IlluMyFi

Report for final three months of year shows pressure driven by rising costs and weak consumer confidence

Business live – latest updates

The number of UK retailers on the brink of collapse has risen by a quarter in the final three months of the year, driven by a combination of rising business costs and weak consumer confidence, according to a report.

The proportion of retail businesses classed as being in “critical” financial distress increased by 25% to 2,124 in the fourth quarter compared with the previous three months, the insolvency specialists Begbies Traynor said.

Sentiment

-0.98

Bearish/Bullish

28.12.24 06:55

by theguardian.com

Beaches, beer and a rare suspended lake … why can’t Nigeria attract more tourist...

Visitor numbers to the African country lag far behind its neighbours due to lack of infrastructure and national planning. Now some are starting to demand changes

At the top of the Ado-Awaye hills lies a lake suspended 433 metres above sea level. Local people say the lake is named Iyake (Yoruba for “crying woman”) after a weeping, barren woman who fell in the water hundreds of years ago, conferring on it powers of fertility.

This belief in the divine is evident in the foothills, where a huge boulder is emblazoned with the words, written in golden letters: “Here we come: African Jerusalem.”

United States of America