Sky's Naomi Kerbel offers a look ahead to what's coming up in the week's business news.
:: Monday 6th May
UK bank holiday
:: Tuesday 7th May
HSBC Q1 results
:: Wednesday 8th May
J Sainsbury Q1 results
:: Thursday 9th May
UK interest rate decision
:: Friday 10th May
G7 finance ministers and central bank governors summit
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The United States created 165,000 new non-farm jobs in April, with the figure beating expectations.
Hiring was much stronger in the previous two months than first thought, and the gains trimmed the unemployment rate to a four-year low of 7.5%, the official figures showed.
The Department of Labour report showed the job market is improving despite higher taxes and government spending cuts.
In addition to the April gains, the government said employers added 138,000 jobs in March and 332,000 in February. That is 114,000 more over the two months than was originally estimated.
The economy has created an average of 208,000 jobs a month from November through April, which is above the 138,000 added in the previous six months.
John Silvia, chief economist at Wells Fargo, said: "This is a good report. There's a lot of strength.
"It's good for the economy. It's good for people's income."
The stronger job growth suggests that the federal budget cutting "does not mean recession," Mr Silvia said. "It does not mean a dramatic slowdown."
The release of the figures in the US came with certain drama after a fire overnight at the department's headquarters shut down the building for most employees.
Members of the media were allowed in for the release of the report.
By Liz Lane, Sky News Reporter
Smartphones could soon become an even greater part of our lives as networks join forces to let us pay for high street goods with our mobiles.
The battle to dominate the market for "virtual wallets" is heating up, but with it come concerns about how thieves and fraudsters could take advantage.
Britain's big-three mobile networks - EE, Vodafone and O2 - are creating an opt-in service that will allow all bank, credit and loyalty card details to be stored on a phone SIM.
The customer will be able to swipe it on a card reader in a shop and instantly pay for goods.
David Sear, chief executive of Weve, the company managing the project, said: "You'll be able to pick up your goods from the counter - your sandwich or whatever it might be, on a small transaction - and simply swipe your phone, rather than having to get your card out of your wallet."
He is hoping to get retailers to sign up later this year, with the promise of advertising opportunities.
Stores will be able to send special offer alerts to customers' phones as they walk past in an effort to tempt them in.
Google, Barclays, Mastercard and Paypal have all come up with their own versions of the virtual wallet, but they have not caught on in the UK.
The contactless payment market as a whole has yet to take off, with only 6% of people in the UK having made such a transaction with a credit or debit card.
Bryan Glick, editor of Computer Weekly Magazine, describes it as a chicken and egg situation.
He said: "Retailers aren't going to offer this as a means of paying unless they know they're going to use it, but people aren't going to use it unless they know there are a lot of retailers they can use it at."
As for security, the new system will have a limit on how much can be spent on a phone without entering a Pin code.
However, cyber security expert Jason Hart said he would take further precautions before using it - including having his smartphone, and the payment system itself, password-protected.
By Mark Kleinman, City Editor
The investors which own the parent company of Yorkshire Water are poised to put a £1.5bn stake in the company up for sale.
I have learnt that shareholders led by Infracapital, the infrastructure arm of the British fund manager M&G Investments, plan to sell a 30% stake in Kelda Group, which they paid roughly £3bn to take private in 2007.
Insiders said on Thursday that Kelda, which was acquired through a vehicle called Saltaire Water, could be worth as much as £5bn now, with a 30% stake raising as much as £1.5bn.
Kelda serves a population of more than five million people as well as 130,000 businesses, according to the company.
Infracapital plans to offload its entire 13% stake in Kelda as part of the deal, while Citi Infrastructure Investors, an arm of the giant Wall Street bank, wants to cut its 37% holding to about 20%, according to sources.
If they proceed with a deal, the Kelda stake sale would be one of the largest infrastructure transactions in the UK this year, and comes as the water industry prepares for its crucial five-yearly price review in 2015.
A research note from analysts at HSBC yesterday said that the window for mergers and acquisitions in the water sector was closing because of the impending regulatory review.
Macquarie, the Australian investment bank, has been appointed to handle the sale process by Kelda' shareholders and is understood to be taking initial soundings from potential investors. Macquarie is itself the controlling shareholder in Thames Water, although it sold a minority stake to China's main sovereign wealth fund, CIC, last year.
At £1.5bn, the available stake in Kelda may be broken into smaller chunks or sold in one block, insiders said.
Infrastructure assets such as water companies have become increasingly appealing to investors seeking stable income streams, particularly since the volatility precipitated by the banking crisis.
