Helen Thomas

Dear reader, It isn’t often that a company pays good money to criticise customers for buying its product. But that is what Eli Lilly did this week. The US pharmaceutical company — whose shares are up 130 per cent over the past year and is now a top-10 S&P 500 stock — chose the week of the Oscars to launch an advert called “Big Night”. “Some people have been using medicine never meant for them — for the smaller dress or tux, for a big night, for vanity,” it said, over shots of a sequinned gown…

Dear reader, Companies and sectors on the up tend to generate work for M&A bankers as they expand, reshape and acquire. Corporate crises, however, do the same — as bad deals of the past must be unwound or as the merits of diversification get shot down by a preference for streamlining and focus. Europe has provided several examples in recent weeks, from companies in various stages of trouble. Lex has been following the travails of Bayer and the fallout from its disastrous acquisition of Monsant…

Dear reader, Comebacks are hard to do, and even harder to do well. Pulling off a business revival, whether it is pivoting to a new opportunity (generally as a core market fades) or resurrecting a business from a scandal or mishap, is difficult stuff — full of ambitious promises, false dawns and dashed hopes. There are plenty of companies — and people — trying to find a path back at the moment. 1) The biggest fightback of them all is required from Boeing. Shares in the company are down by a qu…

Dear reader, There is always a lot to read up on after a holiday weekend — especially with the absence of the Lex newsletter last Friday as we all switched from producing commentary to consuming chocolate. Here is a bumper edition to catch up with the Lex column’s latest output. Quick links Have a great week, Helen ThomasHead of Lex

Dear reader, It is good practice in life, and journalism, to occasionally check your priors. This week the Lex column published two charts that provided reason to consider ours. The first was this one: Biotech minnow Redx Pharma this week declared its intention to delist from London’s junior market, blaming a lack of liquidity on Aim for its exit. The company’s moaning didn’t exactly stack up: it has shrinking revenues, mounting losses and a free float small enough to mean it does qualify for…

Dear reader, After a week off, I’m catching up on the Lex column’s output myself. And there is plenty to chew over. You can find all of the team’s output here, covering everything from broad investment themes to specific deals. Here are some of my picks from recent days. Catch up on the best-read Lex columns of the past week: Have a great week,Helen ThomasHead of Lex

Dear reader, Sometimes, it turns out, bankers do know what they’re talking about. In January, I questioned the talk about “green shoots” in dealmaking by US banking bosses. (In fairness, they’d been saying the same thing six months before and it had come to nought). Three months later and it feels somewhat different. Morgan Stanley’s chief executive Ted Pick this week argued that the “existential” need for dealmaking from companies was starting to usher in a recovery in investment banking. T…

Dear reader, Pity the forecasters. After an unforeseen surge in inflation, followed by a rapid escalation of interest rates and the widespread expectation of multiple rate cuts to come this year, it’s all change: traders have built up bets on the notion that the Federal Reserve could lift interest rates again this year after stronger economic data. Markets are already rattled by the prospect of a delay to rate cuts. As discussed here previously, perceived delays to rate cuts could put a damper…

Dear reader, Every business journalist holds a special affection for certain sectors or companies that they covered at important moments in their career. (The reverse is also true: I covered investment banks for this column in New York in 2008 and 2009. Enough said.) Commercial property is one of those sectors for me, thanks to a couple of years as a young reporter roaming the UK writing about the sheds market in various regions. Sheds — or old-school warehousing — have been reinvented as the…

BlackRock, Norges and GIC are among the investors signed up to back a listed private equity vehicle from the founders of Melrose Industries, in a float this week that will come as a welcome boost to the London market. Simon Peckham, chief executive of Rosebank Industries, told the Financial Times that the new shell company would initially list on London’s junior Aim market. But the founders expect Rosebank to move quickly to the main market once it starts buying companies, probably reaching the…