Friday evening's business news

Jun 27 2008 By Andrew Mernin

Oil hits another new record; The City likes HBOS's move; Tesco shareholders chicken out of TV chef's challenge

Oil prices have broken new ground again, rising above $142 a barrel as stock markets fell across Europe – despite a slight easing in early trading.

Light, sweet crude for August delivery reached $142.26 on New York commodity markets before settling slightly. Just a few hours earlier it breached the $141 level.

The spikes followed yesterday’s $5 rise above the $140 mark amid predictions from oil cartel Opec that prices could balloon further this summer. Crude oil is now nearly 50% more expensive than at the start of the year.

In London, Brent crude also hit a record $141.06 a barrel.

The UK’s biggest mortgage lender Halifax Bank of Scotland gathered stock market momentum today after strong backing for its £4bn cash-call yesterday.

HBOS’s shares spent much of the day around the 275p mark - the price of the ``discounted“ shares being offered to investors under its rights issue - before rising almost 3% later in the session.

HBOS’s stock turned ``ex-rights“ today, meaning that they were trading on the market without the rights to buy the new shares.

Tesco shareholders have voted against a resolution from TV cook Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall which called for the retail giant to improve its chicken-rearing standards.

The star of Channel 4’s River Cottage series put forward a resolution at the company’s annual general meeting requesting that the supermarket upgrade its minimum conditions to the RSPCA’s ``Freedom Food“ marque.

The resolution, which needed the approval of at least 75% of shareholders to be passed, won just under 10% of the vote.

Earlier today, Fearnley-Whittingstall accused Tesco of ``moving the goalposts'' to ensure it defeated the resolution.

He told reporters that Tesco, which urged shareholders to vote against the resolution, had attempted to scare consumers by claiming improved welfare standards could add £1 to the cost of a standard supermarket chicken.

The FTSE-100 index was down 1.1 at 5517.1 at the close of trading at 4.30pm.

The pound at 4pm was $1.9934 compared to $1.9875 at the previous close.

The euro at 4pm was £0.7904 compared to £0.7918 at the previous close.