PRESS DIGEST - Financial Times - April 3

NEW CONSENSUS ON MARKET SLOWDOWN

Standard & Poor's warned on Wednesday that the UK faces "a major slowdown" in the housing market. The credit rating agency placed Britain on a par with Spain as the most likely European candidate to follow the US housing market in a correction. S&P has not yet predicted falling house prices, but it expects flat prices with large downside risks as the property market wrestles with "a triple whammy" of stretched affordability, mortgage squeezes and possible unemployment.

TAX EVASION CRACKDOWN URGED TO STEM LOSSES

An official report from the National Audit Office has revealed that tax evaders are draining the exchequer of over one billion pounds a year. The public spending watchdog urged Revenue & Customs to employ data-screening techniques to track down offenders and warned of new risks as a result of online trading and the buy-to-let market. The NAO said that a telephone hotline set up in 2005 to encourage the public to report evaders had led to the collection of 2.6 million pounds in tax in 2006-07 against original estimates of 32.5 million pounds.

LABOUR UNREST OVER ABOLITION OF 10 PENCE RATE

The Conservative party issued a warning on Wednesday that five million poorer households were due to suffer from the abolition of the 10 pence income tax band, which takes effect from April 6. The tax change, announced last year by Gordon Brown in his former role as chancellor, has also led to unrest on Labour benches, despite his assurances that 21 million people would be better off as a result of the tax change. Labour MP Nia Griffith warned that voters who were on a low income or had taken an early retirement may make their objections felt at the forthcoming local elections.

STAGECOACH FOUNDERS BEAT CGT

Stagecoach (SGC.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) co-founders Ann Gloag and her brother Brian Souter are transferring 33 million shares of the travel group into two discretionary trusts. The move will save them millions of pounds ahead of this weekend's changes to capital gains tax. The shares equate to a 4.7 percent stake in Stagecoach with a value of around 82.4 million pounds at current market prices. The deal is due to be completed in January 2010, but by agreeing to the sale and transfer now, the siblings will avoid paying the higher rate of CGT. The company said that the transactions were "being done for personal tax planning reasons".

WOOLWORTHS TAKES STEP TOWARDS BREAK-UP