03/01/2017 BBC Business Live

This is Business Live from BBC News with Sally Bundock and Rachel Horne.

Are we seeing the calm before the storm?

Today, markets in the UK and US open for the first time this year.

Some experts say business confidence is at an all-time high.

Live from London, that's our top story on Tuesday 3rd January.

It's set to be a defining 12 months for global businesses.

We'll ask why some companies are still feeling positive

despite the uncertainty of Brexit and a Trump Presidency.

Also in the programme, start as you mean to go on.

As we enter 2017, the Australian bank ANZ continues to sell of parts

We'll cross live to Singapore for the latest.

And, after the long holiday break, it's business as usual

They are all headed in one direction at the moment.

We'll be getting an expert view on how long it will last.

We'll be talking interactive billboards and digital

advertising with one of the industry's leading companies.

Dentists are calling for an end to the workplace cake culture.

Is there too much junk food at your work, or does it

Let us know, just use the hashtag #BBCBizLive.

It is never too early for cake and chocolate, just get some false

teeth! Today, markets in the US,

the UK and most of Asia have been open for the first trading session

of the year. In 2016, surprise political results

caused tremors on both sides of the Atlantic,

but a new report suggests there's been a sharp increase in business

confidence for the year ahead. The professional services firm

Grant Thornton says the number of companies expecting

to grow their annual profits Indeed, here in the UK, the Ftse

recently hit an all-time record, despite ongoing uncertainty over

Britain's relationship In fact, Europe's Stoxx

600 has entered a bull market just this week,

so it is 20% up from And it's a similar story

in the United States. The Dow Jones rose 13% last year,

most of the increase taking place after Donald Trump was elected as US

President. The billionaire businessman has

outlined an infrastructure That could give a boost to companies

in the US and across the world. With me is Francesca Lagerberg,

global leader for tax Looking ahead to 2017, the start of

a New Year is often a time for optimism, but looking to this year,

it is uncertain when the future is going, we have a new president in

the White House, not a lot of visibility of what he is going to

do, Brexit, European elections. What is putting up the confidence? It is

fascinating seeing businesses being optimistic, 38% positivity in the

businesses that we surveyed. There is something around knowing the

big-ticket issues of the year last year gave some uncertainty that

Donald Trump will be president, there will be Brexit, and even

though we don't know that Massa Nations, there is some certainty,

and businesses love certainty. 38% more confident about the future, so

that still leaves over 60% who are not, what are their concerns? Some

of the things coming through our around currency changes, around how

other things may pan out, in the Eurozone we have big elections in

France and Germany, different transatlantic agreement in Asia, had

overall was a divinity at 38% is very high. Over the last 20 years,

that is a very positive outlook. What businesses did you survey? And

how many of them? We looked at nearly 3000 businesses, over 37

economies, and they are mid-sized, the powerhouses of these economies,

so they are a good gauge of where business is looking. With the

businesses you survey it, but some a challenge for one is an up agility

for another, so they are coming at it from different angles. The big

economies, a huge rise in positivity, 54%, a massive increase,

over 11% increase, compare and contrast with Mexico, which is

looking north of the border at where change may be happening, and they

have gone down to 8%, so there are great cultural variances. But if you

are the big economies like the Eurozone, very positive in the big

countries there, they see the year as having more opportunities than

challenges. It is one thing for businesses to say they are

confident, but to do something about it, to invest for the future, how

many of them said they were going to? This is about perception and

optimism, but a lot say they will invest up our Andy will go up, --

research and of element will go up, and also investment in machinery.

People are saying they think that you will begin at, they think next

year and 2019 times when they need to invest today to make those years

a success. For the first time in more than 50

years, Sweden's bestselling car Instead, it was a Volkswagen

which topped the sales charts. The VW Golf made up 5.9% of new cars

bought in the country, while Volvo only had a 5.7% slice

of sales, spread The last time Volvo was not

in the top spot was 1962, when another Volkswagen,

the Beetle, headed the list. Singapore's economy just

recorded its best growth According to new government

data, GDP grew by 9.1% on a seasonally-adjusted annualised

basis, the fastest pace seen Buying a home Down Under just

got that much harder, with prices seeing the biggest jump

in seven years. The red-hot markets are Sydney

and Melbourne, fuelled by record low interest rates boosting

demand for mortgages. Annual growth in overall home prices

accelerated to 10.9%, from 9.3%. This is a concern for

the Australian central bank. It hoped the market would cool

after regulators slapped banks Australia and New Zealand Banking

Group, more commonly known as ANZ, is selling off its stake

in a Shanghai bank. How significant is this? It is very

significant. Currently ANZ have a 20% stake in the bank, but it is

selling it for $1.3 billion, and it is part of the bank's restructure,

to simplify its business, because all of Australia's major banks are

battling higher funding costs and lower interest margins. In October,

ANZ also announced a sale of its retail arms in five countries. As

for its Chinese assets, it will be bought by Chinese companies. Through

these deals, they are hoping to become better capitalised.

Happy New Year to you, have not seen you get this year.

Three out of four markets here have been closed since the end of last

year. No action in Japan today. And Wall Street will open later today.

