Finance- Sophie Wilson

Stock markets are growing. New markets are appearing in less developed countries to rival traditional stock markets, meaning stock markets are expanding all over the world. There has also been advances specifically in UK financial markets, caused by a number of things: increases in rapid changes in ICT; emergent of new types of trading, impacting on the modern market place; deregulation of financial markets; institutionalisation. One thing that is important for any stock market in any country is that it is efficient; no investors will be interested in getting involved in any stock market that is not efficient and fair.            What is meant by stock market efficiency? Put simply, in an efficient market, no trader is better off than any other. Neither technical nor fundamental analysis can yield risk-adjusted excess returns, only insider information can result in outsized risk-adjusted returns. No trader has the opportunity to ga...

Two friends from university, Will and Henry, seemed to engage all the dragons when presenting their business idea ‘Look After My Bills’. The site minimises the price people pay for their gas and electric by automatically switching to the best deal and best provider for them every year. Although the dragons were keen on the idea of the business, they were not as keen on the offer of just 1% stake in the company for £90,000.             For me, the most interesting aspect of the business is that the aim is purely to save the public money; not letting big energy companies take advantage of customers and fail to give them the best deals. We learn that one of the partners Will, was previously a member of the Green Party and realised during his time there, that this is what big energy companies try to do. Has this been done before? Is this not just another price comparison site? Will and Henry make it clear in the pitch that this is ver...