A round-up of today's other stories in brief.
HBOS names 38-year-old as new chief
One of the UK's largest banks, HBOS, which owns Royal Bank of Scotland (Ireland), has named 38-year-old Andy Hornby as its new chief executive.
He is currently head of its UK retail business and will replace James Crosby from July.
Mr Hornby, who joined Britain's biggest mortgage lender in 1999, has long been seen as the heir apparent for the top job. Yesterday he said his strategy would be "more of the same going forward".
Educated at Oxford and Harvard, Mr Hornby will be the youngest chief executive of a big UK bank and one of the youngest to head a FTSE 100 firm, though he is older than James Murdoch at pay-TV firm BSkyB and Simon Wolfson at retailer Next. - (Reuters)
Oracle appoints Ireland director
Oracle, the software company, has appointed Paul O'Riordan as its new managing director for Ireland.
Mr O'Riordan takes over the role from Nicky Sheridan, who has been appointed managing director of Oracle South Africa.
Mr O'Riordan joined Oracle over three years ago as consulting director. Prior to joining Oracle, Mr O'Riordan held senior roles in Fusion Business Solutions, Irish Distillers and Accenture.
Ryanair sees 26% rise in passengers
Low-fares airline Ryanair carried more than 33 million passengers last year, a 26 per cent rise on the 2004 total, it was announced yesterday.
Last year's figures were boosted by a 29 per cent rise in passengers last month. The low-cost carrier counted 2.8 million passengers in December 2005 compared with 2.1 million in December 2004.
Ovoca stake in Norplat diluted
IEX-listed exploration group Ovoca Gold said yesterday that its stake in gold mining group Norplat had been reduced to 64 per cent following the issue of new Norplat shares.
Prior to the sale of 10 million new ordinary Norplat shares, which raised £600,000 (€869,632), Ovoca's shareholding stood at 78 per cent. Ovoca still retains the right to acquire all the outstanding shares it doesn't already own in Norplat, at the fixed price of 11 new Ovoca shares for every 10 Norplat shares, until May 2007.
Robbers net €97m from EU banks
Banks in the European Union are robbed at a rate of one every 90 minutes, according to a report that also highlights the increasing brutality of raids.
The European Banking Federation report says that 5,864 robberies took place in the 25 countries of the European Union, as well as in Switzerland, Norway and Iceland, in 2004, the latest year for which figures are available. This is a slight increase compared with the previous year.
Robbers netted€€96.6 million from heists, a decrease of 19 per cent on 2003. However, the figures do not include the record £26.5 million (€38.4 million) raid in December 2004 on Northern Bank in Belfast. - (Financial Times service)
Intel applies for plant in Vietnam
Intel, the world's largest microchip maker, is seeking to set up a $605 million (€500 million) plant in Vietnam to design, assemble and test chips, a project that would be a huge boost to the Communist-ruled country's fledgling high-tech industry.
Phan Huu Thang, a senior official in Vietnam's planning and investment ministry, said in Hanoi that Intel had submitted an application for a project licence, though a source familiar with the project said approvals were probably a formality.
Intel declined to comment on the Vietnamese official's statement. - (Financial Times service)