Hong Kong up by nearly not .7%. We have a weaker dollar, it has gone

down slightly today against most major currencies, which was fuelling

movement in Asia today. All markets in Europe are open, but a few of

them were opened yesterday, but marginal trading scene yesterday,

but as many were still on a long bank holiday. In Europe, they are

all headed higher, and it is interesting, because the euro Stoxx

600 hit a ball market today, 20% up on its low end of February 2000 and

16. Joining us is Sue Noffke,

she's the UK Equities Fund Let's kick off with the London Stock

Exchange, wires have said they have agreed a sale, they have had a bit

for their French clearing business, which could help their tie-up with

the German stock market to go through. LCA Chiswick clearing part,

and the regulators have looked at the merger in the past between them,

and denied them the ability to go ahead. The sale of part of the

business, which removes some of the concentration risk, which regulators

are concerned about pricing and the concentration of power in clearing,

might make it easier for the merger between them to go ahead. In the

meantime, it would seem Europe is going from strength to strength, we

can see the numbers behind you. London is up, having closed at a

record high at the end of 2016. We are seeing quite a lot of market

optimism. It is around the sustainability of growth. The cycle

is quite extended, but has been muted. What we have seen

turbo-charged moss around Donald Trump does 's victory and what that

means for fiscal policy. That means taxation cuts, regulatory take being

torn up, spending on infrastructure projects, elongating the economic

cycle and getting away from these all trilan interest rate. What will

burst the bubble? Lots of things. That is what economists and

strategists are warning about. Instability in geopolitics, European

elections, China growth grinding to a halt, those are the types of

things that in the big picture people are worried about. More work

to do for you! We will talk interactive billboards

with one of the industry's leading players.

You're with Business Live from BBC News.

Here in the UK, rail passengers are facing higher

fares across the country, as average price increases of 2.3%

The increase covers regulated fares, including season tickets,

and unregulated, such as off-peak tickets.

It's being called a "kick in the teeth" for passengers.

Stephen Joseph is from the Campaign For Better Transport.

I issue that is your view? Yes, we think these extra increases are a

kick in the teeth for rail passengers, who have been facing

some very poor service in some cases, especially on the Southern

Rail network, which has been hit by long-term industrial action, but

also by generally poor service on the services into London from the

south coast. We have argued that what we need is a simpler, fairer

and cheaper system of rail fares. What we have is a complex structure

that has grown up over the years, it has been added to since the railways

were privatised, and we need to start again and have a much more

rational system. Somewhat argued the reason why fares have gone up so

soon can give for passengers is that the passengers are paying a larger

percentage of the bill for the railway, from 50% to 70%, and they

might say it is fair enough that the people who use the railways pay for

them. The point to make is that almost no other country in the world

takes that view. There is new research today showing that other

countries subsidise their railways and people pay significantly lower

proportions of their income on commuting, compared with people in

the UK. That is because there are wider benefits from having a good

and affordable rail network, including less congestion and

pollution on the roads. We have some of the most congested roads in the

world, as well as some of the highest rail fares. There has to be

a connection there somewhere. I would imagine many of you have a

view on that subject, the price of those coming up. Mine went up 20p.

It is good to know! Lots on our tablet, quite says that, UK housing

shortage, no policy shortage. Our top story today,

markets in the US, the UK and most of Asia have been open for the first

trading session of the year. Many would argue that perhaps we are

a little bit too over optimistic at the moment given some of the

political risk out there and geopolitical risk out there in the

New Year. That's how the markets in Europe are

trading right now. Most of them are open today.

And now let's get the inside track on the digital revolution

that's taking place in the world of advertising.

No longer is some poor soul required to scale a ladder with a brush

and pot of glue to paste a large sheet of paper on a billboard.

Many displays are now electronic and can adapt

their content to the viewer as he or she passes by.

Primesight is one of the largest "out of home" advertising firms

in the UK and Naren Patel, its chief executive is with us.

