranches, with the first one possibly at a loss.

But Hester, who said the slow economy and tougher regulations had made all bank shares less valuable, said that by the time the entire stake was sold taxpayers should get their money back.

There were still "bumps in the road", said Hester, who was parachuted into RBS at the time of the October 2008 bailout to replace Fred Goodwin.

"There is hard work still ahead for the economy and our industry. Nonetheless, our sights are set on moving RBS beyond its restructuring phase towards the ambition of building a really good bank for customers and for all we serve.

"These results show pleasing progress in delivering a strong and valuable RBS for all our stakeholders. We expect to substantially complete the bank's restructuring phase during 2014."

A number of question marks still hang over any share sale. The Prudential Regulation Authority, the new City regulator, is still in discussions with the industry about how to plug a £25bn capital shortfall it has identified across the industry. The parliamentary commission on banking standards is due to report next month and has been asking questions about whether RBS should be broken up into a good and bad bank. The proposals from the independent commission on banking to implement a ringfence between high street and investment banking still need to be implemented.

The bank did not make an additional charge for payment protection insurance on top of the existing £2.2bn, although it put aside an extra £50m for insurance rate swap mis-selling.

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Argos, Homebase and Habitat owner reports profits down for fifth year

Home Retail Group chief executive Terry Duddy hails 'good outcome to … challenging year' after 23% fall in profits

Argos has underlined the waning importance of the high street to retailers by revealing that more customers buy its products online and through click-and-collect services than by making traditional in-store purchases.

Profits at its parent, Home Retail Group, which also owns Homebase and Habitat, have fallen for a fifth consecutive year as the retail industry undergoes a transformation against a backdrop of weak consumer confidence.

Homebase stores will increasingly stock Habitat and Laura Ashley products.

 Home Retail Group reported a 23% fall in profit before tax to £99m in the 12 months to 2 March, with revenues broadly flat at £5.48bn.

Despite what he described a "challenging year", HRG's chief executive, Terry Duddy, said the transformation of Argos from a catalogue to a digital retail business was progressing, as he said like-for-like sales increased for the first time in five years, delivering a 2% rise in like-for-like revenues with underlying profits up 6% to £100m.

Duddy explained the key factor in growth was click-and-collect sales – where online purchases are collected in the shop – which now account for 30% of business.

He said: "If you go back to 2002 when we went from a telephone system for ordering products and went onto the internet for the first time, did I think that would now be 30% of our sales? No."

However, Homebase profits were washed away by poor weather last summer, with sales down nearly 5% and underlying profits halving to £11m.

With nearly £400m of cash in the bank and no debt, the company is pushing ahead with a three-year investment plan announced last October. Homebase stores will be given a facelift, and will increasingly stock products from Habitat and Laura Ashley, including a recently created range of Habitat paints, wallpapers and tiles.

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MP John Robertson calls for official tax inquiry into npower

Npower admitted to energy and climate change select committee that it had paid almost no corporation tax for three years

A row over alleged tax avoidance by npower has flared again after a member of a parliamentary watchdog called for an official investigation.

The call from John Robertson MP, who sits on the energy and climate change select committee, came as the number of people signing a petition against npower rose above 167,000.

"The taxman should establish an urgent inquiry to get to the bottom of how npower have got away with paying no tax despite making hundreds of millions of pounds in profits," said Robertson, a long-term campaigner over fuel poverty. "If npower aren't tax dodging, what possible reason can there be for a business in Britain paying money to a German company via Malta?"

 Npower admitted to his committee two weeks ago that it had paid almost no corporation tax for three years but explained that was because it could write off profits against the huge power station investments it was making.

The argument blew up again this week when German-owned n power admitted money was moving via a company it owned in Malta and revelations that the former boss of n power, Volker Beckers, was working as a non-executive director for HM Revenue and Customs.

But the company denied that the use of its Maltese financing subsidiary, Scaris Ltd, was designed to avoid paying tax in Britain and was just a way of borrowing cash to fund British investment "more efficiently."

