Shoppers surged back to high streets across England on Monday as fashion stores, toy shops, hairdressers and other non-essential retailers reopened their doors for the first time in more than three months.

The number of people out and about more than tripled compared with the previous Monday and was only just less than 15% lower than 2019 levels.

With snow flurries in some places and cold weather across the country, shopping centres reported the biggest rise in footfall followed by high streets. Retail parks, saw less of a pick-up after enjoying the strongest trade throughout the lockdown because of their generally larger stores, available parking and the more likely presence of food and DIY stores, which have been able to trade as essential retailers.

In 2009, in the midst of the global financial crisis, Paul Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chair, famously observed that the only socially productive financial innovation of the preceding 20 years was the automated teller machine. One wonders what Volcker would make of the tsunami of digitally enabled financial innovations today, from mobile payment platforms to internet banking and peer-to-peer lending.

Volcker might be reassured: like the humble ATM, many of these innovations have tangible benefits in terms of lowering transactions costs. But as a critic of big financial firms, Volcker presumably also would worry about the entry of some very large technology companies into the sector. Their names are as familiar as their services are ubiquitous: Amazon in the US, the messaging company Kakao in Korea, the online auction and commerce platform Mercado Libre in Latin America, and the Chinese technology companies Alibaba and Tencent.

These entities now do...

Cybersecurity firm Darktrace has announced plans to float on the London Stock Exchange, in a move that will reportedly value the Cambridge-based company at £3bn.

The company, which is backed by tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch, is the first major firm to have chosen the City for its initial public offering (IPO) since Deliveroo’s disappointing stock market debut last month.

Darktrace, which was founded in Cambridge in 2013 and employs more than 1,500 staff globally, claims to have been the first to use artificial intelligence to detect and tackle cybersecurity threats on a large scale.

The firm, which has 4,600 customers including Rolls-Royce and memory chip producer Micron, said demand for some of its products surged last year as companies scrambled to keep up with security risks following the boom in homeworking during the Covid outbreak. Darktrace started offering its services to the NHS, free of charge, at the start of the pandemic.

The IPO will...

My colleague Sarah Butler has braced the cold and snow on London’s Oxford Street as retailers reopen their doors.

She reports that there’s quite a queue outside the JD Sports store this morning, as shoppers flock to buy its sportswear clothes and trainers.

Preventing poor countries suffering from vaccine “apartheid” will require the G7 group of rich nations to commit $30bn (£22bn) a year to a global immunisation drive, Gordon Brown has said.

The former Labour prime minister said the UK should use June’s G7 summit in Cornwall to rekindle the moral purpose of the Make Poverty History campaign of 2005, paying for its share of the new fund by reversing the government’s “misguided” cut to the foreign aid budget.

Brown, who has written for the Guardian outlining his plan for a $30bn-a-year mass vaccination programme, said he was alarmed that vaccination in Africa had barely begun and warned that this would have repercussions for rich nations.

The G7 – the UK, the US, Germany, France, Italy, Japan and Canada – should contribute $30bn annually, he said, in line with their share of global economic output. Britain would be expected to contribute 5-6% of the total, between $1.5bn and $1.8bn a year.

Brown, who...

London had the highest number of super-luxury home purchases of any city in the world during 2020, outperforming its traditional rivals of New York and Hong Kong.

According to the upmarket estate agency group Knight Frank, 201 “super-prime” homes – collectively worth more than $3.7bn (£2.7bn) – were bought in London last year, easily knocking Hong Kong into second place with 169 sales.

Analysing transaction data from 12 super-prime residential markets around the world, Knight Frank found that overall, global sales of super-prime homes – defined as properties costing $10m (£7.3m) and above – fell just 1% in 2020.

The tiny fall in sales compared with 2019 is remarkable given the temporary property market shutdowns and various travel restrictions that were in place around the world last year, it said.

Transactions in London rose by 3% in 2020, while in Hong Kong and New York they fell by 27% and 48% respectively, allowing the capital to leapfrog both...

People should enjoy new freedoms but remain wary of the risks, Boris Johnson has said, as beer gardens, alfresco restaurants, shops and salons prepared to reopen across England on Monday for the first time in almost four months.

The prime minister hailed the reopening – a major and “irreversible” step in the roadmap of easing restrictions – as “a chance to get back to doing some of the things we love and have missed”.

Britain’s economy is heading for a prolonged recession lasting until next spring as the number of coronavirus infections climbs and tougher restrictions are introduced to contain the virus.

As a Covid-19 second wave spreads and the government launches fresh measures to restrict business and social life, City economists warned that the fightback from the deepest recession in history begun this summer was running out of steam.

Dashing hopes that the Covid recession could be among the shortest downturns in history, analysts from Bank of America said growth in gross domestic product (GDP) would probably stall in the fourth quarter and the first three months of 2021.

Robert Wood, the chief UK economist at the bank, said: “We struggle to see how the economy can grow in the fourth quarter with escalating lockdown measures, fading stimulus and Brexit risks.”

English wines picked up a record haul of awards this year in the industry’s largest wine competition, including two judged to be in the top 50 best-tasting in the world.