Welcome. Good morning. First of all, just explain to us this concept of

out of home advertising. Well, out of home is basically every ad that

you see when you're not in your house. So it is things on rail

stations, buses, airports, and on the roadside, underground. We kind

of, we spend three hours a day outside our home look looking at

billboards and that's the time you spend looking at these ads. Only 3%

of your billboards are digital, but that accounts for 20% of your

revenue. Surely that would mean you want to increase the number of

digital billboards you have to increase the revenue? Yes, but the

day of the man and the bucket and paste will always be there. We have

20,000 in total. So we will never digitalise them all, but we are

digitalising the best sites. We are about 20% of our revenues and the

industry is 35%, we think it will get to 50%, but it will stabilise

because we need the old traditional paper and paste because it gives us

cover every where. The same ad goes up in Slough and Derby and Edinburgh

at the same time and advertisers like that. They like the fame of

getting their ads up. You are a UK based organisation... Correct. You

mentioned the key cities in the UK. To what extent are we affected by

billboards? What evidence is there to say that looking at a billboard

will affect what I do with my money or what I do with my time? Well,

there is loads of evidence, but the key thing you have got to look at is

our advertiser base. So we our advertisers consist of the top

advertisers in the UK. Mainly media companies, all the big media

companies out out of home. They only use it because it works and there is

a tonne of evidence. If you want to check on the IPAO they provide lots

of it. And the way it works is, when you're out and about, you are more

active. You have an active mindset and that makes you absorb messages

and we did a bit of research last year really on, because the whole

thing around smartphones which is really interesting and we tracked

people's movements and we found that on the top 20 campaigns, their

search increased by up to 40%. So if that doesn't prove that outdoor

qorks, what does really? Where are you in the marred accounting spend

with your clients? If things get tough economically, are you lower

down in the pecking order when it comes to their marketing spend? Out

of home this year is the second fastest growing medium. I'm talking

about 2016. In terms of advertising? Of course, the internet is the

fastest, and we will be second and TV will be third. We are really

important and digital is what is really driving this. So we have gone

from a wonderful media, in a way you could get your posters, but across

the country to something that gives awe lot of flexibility. So if you

are, for example, a car advertiser, all the research says people think

about buying cars when they are diving home. Right. Now you can

serve your ads on digital billboards between 4pm and 7pm. That's

brilliant. It cuts down a lot of wastage, you are turbo charging it

with digital. There are lots of good examples of using data to drive

content on screens and that's what is getting the industry excited

about at home. I want to talk about targeted advertising. You mentioned

about targeting drivers orn the way home with ads for new cars because

that's when we think about it. It is harder on billboards than on smart

devices. How do you target it for the audience? I don't see Tom Cruise

and Minority Report happening soon. We don't use personalised data. We

pick up we buy a lot of data from smartphone networks, it gives us

travel patterns, it gives us ideas of which audiences are going where

and we load up our content it maximise that. So it is not about, I

know you, you are looking for ladders, so I am ale going to serve

awe ladder ad on a billboard. Thank you. Fascinating. It is, it is

fascinating. Let's cross over to the US now

because the Consumer Electronics Show is set to get underway

in Las Vegas later this week. Many people consider it to be

the biggest technology exhibition in the world and it's an annual

fixture for many of the giants The event is now entering its 50th

yearand it's fair to say it's a very different show from when it

all started back in 1967. The originalising is providing

education and entertainment at a very reasonable price.

It is phenomenal. It is a huge show. It was an event called the National

Association of Music Merchants and there was a portion, a tiny portion

of the show that said we'll let the consumer electronics portion be over

here and the guy who hired me said that's really unacceptable and he

convinced the board of this nonprofit trade association that

they should launch a show and they did in 1967 in New York called the

Consumer Electronics Show and it was successful for a launch. It had over

17,000 people. Had over 100,000 square feet, but it only had three

products, radios, TVs and photographs.

I do believe that the human touch, the live experience of being with a

real person is something that will not be replaced in 50 years and as

long as we will take honeymoons with our loved ones live, there will be

opportunities for business events like CES where you are physically

with other people and get to know them on a personal basis.

Sue is with us. The photograph of CES CES50 years ago, there was a

beautiful woman behind a desk doing the admin and all the delicates were

men in suits. Oh how things have changed! I wanted to make what

point! Sue Noffke, UK equity fund

manager at Schroders - We asked you to send in your tweets

about cake in the office. Some dentists have been saying we

shouldn't be bringing in sweet treats and we should break it now it

is January. Inside the studio and outside the studio there has been

response. We have an office tradition, it is your birthday, you

provide sweet treats. There is fruit. At your company? Yes, there

is fruit, but the cakes are the big hit. Absolutely. Who wants fruit on

a birthday? Sarah says, "Dentists hate joy."

Conor says, "My lemon drizzle cake is on its way in." James says, "Why

would dentists want to end this culture, it is good for their

business." Wendy says, "Why should only sugar make people happy. Cut

out cake and give them a Mediterranean snack." Here at 3am

and 4am, we have lots of cake. I will bring Rachel cake sometime this

week. Air about and about in the news, we were taug being it

yesterday because of new regulations in Paris, but the Financial Times is

looking at how its income in London could be curtailed? That's right.

There are new regulations and air about and B are self regulating as

well. So rather than pushing all the regulations on to the hosts, they

are taking responsibility for monitoring this new 90 day limit on

themselves which some other bookings companies are not doing. They are

leaving that responsibility with the host. Now, there is... I presume

that's after a lot of pressure. You don't want to take on new

responsibilities unless you have to. I think a lot of these newly listed

tech companies are finding that regulatory and the tax regular

lasses are going after them because they are cash rich and they are

successle and they are very big and there is a consumer backlash about

whether they are really paying their deuce. This is an interesting

response from the company stepping up and taking the responsibilities

and perhaps making sure that they are not caught by the European

Courts in the future. It started out just as a way to make a little bit

of cash on the side, but it is being used by professional landlords?

Absolutely. There is issues about how much that's really impacting the

economy. Sue, thank you very much for your company. Thank you too for

your company. We will you tomorrow. Join us then. Bye-bye.

Well, quite a frost across the south this morning. It was minus five

Celsius in Bournemouth. Glasgow, a different story, plus seven Celsius.

How about today? We have got