The dastardly Mr Deedes

London Stock Exchange chief executive Xavier Rolet’s pledge to continue in his £6.6m-a-year role, despite the humiliating collapse this week of his proposed £21bn merger with Deutsche Boerse, is absurd. But some LSE investors are far keener to see the back of the anonymous chairman, ex-banker Donald Brydon, whom they regard as a classic City placeman. Courtly Brydon, 71, does seem a magnet for plum roostings. He previously chaired Royal Mail during its cack-handed privatisation, where he was pocketing £200,000 for a twoday week.

Castigated for its cosy tax arrangements, slammed over its failure to shut down extremist videos, has Google now decided on a change in strategy? Its PR firm, Portland Communications, run by Tony Blair’s ghoulish ex-propagandist Tim Allan, has finally been given the flick.

Theresa May signed her historic letter invoking Article 50 using a £400 gold-nibbed fountain pen, which was handcrafted by American firm Parker. Its manufacturing base was in Newhaven, East Sussex, until 2011, when it moved production to France at the cost of 200 jobs. A British-made Conway Stewart might have been better in the circumstances. Goldman Sachs’s London staff received a voicemail early last Friday from the bank’s European chief Richard Gnodde, reassuring them no big changes were imminent following the triggering of Article 50. Bankers usually earmark

Thursday nights for ‘entertaining’ clients. Those waking squiffy-eyed to a voicemail from the boss must have felt their pulses jolt a notch or two.

Forget gold or the stock market. According to a study, one of the best investments of the past 35 years has been a Hermes’ Birkin handbag. The fancy bags, which cost between £10,000 and £250,000, have risen in value 14.2pc a year since their creation in 1981. The design takes its name from English actress Jane Birkin, 70, to whom Hermes still pays an annual royalty of £30,000, which she donates to charity.

Have you any gossip for our City diary? Email: mrdeedes@dailymail.co.uk