M&G, Infracapital's parent, is owned by Prudential, the insurance group. Last year, it participated in a takeover of Veolia Water RegCo, the second largest regulated water-only company in the UK, which provides water services to more than 3.5m people in three regions of northwest London and southeast England.
The other shareholders in Kelda, Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management, and GIC, an investment fund backed by the Singaporean government, are not planning to reduce their shareholdings as part of the new process.
None of the investors in Kelda would comment today.
By Enda Brady, Sky Correspondent
Hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers' money has been wasted over the last two years as a result of poor repairs to roads dug up by contractors, according to the Local Government Association.
The latest research by the LGA estimates that the amount - £435m - would be enough to fill in the equivalent of eight million potholes.
A new taskforce - comprising councils, utility companies and business representatives - has been set up in the wake of a summit called by the LGA to try to reduce the cost and the disruption caused by roadworks across Britain.
"Most roadworks are essential and in many cases carried out efficiently and to a good standard," said Cllr Peter Box, chairman of the LGA's Economy and Transport Board.
"However, all too often the rush to get on to the next job leaves in its wake patches of shoddy resurfacing.
"Not only is the taxpayer left to foot the bill to do the resurfacing properly, it means needless frustration for motorists and thousands of pounds in lost trade for small businesses.
Some 20% of roadworks last year were considered not up to standard "For many years people have been complaining about these problems, but very little has changed. Hopefully now that the councils, utility companies and businesses have agreed to work together something will be done so the disruption and frustration of motorists and traders is kept to a minimum."
The LGA's claims are based on research by the Asphalt Industry Alliance's Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (Alarm) surveys, carried out among highways departments.
Acoording to the Alarm 2013 report, 20% of contractors' work was not up to standard last year, meaning the jobs had to be redone properly at the expense of local councils, causing more disruption and delays. This was up 3% on 2011.
Problems can also be caused by the same stretch of road being dug up by different companies in quick succession, rather than carrying out the work in the same trench.
The new taskforce will aim to use new technology to better coordinate projects and monitor the contractors' performance.
Updated: 9:18am UK, Friday 03 May 2013
By David Buik, Panmure Gordon & Co
The moment that Barclays' Rich Ricci's "Champagne Fever" charged up the Cheltenham hill on March 12 to take the opener at the Festival, I had that feeling that this would be the last time we would see Mr Ricci in that flamboyant tweed suit, as head of investment banking - he is the last vestige of the Diamond era.
The subsequent news of his bonus announced on Budget Day was the overriding evidence required that the change in Barclays' culture, promised by Messrs Walker and Jenkins, was finally being implemented.
However sometimes I feel that commentators on banking have been living on the 'Planet Zog'. Ill-informed comment such as 'casino banking' caused the capitulation of the banking sector, is just plain arrant nonsense.
It is generally acknowledged that in paying circa £26bn for ABN AMRO, RBS had bought a 'pup'. Apart from that injudicious and reckless venture, there is no evidence that investment banking triggered the banking crash of 2008, unlike the sub-prime lending efforts in the US, where investment banking played a matinee idol's role.
The UK's problems emanated from poor credit assessment which saw Northern Rock, Bradford and Bingley and HBOS collapse like a pack of cards. Also, the merger between Lloyds and HBOS was cobbled together unnecessarily with indecent haste towards due diligence. Our problems in London were exacerbated by bank balance sheets growing by gargantuan proportions with inadequate regulation.
Without any doubt at all, had Barclays Capital not contributed, apart from one year, between 50-60% of the bank's profits plus a capital injection from Qatar the 'Bald Eagle' would also have been at the behest of the taxpayer.
The public at large may not have liked the cut of Bob Diamond's jib nor the disproportionate bonuses paid. Nonetheless Barclays was a successful 'mover and shaker' in global investment banking. We should also remember that had Steve Ashley's RBS Treasury team not contributed about £9bn to profits in 2008-9 RBS would be in a very parlous state, rather than parlous.
Though some of the responsibility for Libor transgressions has been laid at the feet of investment banking, most of it and that of the huge fines and repayments made on PPI miss-selling are down to general and consumer banking.
Also, let's not conveniently forget the fines for inadequate money-laundering controls incurred by HSBC and Standard Chartered. Barclays' investment banking recently posted a profit of £1.3bn out of £1.8bn - hardly shabby.
Lloyds Banking Group posted much better than expected pre-tax profits of £1.92bn. Lloyds's continued recovery is hugely reliant on the performance of the UK's economy.
Impairment charges were cut from £1.6bn to £1bn. There is no guarantee that this trend will continue.
