The likelihood of us being allowed to buy anything in the textile

“The likelihood of us being allowed to buy anything in the textile sector is remote I think, to be honest we’ll grow what we’ve got But we’ll see what turns up. The biggest opportunity at the moment is the cost of money [with interest rates at 48-year lows]. I don’t see money becoming expensive for two to three years.”. The value of the pound is no longer a major obstacle to joining the euro, the Governor of the Bank of England said yesterday as sterling plunged through another key support level.

Sir Edward George told MPs the exchange rate was “more acceptable” than it had been a year ago although the exact rate would be a “matter of judgement”. “Whatever it was a year ago it’s certainly more acceptable now.”Asked what he thought would be the appropriate rate at which to join, Sir Edward replied with a laugh: “Heaven knows, it is a real art and will come to a lot of different answers.”Britain in Europe, the pro-euro lobby group, said the Governor had confirmed that the pound was moving in the right direction.”Eddie George’s comments will be a deep disappointment to anti-Europeans who have long maintained that the over-valuation of sterling is a barrier to Britain joining the euro,” its campaign director Simon Buckby said.But the No Campaign said Sir Edward had highlighted the difficulty in deciding what was the appropriate exchange rate. “The important thing is to have a long period of exchange rate stability but, instead there has been substantial volatility since the euro was launched and this reflects the differing needs of our economy,” its director George Eustice said.The value of the pound against a basket of currencies fell below the key 100 level and to its lowest for more than four years yesterday. Against the euro it came within a whisker of breaking through the 69p level – equivalent to DM2.83.Adam Cole, a senior currency strategist at Cr?t Agricole Indosuez, said the pound could easily hit 70p. “It is a relatively short-term phenomenon but it won’t go away in a hurry,” he said.He added that the pound had fallen because of a combination of fears over the implications of a war with Iraq and continued fallout from last month’s interest rate cut.But Mr Cole said assuming a short, sharp war restored global confidence and the Government ruled out a referendum on the euro in the current parliament, the pound would rally “I think 65p is a realistic expectation,” he said..

Thistle Hotels has rejected a £555m takeover bid from its biggest shareholder, the Singaporean investment company BIL International, as “opportunistic”. Shares in Thistle rose 3 per cent to 122p on speculation that BIL’s move would flush out other bidders. BIL intends to retain Thistle’s £367m net cash pile as well as the final dividend of 3.4p per share.David Newbigging, Thistle’s chairman, said the offer was at a “wholly inadequate premium.” He added: “It totally fails to recognise the underlying value of Thistle.”It emerged yesterday that BIL, which has two representatives on Thistle’s board, had been responsible for the hotel group’s failure to return its net cash to shareholders. “The views of BIL were highly influential in the decision to retain this cash within the company,” Thistle said, adding that it was looking at ways to maximise shareholder value.Arun Amarsi, BIL’s chief executive, said Thistle, which was floated by BIL in 1996, had “not performed to expectations .. In good times it lagged other hotels. As a listed vehicle it is not working.” To avoid a conflict of interest, Mr Amarsi and Tan Sri Quek Leng Chan, BIL’s chairman, who both sit on Thistle’s board, have not been involved in any discussions about the offer.Analysts said the bid was at a huge discount to the group’s net asset value of 211p per share “It’s not a serious offer. It’s an insult to Thistle shareholders,” Mark Abramson, at Bear Stearns, said.William Claxton-Smith, at Insight Investments, which has a 4 per cent stake, said he would back Thistle. Another top 10 investor called the move, which came one day after Hugh Osmond launched a £5.6bn hostile bid for Six Continents, a wake up call for hotel groups “It is about getting the bidding going.