Paul Massara, chief executive of npower, said: "The use of Malta in making payments on our financing made no difference to our UK tax contributions. Npower has not, and will not, engage in tax avoidance. Our corporation tax bill was low between 2009 and 2011 because we made losses in our retail business and invested billions into the UK."

But Richard Murphy, an accountant who runs a consultancy called Tax Research, said it remained unclear why RWE, npower's parent company, would lend money to its UK business via Malta "unless tax avoidance was its motive. The tax saving that results is very clear."

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UK's largest coal producer 'seeks voluntary liquidation'

Up to 2,000 jobs at risk after UK Coal Operations hit by £300m losses and 'disastrous' Daw Mill mine fire

Britain's largest coal miner, UK Coal, is fighting for survival as it grapples with the consequences of the devastating fire that closed its biggest colliery.

The firm refused to deny reports that it is seeking voluntary liquidation, which would allow parts of the business to continue trading, in order to avoid enforced liquidation and a full shutdown. Following the blaze at the Daw Mill colliery in March the company lost £100m of equipment, £160m of coal and ran up £35m in costs, making further restructuring inevitable.

 UK Coal said this week that it is holding talks "with a wide range of interested parties" over the future of its last two deep mines – Kellingsley in North Yorkshire and Thoresby in Nottinghamshire – as well as six open-cast mines in north and central England. The company produced 7.3m tonnes of coal in 2011, helping generate 5% of the UK's electricity.

Kevin McCullough, chief executive of UK Coal Mine Holdings, said: "Our main focus has been on preserving 2,000 jobs and securing the future of UK coal mining. Our remaining mines have been performing well since the fire at Daw Mill and we continue to work closely with our employees, government, pension funds, the Pensions Regulator, suppliers and customers. We remain positive that we have an underlying profitable business."

"There will undoubtedly be some difficult decisions as we have had to look at all possible options, but there is a good business here with 2,000 families depending on our workforce and I am confident we will be able to announce more news in the coming days." Company spokesmen did not respond to further questions.

The company announced the closure of Daw Mill in north Warwickshire with the loss of 650 jobs in March after the worst coal-mining fire in 30 years.

The fire was the latest blow to the industry following Hargreaves Services's decision last year to mothball the Maltby mine near Rotherham with the loss of 500 jobs.

Voluntary liquidation would allow a subsidiary to run the firm's surviving mines but could pass on the company's £540m pension deficit to the UK Pension Protection Fund, which would force losses on some of the company's 6,800 savers. If UK Coal fell into insolvency the workforce could see 10% of the value wiped off their pensions. The Pension Protection Fund pays 90% of a pension's value to workers yet to reach retirement age, but usually pays out 100% to existing retirees and those with long-term health problems.

UK Coal has been grappling with its pension deficit for years and recently spun off its less-risky property business, Harworth Estates, to help solve the problem in a move that won the approval of the Pensions Regulator.

"At £540m this would be one of the very largest hits for the PPF, since it opened in 2006," said John Ralfe, an independent pensions consultant. "This would wipe out half [PPF's] surplus." The PPF reported reserves of £1.06bn in 2012. "Last year's convoluted restructuring, approved by the Pensions Regulator, only managed to paper over the cracks. The devastating pit fire has brought things to a head very quickly, but with UK Coal's pension problems things were never going to end well."

A spokeswoman at the Pension Protection Fund said it was monitoring ongoing developments and liaising with other parties including the pension scheme and the Pensions Regulator.

Chris Kitchen, secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers, said it was disappointed that the government had not done more to help UK Coal, following a promise from former energy minister John Hayes in March that "the government will do all it can ... to protect the interests of [the Daw Mill] workers".

The NUM wants the government to grant closure aid to Daw Mill, which would allow mine workers to keep an enhanced redundancy package worth £12,000 more than the statutory minimum. "The minister made a statement that they wanted to help. There is a route that is open to them. But it involves the government spending money."

A spokesman at the Department for Energy and Climate Change said the government was helping Daw Mill workers find jobs through "full mobilisation of a job centre rapid response process".

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