The dastardly Mr Deedes

Mark Carney allowed the LBGT rainbow flag to be hoisted over the Bank of England to mark last weekend’s gay pride celebrations. Wonder if Bank of England staff, currently preparing to strike over a pay dispute, are charmed by the governor’s posturing? The Spectator claims morale in Threadneedle Street is at rock bottom under Carney’s ‘humourless’ tenure. Gay pride can come before a fall, dear!

City grandee Sir Mike Rake faces BT shareholders for the final time tomorrow when he hosts his last annual general meeting before departing in November. Thanks to the Italian accountancy scandal which wiped £8bn off BT’s share price in January, gentlemanly Sir Mike, 69, should be in for a lively morning. As chairman of Worldpay he’s already had a kicking this week for agreeing to a £9bn takeover by US competitor Vantiv, so at least his tin hat’s at the ready.

Surly, no frills Deutsche Bank boss John Cryan, 56, on bank chiefs: ‘When I started in the financial world, nobody knew the names of the men who ran banks. They were anonymous and worked in the back- ground. Thereupon we should return.’ A voice of reason among a sea of poseurs.

Goldman Sachs president David Solomon is selling his 83- acre mansion in Colorado’s fashionable Aspen for £28m. Solomon, 55, is considered a shoe-in to succeed Goldman’s £20m-ayear chief Lloyd Blankfein, though the way he’s going some would think he was planning for retirement. Only recently he offloaded his palatial Manhattan apartment for £17m.

Rosewood Hotels has reopened Paris’s Hotel de Crillon following a four-year refurbishment costing £389m. I’ll be curious to see what Parisien boulevardiers make of its Karl Lagerfeld designed suites, apparently inspired by Herr Lagerfeld’s pampered cat Choupette, as well as the promise of live performances by DJs. The Evening Standard’s Paris correspondent Sam White, who phoned his sparkling columns in from the Crillon bar for nearly 40 years before his death in 1988, will be turning in his grave.