Two English producers – Roebuck Estate in West Sussex and Simpsons from Kent – each won the prestigious accolade of best in show for a sparkling and a still white at the 17th annual Decanter World Wine Awards.

English wines from 21 counties won three platinum, five gold, 94 silver and 46 bronze medals at the awards, with the English wine industry notching up an all-time record of 155 awards – up from 145 in 2019.

Throughout August 116 judges including 37 masters of wine and nine master sommeliers tasted and analysed the merits of 16,518 wines produced by some of the world’s top wineries in 56 countries. Judges used “vibrating proximity lanyards” and bespoke disposable spittoons to ensure safe conditions in the first major contest to have been judged under strict safety guidelines as a result...

US stock markets continued falling on Monday as investors worried Congress would not agree to more stimulus cash before the election and reacted to an uptick in coronavirus infections.

The Dow Jones closed down 510 points, or 1.9% after a late rally. The S&P 500 lost 1.2% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite closed just 0.1% lower after a late-day surge in tech stocks.

US stock markets are entering a fourth week of selloffs, ending a rally that had driven them to record highs over the summer. Monday was the first time since February that the S&P 500 has posted four straight daily losses.

“Today’s market action reflects investors’ frustration with Congress’s inability to pass additional stimulus,” Jack Ablin, chief financial officer at Cresset Capital wrote in a note to investors. “Federal Reserve chairman Jay Powell, in a speech last week, stressed ‘more fiscal support is likely to be needed’ to help struggling small businesses and...

The fashion chain J Crew is to permanently close all six of its UK stores in the latest exit by a US retailer.

The brand, known for its preppy style, has appointed FRP advisory as liquidators to its UK business, which has a head office in London and employs nearly 80 staff.

A spokesperson for J Crew said: “After a thorough review, we have determined we are best able to serve our UK customers through our global e-commerce platform and are closing our six store locations in the country. We thank our UK associates for their dedication during this unprecedented time and are working to support their transition.”

Known as one of the former first lady Michelle Obama’s favourite brands, J Crew opened a flagship store on London’s Regent Street in late 2013 shortly after testing out a small menswear shop on Lamb’s Conduit Street in Bloomsbury.

The brand, and its sister label Madewell, was also taken on by the department store chain John...

The organic vegetable box company Riverford has been certified as an ethical B Corporation business, reflecting its focus on its workers’ wellbeing through its John Lewis-style employee ownership model.

The Devon-based company scored 124.6 out of 200 in its first B Corp assessment, becoming the second highest-scoring food business overall in the UK behind ethical chocolate brand Divine Chocolate.

B Corp certification uses a broad assessment, substantiated by evidence, to score companies’ social and environmental performance. To certify as a B Corp, a company has to formally give people and environmental considerations the same weight as shareholders or profits. They must score at least 80 out of 200 to be certified and the assessment is repeated every three years.

A global model, there are now an estimated 307 certified B Corp businesses in the UK including Guardian Media Group, the owner of the Guardian. Big brands include Unilever’s Ben...

Far from it. Had the deals not been reached, the government was set to step in with its own “operator of last resort” on more lines. The contracts instead ensure that rail firms can operate profitably for another six to 18 months while the effects of the pandemic continue, being paid a management fee rather than taking the risk on passenger numbers and fares.

Thousands of Britons living in the EU will have their UK bank accounts closed by the end of the year because of the UK’s failure to agree a post-Brexit trade deal.

Lloyds, Barclays and Coutts have informed retail and business customers that they will lose their accounts before or when the Brexit transition period ends on 31 December and more banks are expected to follow suit.

Lloyds Banking Group, which includes Halifax and Bank of Scotland, has contacted its 13,000 customers in the Netherlands, Slovakia, Germany, Ireland and Portugal, warning them they must make alternative arrangements as the bank is no longer allowed to offer services.

A spokesperson said: “We have written to a small number of customers living in affected EU countries to let them know that due to the UK’s exit from the EU, regrettably we will no longer be able to provide them with some UK-based banking services.

“We want to keep customers informed and offer...

Shares in London have come under severe pressure amid fears that a second wave of Covid-19 cases will force the government into harsh lockdown measures that will damage the economy.

The FTSE 100 – the leading benchmark of the UK stock market – was down almost 200 points in early trading and on course for its worst day in three months.

With the health secretary, Matt Hancock, warning that the UK was at a coronavirus tipping point and that people tended to catch Covid-19 is social settings, shares in travel and hospitality companies were among the hardest hit by the sell-off.

British Airways owner IAG was the biggest faller on the FTSE 100 on Monday morning, down 14%. Shares in the FTSE 250 pubs group Mitchells & Butlers were down 13%, while JD Wetherspoon fell 8%.

The transport secretary, Grant Shapps, said the government could not wait for deaths to start rising before taking action.

London was not alone in seeing big...

Millions of savers with NS&I have been dealt a blow after it announced it would slash interest rates in November and cut the Premium Bonds prize fund a month later.

