Quoted against the dollar in this way, the euro is worth more than one, and therefore might be seen to denote superiority.
Furthermore, because the euro was expected rapidly to establish reserve currency status, and strengthen against the dollar, this method of quotation would more easily illustrate rising value and therefore increased superiority Embarrassingly, it hasn’t worked out that way The euro has been sinking ever since it was launched. The difference might seem an unimportant one, but for the pompously minded men of Europe, it has (or rather had) a certain symbolic significance. The formal declaration will have to wait until we can be absolutely sure.. HOISTED BY their own petard. Compared to the scale of boom and bust Britain experienced in the 1980s and early 1990s, this is quite an achievement on the part of policy-makers.

Furthermore, revisions of preliminary data are frequent and large and it might be unwise to put too much faith in yesterday’s figures.But even assuming the worst, it is hard to see the UK economy suffering more than two or three quarters of marginally negative growth. But economists draw comfort from all sorts of anecdotal evidence that services are now picking up again.
This evidence ranges from the informal, the reappearance in London’s restaurant and shop windows of help-wanted notices, to the more formal – pick-ups in confidence in the biggest business surveys. The housing market has certainly perked up, as net lending and house price figures show.The biggest remaining worry is how much the strong exchange rate could yet damage exports. It is still just about possible that this could still tip the whole economy into recession. Services output grew even more slowly in the first quarter than in the final months of 1998. Better still, the figures indicated that the pace of decline in manufacturing has eased. Unlike other areas of the economy, manufacturers have indeed suffered a recession – technically defined as two successive quarters of falling output – but they now appear to be pulling out of it despite the strong pound.

The reason is one of relief; the vast majority of economists think the slowdown in January to March is as bad as it is going to get We have, they think, achieved the proverbial soft landing. The deal, worth about pounds 12m, is thought to be the largest-ever sponsorship for a UK football club.. THE BRITISH economy expanded by less in the first quarter of this year than any other quarter since the tail-end of the last recession Yet yesterday’s figures were greeted with remarkable cheer. It said in March that its search for a backer had failed and could no longer continue to trade due to its financial troubles.SHARES IN Arsenal Football Club soared 10,000p to 210,000p yesterday after the Ofex-traded company announced a new three-year sponsorship deal with the computer group Sega.The contract allows Sega to publicise Dreamcast, its new video games console, on the Gunners’ home and away shirts from next season.

The company, which produced up to 3,000kg of ice per hour at its Peterborough plant, bowed out unchanged at 112.5p.Seal Ice had a market value of over pounds 1.6m and sales of pounds 390,000. The convenience store operator, Dawn Til Dusk, sunk 21.5p lower to 75p after announcing the closure of its “Liquorzones” shops and predicting profits “significantly below” expectations.The mattress maker Relyon Group sunk 55p to 242.5p after blaming the poor furniture market for a shortfall in profits.The textile group Dawson International unravelled 2.5p lower to 18p after talking of a tough trading environment.SEAQ VOLUME: 929mSEAQ TRADES: 76,343GILTS INDEX: n/aSEAL ICE, a maker of ice cubes, yesterday appointed a liquidator and withdrew from the junior Ofex market. The reclining chair maker, known to have received an approach, rose 13.5p to 112p.The Coke bottler, Coca-Cola Beverages, fizzed 9p higher to 117p on evidence of a buoyant market for the sticky stuff. The activist fund manager PDFM owns a large stake and could be looking for a buyer.Another company in the PDFM stable, Cornwell Parker, rose on talk that a bid was near. Hickson, a long-suffering chemical group, was also in demand It closed 8p higher at 58.5p as old bid talks resurfaced. The supermarket slid 1.5p to 191.5p, while the owner of B&Q was 12.5p higher at 822p. The rumour of a strike by Wal-Mart for Safeway grew stronger as it emerged that Tony Blair had met with an executive of the US giant.

The UK group closed 14.25p up at 279p.The mid-cap was in indecisive mode, ending 7.8 points lower at 5,784.5. Royal Bank of Scotland, its most likely partner, was unruffled, closing 1p up at 1,411p.British Energy powered 17.5p ahead to 550.5p amid talk of a pounds 400m share buyback. The company could be spurred to return the cash after failing to buy one of the power stations put up for sale by PowerGen.Asda and Kingfisher survived – almost unscathed – news of a Stock Exchange probe into share dealings before the announcement of their merger. Reed International suffered the same fate and closed 17p down at 522p.Bid talk returned to swirl around Barclays. The leaderless bank rose 54p to 1,933p after the outgoing chairman, Andrew Buxton, said that it was open to merger talks.