MORE CONSUMERS MAKING SWITCH TO MOBILE BANKING - Irish consumers are increasingly switching from online to mobile banking, according to figures published for the first time by the Banking & Payments Federation.
The data, for the first half of 2014, shows more than one in three of all online and mobile banking payments are being done on smartphones or tablets, writes the Irish Times. As consumers increasingly eschew their laptop or desktop computer in favour of doing their banking on the move, online banking payments are on the decline, with such payments falling by 5% from Q1 2014 to Q2, or by 10.1% in the year to June 30th. But despite the move to mobile, figures from the EU shows the Irish are still moderate consumers of online banking, with 50-75% of internet users engaging in online banking, similar to the UK and France, but ahead of Spain and other southern European countries. The Netherlands has embraced online banking more than most EU countries, with more than 75% of internet users banking online. According to the data from the BPF, customers made 14.2 million online and mobile banking payments in the second quarter of 2014, up by 1% from Q1, or by 35% from June 2013, showing the continued move away from in-branch banking. Of these, 4.8 million, or 33%, were made on a mobile device, up by 14% from 4.2 million in the first quarter of 2014.
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GREENCORE THE EARLY FAVOURITE AS KERRY OFFLOADS FROZEN FOODS - Kerry Group is in talks to sell off its frozen foods division, as it looks to focus on more lucrative parts of its business. The food and ingredients giant is said to have put the "for sale" sign up on its frozen foods arm, which has been one of the hardest hit parts of its business since the downturn, says the Irish Independent. The frozen foods sector has some of the tightest margins in food manufacturing, with consumers being particularly agnostic about what brands they use. Kerry's division is thought to have been struggling for some time. Market experts estimate it accounts for about 4% of the consumer foods arm of the company. Last year, consumer foods generated about €1.7 billion in revenue. That contrasts sharply with the company's ingredients and flavours business, which has been the main driver of the group's profits over the last decade. Ingredients and flavours accounted for more than 80% of the company's profits in 2013, and that proportion is likely to be higher this year. Kerry is believed to have appointed advisors to find a buyer for the business. While Kerry looks to offload the business, it may yet stay in Irish hands. Dublin head-quartered Greencore is one of the biggest players in the frozen ready-meals business and would be a natural suitor for the business.
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GOLDMAN SACHS LEADS $15m FINANCING OF DATA SERVICE FOR INVESTORS - Goldman Sachs has emerged as the largest investor in a financial analytics start-up that enables institutions to mine a wealth of big data, underscoring Wall Street’s drive to tap new technology, says the Financial Times. Goldman led a $15m round of financing in Kensho, an analytics platform that can instantly answer millions of complex financial questions by automating previously human-intensive research. The bank will roll out the platform across its business as well as to some of its big clients. Kensho, which has been likened to a Siri-style service for investors, analysts and traders, enables them to ask questions such as, “What happens to US homebuilder stocks if a category three hurricane makes landfall?” Analysts said Goldman was probably seeking to save on costs while also tapping into a wealth of so-called “unstructured” data. Such information involves text as opposed to the numeric “structured” data that have traditionally been easier for computers to digest. Research scientists estimate that 80% of all data come in unstructured form; being able to quickly analyse this wealth of information is the holy grail for banks seeking to use big data to augment their business.
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UK SUPERMARKET PRICE WAR TURNS SMALLER FOOD SUPPLIERS INTO 'CANNON FODDER' - UK food producers have become cannon fodder in the bitter supermarket price war, according to accountancy firm Moore Stephens, which found 28% more specialist manufacturers have gone into insolvency this year than last. In the year to September, 146 food producers went into insolvency, including wholesale bakeries, pasta makers, fish processors and ready meal manufacturers, writes the Guardian. In one of the larger cases, 170 jobs were lost when Sussex-based fresh pasta maker Pasta Reale went into administration in August after it lost three major supermarket contracts in a year. Duncan Swift, head of the food advisory group at Moore Stephens, said: “The supermarkets are going through the bloodiest price war in nearly two decades and are using food producers as the cannon fodder. UK supermarkets are trying to compete on price with Aldi and Lidl but with profit margins that are far higher than these discount chains. “To try and make the maths work, the big supermarkets are putting food producers under so much pressure that we have seen a sharp increase in the number of producers failing.” The rise in insolvencies among food suppliers is in stark contrast to the 8% fall in liquidations in the economy as a whole over the same period.