Savers with NS&I’s popular direct saver account will receive a cut in rates from 1% to just 0.15%, while the return on income bonds – which had been best buys – will plummet from 1.15% to 0.01%

The government-backed organisation, which has 25 million customers, said there would be cuts to variable rate accounts and some fixed rates as it attempted to “strike a balance between the interests of savers, taxpayers and the broader financial services sector”.

It had become a first port of call for savers looking for returns after the Bank of England cut interest rates to a record low and savings providers started to follow suit.

The cuts announced on Monday are deeper than those NS&I had planned earlier in the year but then put on hold as the pandemic hit.

The UK government has extended emergency funding measures for rail companies for the next six to 18 months to help them get through the Covid-19 crisis, as a first step towards a complete overhaul of the railway system.

The Department for Transport said the move had ended franchising after 24 years as the first step in bringing Britain’s fragmented network back together. It hailed the emergency measures as a “transitional stage to a new system, the biggest change to the railways in a quarter of a century”.

So far the government has spent £3.5bn covering train companies’ losses since the pandemic started. It effectively nationalised them in March when rail franchise agreements were suspended. Rail travel collapsed to 95% of pre-pandemic levels during the coronavirus lockdown in late March and April, and is still down about 70%.

Under the new emergency arrangements, the DfT will continue to cover rail companies’ losses and pay them a fixed...

Shares in the banking sector fell on Monday after media reports that some of the world’s largest banks had moved large sums of allegedly illicit funds over nearly two decades, despite red flags about the origins of the money.

Barclays fell by 4% in early trading in London and HSBC and Standard Chartered both lost 3%. Earlier in Hong Kong, HSBC dropped more than 4%, taking the shares to their lowest level sinceMay 1995.

The drop came after thousands of documents detailing $2tn (£1.55tn) of potentially corrupt transactions that were washed through the US financial system were leaked to an international group of investigative journalists.

Media reports were based on more than 2,000 leaked suspicious activity reports (SARs) filed by banks and other financial firms with the US Department of Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCen).

Banks and other financial institutions file SARs when they believe a client is using their...

Most stocks on the FTSE 100 are down in early trading, as traders react to the prospect of tighter Covid-19 restrictions.

Rolls-Royce is the top faller, down over 6% to 167p - its lowest level since 2004.

On Saturday, the Financial Times reported that the jet engine maker was in talks with sovereign wealth funds to raise £2.5bn, to shore up its balance sheet.

Airline group IAG, which owns British Airways, has dropped by over 4%, on fears of further disruption to flights and travel.

On the smaller FTSE 250, cruise operator Carnival is down 5% at 900p (a one-month low).

In the hotel sector, Intercontinental Hotels has lost 3% while Whitbread, which owns Premier Inns, has lost 3.5%.

Naeem Aslam of Avatrade says fears of local, or national, lockdown measures are hitting stocks:

An inquiry into the destruction of Juukan Gorge has heard that Rio Tinto is expected to destroy another 124 Aboriginal heritage sites at a new iron ore development less than 100km away from the exploded rock shelters.

Questions have also been raised over whether the approval granted by the WA government to destroy the 46,000-year-old sites in Juukan Gorge was valid.

I’m an unhappy customer of PC World and its Team Knowhow. On 15 July I took my computer in because the on/off switch didn’t work. After weeks of going backwards and forwards, and having to buy a new motherboard and a new hard drive, I finally was told the computer was fixed and would be returned in two days. That was 12 days ago. Despite me showing up every day at PC World, phoning the repair team regularly and demanding attention, I am still waiting. I teach online so it has been a nightmare. A simple fix has become an expensive exercise without any result. I am furious.

PE, Tunbridge Wells, Kent

Your letter is yet another example of customer service departments being swamped with queries and unable to cope. Like other Guardian Money readers, you struggled to get a response from Team Knowhow and turned to us in desperation.

Currys PC World told us the repair was completed and the machine passed quality assurance in mid-August. However, due to human error,...

The Treasury has told a new bank customer complaints body to prepare for an influx of grievances over government-backed Covid loans.

The Business Banking Resolution Service (BBRS) – set to launch in mid-November - was preparing to tackle cases dating back to 2001.

But its chair, Lewis Shand Smith, said the unprecedented surge in business lending during the pandemic – starting with the state-guaranteed coronavirus business interruption loan scheme (CBILS) – had forced it to shift focus.

They were dragged kicking and screaming, but Rio Tinto’s board finally took the crucial first steps towards accountability for the destruction of caves at Juukan Gorge.

Cultural heritage destruction is an almost daily occurrence for traditional owners. Mining companies are almost never held accountable. Media coverage is usually scant at best. No wonder Rio thought the story would go away. And no wonder the three executives in question, whose governance failings robbed us of a world heritage significant site, were smug enough to destroy it in the first place.

The Juukan Gorge disaster has unveiled shocking revelations that are everyday reality for traditional owner groups. The enormous imbalance of power on which traditional owners and mining companies sign agreements has become tragically normalised in our sector. Mining companies capitalise on this power imbalance and the deficiencies in legislation to push traditional owners into agreements they mightn’t...