THE DAILY BRIEFING
■ AIRLINE SOARS Budget airline Wizz Air carried more than 28m passengers sengers in 2017, 24pc up on a year earlier. In the UK it carried more than 7m passengers, up 11pc.
■ DISTRIBUTION DEAL In International tional sales and marketing firm DCC is buying Countrywide Farmers’ Far liquefied petroleum gas distribution business for £28.75m.
■ GOLD BOSS Egypt-focused gold producer Centamin’s chairman Josef El-Raghy is to retire by the end of 2018, it was announced.
■ FASHION BACKING Analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald have upgraded their price recommendation for fashion firm Superdry following a strong set of sales results.
■ DIVIDEND BONANZA European stocks will pay out a record £286bn in dividends this year as the world economy takes off, says Allianz Global Investors.
■ JEWELLER HIT Shares in Danish jeweller Pandora lost their sparkle, falling 10pc, after it said 2017 sales could well be lower than predicted.
■ PAYMENTS BOOM A record 6.3bn payments worth £4.9trillion were handled by direct debit and credit service Bacs last year.
■ SALES SLUMP Car finance sales fell 8pc in November compared to a year earlier as the auto industry slowdown continues to bite.
■ RIVAL BOUGHT Pension administrator Xafinity has bought the consulting arm of rival Punter Southall group in a £153m deal.
■ TURKEY LAUNCH Payments firm Worldpay is launching a service in Turkey through a partnership with Istanbul-based business Iyzico.
■ FUND RECORD Investors pumped a record £589bn into funds across Europe last year, according to research firm Morningstar.
■ DEAL COMPLETED Online-only lender Tandem has completed its purchase of Harrods Bank – giving it a £375m mortgage book and more than £400m of deposits.
■ TECH SWOOP google has bought 87pc of UK-based Redux, which is working on technology to turn smartphone screens into speakers.
■ DRAMA SOLD TV series See, written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight and directed by hunger games director Francis Lawrence, has been bought by Apple.