Mr Tyler said: “The DIY market is in a bad way.”His comments followed warnings from B&Q’s owner, Kingfisher, that demand for DIY products was at a 10-year low.The picture at Argos was slightly better, with flat like-for-like sales and a 9 per cent rise in total sales, driven by 65 new store openings during the year. Its attempts to stimulate sales with money-off promotions failed, hitting the gross margin. David Tyler, GUS’s finance director, said: “The demerger plan will happen irrespective of the market.” GUS hopes to complete the separation in the autumn. Its shares fell 32p to 1,013p, the biggest fall in the FTSE 100 leader board.
In a trading update, GUS revealed that trading at Homebase, which competes against B&Q in the do-it-yourself market, had deteriorated faster than it had expected. GUS spooked investors with a profits warning for its Homebase chain, which is part of its Argos retail arm, but insisted its plans to list Argos and Experian as separate businesses remained on track. Competition has ensured the costs to all are balanced in a way that has allowed the system to flourish, providing the world’s 1.3 billion Visa cardholders with acceptance at over 24 million merchants.”.

The holder of the same international card may pay 12 times more in one country than in another country.” She described the margins under discussion as “outrageous”.A spokesman for Visa Europe said: “Over the past four decades the European payment card system has developed to provide consumers, banks and merchants with universally accepted products. She said: “Banks charge up to 2.5 per cent on every retail purchase with a payment card, the equivalent of a tax on consumption. Moreover, the fees paid by small firms such as retailers for accepting payment cards in one country can be six times more expensive than in another.”Consumers also pay more in one part of the European Union than in another. Because banks deal jointly with retailers instead of competing directly for their business, there is little choice of payment networks for many firms.Ms Kroes said she wants a European car payment system to compete with Visa and MasterCard which have a powerful grip on the market. Neelie Kroes, the European competition commissioner, said she was “fed up” with the behaviour of key players in the massive markets for credit and debit cards, promising “action from our side”. The firms have a 10-week consultation period in which to come up with ways to avoid lawsuits for abusing their dominant market position or operating cartels.
“The more they do to bring profits from card payments down to acceptable levels, the less likely they are to face action under EU antitrust rules,” Ms Kroes said.A report based on an investigation into payment cards said customers are paying too much because the industry is conducted along national lines and technical barriers prevent new card providers entering the market.The sector is highly lucrative, with 23 billion transactions in Europe in 2004 worth about €1,350bn (£934bn) in payments.

It wasted time and it prevented the Bank (and me) from ever knowing quite what case it was expected to meet.”. Credit and debit card operators face legal action within weeks, the European Commission said yesterday, after issuing a warning that “outrageous” profit margins are costing households several hundred euros a year. I told the Lord Chief Justice, then Lord Woolf, that the case was a farce.”The fear: “I warned the Lord Chief Justice that I feared that the case had the capacity to damage the reputation of our legal system.”The rude QC: “Mr Pollock’s sustained rudeness to his opponent… was behaviour not in the usual tradition of the Bar and it was inappropriate and distracting.”The timewaster: “I regarded as unhelpful this unusual approach of the claimants’ counsel [Clare Montgomery]. A committee representing the creditors thought the legal action should have been dropped sooner.Laying down the lawWhat the judge saidThe farce: “I became so concerned about the case that I decided both to consult and to warn the Lord Chief Justice about it. “It was behaviour not in the usual tradition of the Bar and it was inappropriate and distracting,” he said.Deloitte has recovered large sums from other institutions embroiled in the BCCI collapse and has returned 81 per cent – nearly $6bn (£3.4bn) – to creditors.The firm has received £184m in fees during the entire liquidation and a reported £56m in the 12-year claim against the Bank. They are therefore disappointed by the way in which the judge has characterised the conduct of the case.” The Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, said: “The judge’s words speak for themselves.”The judge also accused Mr Pollock, one of the City’s highest-paid lawyers, of rudeness to himself and Mr Stadlen.