New CBI boss says she is ‘profoundly sorry’ to women let down by business group – as it happened

Rain Newton-Smith, then chief economist of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), speaks during its annual conference in November. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

3.00pm BST

Closing summary

On her first day as director general of the crisis-hit CBI, Rain Newton-Smith said she is “profoundly sorry” to women who have been let down by the business group.

She took over amid the fallout of a series of sexual misconduct allegations reported by the Guardian. The new boss also said in a series of tweets that she believes in the work of the trade group and is determined to “rebuild and reimagine” the organisation.

Newton-Smith was the CBI’s chief economist until recently when she left to join Barclays, and also used to work for the Bank of England.

Her comments came as Emma Walmsley, the chief executive of GSK, Britain’s second-biggest drugmaker, condemned the allegations of sexual misconduct that have thrown the future of the CBI into doubt as “extremely shocking” and “pretty repulsive”. Walmsley spoke as GSK reported its latest quarterly results.

The UK’s competition regulator has blocked Microsoft’s attempted takeover of Activision Blizzard, the developer behind hit video games such as Call of Duty, in what would have been the largest acquisition in gaming history.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) prevented the $68.7bn (£55bn) cash purchase because of concerns it would squash the cloud gaming market.

European stock markets are in the red, as investors remain nervous about the banking sector. The UK’s FTSE 100 is 45 points, or 0.6% lower at 7,845. Germany’s Dax has lost 0.6%, France’s CAC fell more than 1% and Italy’s FTSE MiB is down 0.9%.

On Wall Street, the Nasdaq gained 0.9%, the S&P 500 edged 0.1% higher and the Dow Jones is flat.

Thank you for reading. We’ll be back tomorrow. Take care! – JK

Updated at 3.01pm BST

2.50pm BST

US durable goods orders jump, trade deficit shrinks

Durable goods orders in the US jumped 3.2% in March from February, but this was mainly because Boeing booked 38 aircraft orders.

The journalist and analyst James Picerno tweeted:

New US orders for durable goods surged in March, but don't get too excited: nondefense ex-aircraft order, a proxy for business investment, fell for a second month (and are down in 4 or the past 5 months), suggesting headwinds for the economy are blowing: pic.twitter.com/4EL2B4wLgI

— James Picerno (@jpicerno) April 26, 2023

Andrew Hunter, deputy chief US economist at Capital Economics, has sent us his thoughts.

The 3.2% m/m jump in durable goods orders in March mainly reflects a stronger-than-expected gain in the more volatile commercial aircraft component, with the details suggesting that business equipment investment contracted again in the first quarter.

After Boeing booked 38 net aircraft orders in March, up from only two the previous month, the value of commercial aircraft orders jumped by nearly 80% m/m after seasonal adjustment, easily offsetting a 0.1% fall in motor vehicle orders.

The 0.3% m/m rise in core non-transport orders was also stronger than the small fall we had pencilled in, but the underlying details weren’t nearly as strong, with both orders and shipments for non-defence capital goods (ex-aircraft) falling by 0.4% m/m, and prior months’ readings revised lower.

Even allowing for a further recovery in transport investment, as motor vehicle sales picked up, we estimate that first-quarter business equipment investment fell by 5% annualised. That isn’t quite as bad as we had expected, but the capital expenditure intentions surveys have generally continued to weaken. And while it was never likely that the banking turmoil last month would strike an immediate blow to investment, we expect tighter credit conditions to drive sharper declines over the coming months.

Meanwhile, the advance trade report showed a narrowing in the goods deficit to $84.6bn in March, from $92.0bn, driven by a 2.9% rebound in exports.

Hunter said:

Despite a strong rise in exports to the US already reported in the Chinese trade data, the US data show that goods imports fell by 1.0% m/m. The strength of exports means that net trade probably didn’t subtract as much from first-quarter GDP growth as we had thought and, alongside the durable goods data, suggests the main risks to our forecast that growth was 1.8% annualised (data due on Thursday) lie slightly to the upside. But that doesn’t change our view that a much sharper slowdown lies ahead.