RBS posted its first net profit of £393m. Impairments are again down by a third to £1.03bn. Much has been achieved in the last few years.
The balance sheet is down by £900bn since 2009. RBS has ammunition to lend to SMEs. However the UK economy is still brittle; so any talk of privatising Lloyds and RBS before 2015 may be precipitous.
Next week HSBC and Standard Chartered post their interim results. Their respective results will be buoyed by significant overseas earnings and in the case of HSBC, also by investment banking revenues.
The failure by Lloyds to sell its 632 branches to the Co-op, following in the wake of Santander jilting RBS at the altar last year will come as disappointment to the Chancellor and Business Secretary Vince Cable, but as no surprise to observers in the City.
The threat of draconian EU regulation creates black cumuli nimbus clouds over the UK's banking sector. We also all understand the need for greater capital requirements. Capital would be much easier to raise without the EU sitting over London like the Sword of Damocles Also more upbeat sentiments from our political masters would be constructive.
Whilst banking competition on the high street is a laudable aspiration, getting the correct regulation of UK banks is even more important.
Though we look forward to Mark Carney's arrival at the Bank of England, he is only human and has just blood in his veins. We should not split our banks up, as Dr Cable and the Sir Mervyn King would have us do. Implementing a 'split of assets' will seriously damage London's ability to remain at the head of global finance.
We understand Antony Jenkins's rationale for changing the culture of Barclays. We just hope that Barclays has not thrown the baby out with the bath water by attempting to put investment banking on the back burner!
Homeowners with interest-only mortgages due to be paid before 2020 need to "act now" to ensure they have enough money to pay their loans back, a report says.
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) fears that consumers are under-estimating the scale of the problem, with around 260,000 people thought to have no strategy in place for repaying their loan.
Consumer campaigners also raised concerns that a "significant" number of people claimed to be unaware how their loan was meant to be paid back when they took the product out and called for further work to make sure some borrowers were not mis-sold deals.
13% of borrowers were unaware they needed an interest-only repayment plan Mortgage lenders have agreed to alert their most at-risk customers to help them avoid "payment shocks". Some of them could end up having to sell their home to pay the loan back if they do not take stronger control of their repayment planning.
Around 2.6 million interest-only mortgages are due for repayment over the next 30 years but research has revealed that one in 10 people on such a deal have no plan for paying the money back.
The report said it was not clear how well some borrowers understood the discussions about how the mortgage was meant to be repaid when they took the deal out.
Some 13% of interest-only borrowers said they were not aware when they took out the deal that they needed a plan in place to repay the whole amount borrowed, not just the interest - and a further 6% were unsure.
However, those who said they were unaware of the need for a repayment strategy were more likely to have taken out the deal longer ago and just one in 40 people (2.5%) who said they were unaware still has no repayment plan in place.
Richard Lloyd, executive director of consumer group Which?, said: "We're worried that a significant proportion of consumers say they did not know they needed a separate repayment plan on their interest-only mortgage."
The FCA said that the regulator is concentrating its efforts on making sure that the people whose interest-only mortgages are maturing will have a way of paying their loan back.
Mortgage lenders will contact homeowners considered most at risk It is thought that despite the report's findings, there are no particular jumps in mortgage complaints figures to suggest that the way that interest-only mortgages were sold was a widespread problem.
A Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) spokeswoman said that the body's focus will be on helping those who still have no strategy in place for repaying their mortgage.
Further cuts to petrol and diesel prices have been launched amid fierce competition among supermarkets.
Morrisons sparked a likely supermarket round of cuts today by announcing a reduction in its fuel prices for drivers from 3pm on Thursday.
It would take up to 2p a litre off petrol and 1p a litre off diesel costs, the company said.
The move is the latest in a series of reductions by supermarkets over the last few weeks as wholesale costs have fallen.
Morrisons petrol director Mark Todd said: "With a sunny bank holiday weekend predicted, we're expecting to see high numbers of motorists filling their tanks for family trips out.
"That's why we're passing on these savings in time for the pre-bank holiday shop."
The chief executive of Shell Peter Voser has stunned investors with a surprise announcement that he is to retire next year.
Peter Voser, who is 54, said his decision was driven by a desire for a change of lifestyle.
Voser has run Europe's top oil company since 2009 and led it to a position of sector leader in the burgeoning industry of liquefied natural gas.
He said: "After almost 10 years as CEO and CFO and more than 25 years in Shell, I have elected to retire in the first half of 2014.
"After such an exciting executive career I feel it is time for a change in my lifestyle and I am looking forward to having more time available for my family and private life in the years to come."
Shell, the last of the western world's top four oil companies to report results, joined its peers in delivering a result that topped market expectations, thanks in part to strong refining and trading performances, and despite production troubles in Nigeria and lower oil prices.
Adjusted net profit on a current cost of supply basis rose to $7.5bn (£4.82bn) in the quarter from $7.3bn a year ago.
Shell did not take a writedown on its unsuccessful Alaskan drilling programme as some analysts had expected but it was the retirement announcement which dominated talk after the results were released.
Shares rose slightly in value when the FTSE 100 opened for business.
Shell chairman Jorma Ollila praised Voser's leadership of the Anglo-Dutch company.
He said: "Peter's leadership of Shell over the last four years has been impressive, reorganising the company, delivering growth, and developing a clear forward strategy with a strong portfolio of new options.
"I have enjoyed working with Peter, in a period of great change and progress for Shell, and I wish him well for the future."
Con artists in the UK are thriving during the recession by coming up with new ways to profit from the financial misery of others, Citizens Advice has warned.
The charity said 22,000 scams were reported to it in England and Wales in the last 12 months.
Financial desperation is making people more vulnerable to scams that offer loans or employment opportunities, it added.
"Opportunistic con artists are targeting people who have fallen on hard times with offers of phoney jobs, training and debt scams," Citizens Advice said in a statement.
Typical scams include persuading victims to pay upfront fees to qualify for non-existent loans or to reserve places on fictitious professional training courses, the charity said.
Citizens Advice CEO Gillian Guy said: "Scammers have never had it so good.
"For most people the recession has been really tough but it's a different story for rogues and tricksters as they've cashed-in on other people's misfortune.
"We're seeing people who have been dealt a double-blow by losing their job and then losing money while trying to find a new one."
Citizens Advice will run a campaign throughout May to raise awareness of potential scams.
Leon Livermore, from the Trading Standards Institute, said: "Trading standards officers see first hand the impact these unscrupulous fraudsters are having on often the most vulnerable in our communities. We are working hard with other authorities to stop them."
Citizens Advice said it was worried con artists were already dreaming up new schemes to profit from proposed benefit changes, specifically the so-called Bedroom Tax and the localising of council tax support.
Apple has sold $17bn (£10.9bn) in the largest non-bank bond deal in history as it moves to placate frustrated shareholders.
The move, to raise money to pass along to investors through dividend payments and stock buy-backs, is part of an effort to reverse a 37% drop in Apple's stock price during the past seven months.
It took advantage of low interest rates through the sale despite having $145bn in cash - more than enough to cover the $100bn cash return programme.
However, most of its money sits in overseas accounts and the company doesn't plan to bring it to the US unless the federal corporate tax rate is lowered.
Raising the money through a corporate bond sale also gave Apple a tax benefit because interest payments on corporate debt are tax-deductible.
The plunge in Apple's stock has been attributed to intensifying concerns about the company's shrinking profit margins as it faces more competition in the mobile computing market.
Last week, Apple confirmed its first drop in quarterly profits for a decade.
Rajeev Sharma at First Investors Management said: "Apple made its intentions clear that this deal is for shareholder-friendly activity, but they have tremendous metrics and brand recognition.
"Apple is something everyone wants in their portfolio," he concluded.
Apple's stock added $12.66, or nearly 3% on Tuesday, to close at $442.78.
The shares have now risen by 9% since Apple announced its plan to return $100bn to stockholders.
The energy regulator is investigating six suppliers, saying they have failed to meet their targets on providing consumers with efficiency measures.
Ofgem said that while the sector had achieved 99% of energy efficiency targets set by the Government, some firms had not met their obligations to customers.
It named British Gas, Drax, Scottish Power and SSE as among the companies which had missed the targets, aimed at helping households lower their energy bills and reduce carbon emissions.
Under the measures, energy suppliers were obliged to provide customers, and in particular vulnerable consumers such as people on low incomes or the elderly, with insulation for their lofts and walls and replace inefficient boilers.
Energy firms are under pressure to help bring bills down The investigation is a sign that the Government and regulator are taking an increasingly tough stance against energy suppliers after a series of fines for mis-selling and at a time when energy bills are rising.
Ofgem said EDF Energy, Eggborough Power, E.On and nPower had all met their responsibilities.
Sarah Harrison, Ofgem's senior partner for enforcement, said: "Ofgem's role is to ensure that consumers do not lose out by the failure of firms to deliver all the help required."
Under the Consumer Energy Saving Programme, British Gas was found to have met just 62.4% of its target while Scottish Power managed 70%.
SSE, which was recently fined £10.5m for mis-selling, achieved a figure of 90.9%, the regulator said, while EDF, E.On and Scottish Power all exceeded their targets.
A senior official with rating agency Moody's has said it is not yet possible to exclude Italy from being forced to ask for a future eurozone bailout.
Moody's said it will monitor the ability of the newly formed Italian government to overhaul the economy, it told an Italian newspaper on Monday.
"We will have to verify the commitment of the new government and its ability to resolutely pursue the huge structural reforms the country needs to improve its creditworthiness," Moody's senior credit officer Dietmar Hornung told La Repubblica.
"For now the situation remains difficult," Mr Hornung said.
It said help may be needed through the European Central Bank and the European Stability Mechanism.
But Italian 10-year bond yields dropped more than 2% in early trading as markets opened and the MIB stock exchange was up more than 1.5%, on news of the government deadlock being broken.
The ratings agency said on Friday it had kept Italy's sovereign debt rating at Baa2 thanks to the country's reasonably low current cost of funding and its primary surplus.
But Moody's maintained its negative outlook for Italian sovereign debt because of prolonged economic crisis.
Last week, after weeks of political deadlock, Italy elected Enrico Letta of the centre-left to become the new prime minister.
Mr Letta, a 46-year-year-old leftist moderate, leads a broad-coalition government backed by his own Democratic Party and the conservatives of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.
A general election in February proved inconclusive, with the electorate split among three main blocs and no party winning enough of the vote to muster majorities in parliament.
The Greek parliament has voted in a new law that will allow dismissal of 15,000 civil servants as part of austerity measures imposed by the country's international creditors.
After heated debate during an emergency session, 168 deputies voted for the bill late on Sunday, with 123 voting against and one abstaining.
The opposition proved powerless to stop cuts the government insisted were needed to keep the country afloat.
On Monday the Greek finance minister also said that the Eurogroup Working Group will meet to approve a 2.8bn-euro (£2.3bn) aid tranche.
The newly agreed Greek law overturns what had been a guarantee of a job for life for workers in a notoriously bloated civil service.
Around 800 people turned up outside the parliament to protest against the measure in a demonstration called by trade unions.
The bill provides for the dismissal of 15,000 civil servants by the end of 2014, including 4,000 this year, to meet terms set by Athens's creditors for billions in bailout loans.
Civil service trade confederation Adedy condemned what it called the "politicians who are dismantling the public service and destroying the welfare state".
Private union GSEE said the bill would only worsen Greece's dire unemployment rate, which currently stands at 27%.
Slashing an unwieldy public service is a condition set by Greece's so-called "troika" of creditors - the International Monetary Fund, European Union and European Central Bank - to unlock loans of 8.8bn euros (£7.4bn).
The EU and IMF have committed a total of 240bn euros (£200bn) in rescue loans since 2010, with the heavily indebted country obliged to pursue austerity measures in exchange for the international aid it needs to avoid bankruptcy.
The new law will speed dismissal procedures, which previously made it impossible to sack civil servants and saw the public sector swell over the years as every new administration brought in its own people.
Employees who have been disciplined for corruption or incompetence and those working for one of dozens of shuttered government agencies will be the main targets.
The law, which was written in a single article to force politicians to adopt all its provisions together, also extends weekly working hours for teachers, opens a number of professions to competition and reduces a controversial property tax by 15%.
Another section creates new payment terms for unpaid taxes, intended to help the government recover billions of euros owed by indebted companies and households.
High street baker Greggs has seen its share price slide more than 7% after it issued a profit warning over poor winter trading.
Britain's biggest seller of food-on-the-go said it expected full-year profit to be down this year, partly blaming the adverse weather in January and March for keeping shoppers out of its stores.
"Although we are only four months into the year, based on current own shop like-for-like performance we believe that profits for the year are likely to be slightly below the lower end of the range of market expectations," the firm said.
It said the range for the year to December 28 was £47.5-55.2m.
Greggs said sales at stores open over a year were down 4.4% in the 17 weeks to April 27.
"We are continuing to experience lower footfall across much of the estate although average transaction values have increased marginally," it said.
Greggs said a higher proportion of promotional deals meant a slight impact on margin, a trend it expected to continue throughout the year.
The firm said total sales in the period rose 3%, helped by a net 10 new shop openings and a 2.9% increase in wholesale and franchise sales.
Shares in Greggs closed on Friday at 462.5 pence, valuing the business at 467.9 million pounds.
But by 9.15am on Monday shares had shed 33p to 429.5p.
:: Construction giant Balfour Beatty saw its share price plunge 11% on Monday after it issued a profit warning.
