The German Postal Service has concluded first agreements with small companies regarding mail deliveries. This will help realising the decree of the Federal Cartel Office to open up the market, the company said in Bonn. The Cartel Office has ordered the Postal Service to allow competitors regarding tasks like pick-up, pre-sorting and delivery of letters under 100 grams.
Read MoreSingapore Post has booked a 6 percent increase in annual earnings.
Net income for the year to March came in at 110.5m dollars, beating market forecasts.
Its bottom-line was boosted by higher earnings at its mail and logistics businesses.
For the fourth quarter alone, net profit was 26.8 million dollard.
That’s a slide of 7 percent compared to the same period last year, but still better than analysts’ expectations.
The postal services provider reported growth in its three core businesses.
And there is good news for investors.
SingPost says it is enhancing its dividend policy by raising the minimum annual payout and paying dividends on a quarterly basis.
Read MoreUnited Parcel Service business mail services unit Mail Innovations unveiled an integrated suite of mailing services that includes a new option to send non-urgent mail at a lower rate in exchange for less speedy delivery.
Called UPS Mail Logic, the service includes mail pickup, transport and processing to the U.S. Postal Service or overseas. For mail in the United States, UPS Mail Logic delivers at First-Class mail speeds plus one day.
Customers also can choose UPS Mail Logic Saver, which delivers mail in an average of six days. Mail sent with UPS Mail Logic Saver qualifies for a lower per-piece rate.
Domestically, UPS Mail Innovations typically handles mail pieces weighing less than 1 pound, including flats, bound printed matter, including catalogs and lightweight products such as CDs or books. Internationally, UPS Mail Innovations handles mail of all weights.
Read MoreThe courier and express cargo industry is slated to go through a phase of consolidation. Last year, DHL Express India acquired Blue Dart and the industry is now rife with the speculation of another big-ticket acquisition.
This time, the target is learnt to be Secunderabad-based express cargo major Gati and the company eyeing it is Dutch express cargo and logistics major TNT.
TNT already operates in India, though its presence its currently limited. Gati’s acquisition will give the MNC a pan-India presence. While TNT India refused to confirm the move and described it as a rumour, Gati is in closed period and refused to comment. However, sources say that the two companies are in active negotiations.
Read MoreIn France, the transfer of La Poste’s financial services activities to a newly created postal bank next July is a major victory for the postal operator and a setback for France’s banking lobby. However, France is not alone in seeing postal organisations moving into retail banking.
China’s government is expected to pursue reforms, perhaps as early as this year, that will result in the conversion of the Postal Savings and Remittance Bureau into a postal savings bank. Meanwhile, Swiss Post has lobbied unsuccessfully for permission to obtain a banking licence to expand the range of products and services it can directly offer through its PostFinance financial services division, especially products such as consumer credit and housing loans.
While some postal operators are offloading their postal banks, others are returning to the sector by setting up financial services or banking subsidiaries.
Read MoreBusiness Post announces that Russell Hodgson, 56, responsible for Parcel
Services, will be leaving the Group on 30 September 2005, for health reasons.
His role, overseeing the Express, International and HomeServe business units and
Network Services, will be assumed by Paul Carvell, Chief Executive.
Deutsche Post World Net AG said it has not warned analysts of a lower profit at is mail unit than the year earlier, denying earlier press reports.’The press reports give the impression that we gave figures to a small circle (of analysts). We strongly deny this,’ a Deutsche Post spokesman said. The report, which appeared in the Financial Times Deutschland today, cited analysts as saying they had received a profit warning from Deutsche Post which stated that the group’s mail division’s operating profit has declined by around 100 mln eur in the first quarter from 749 mln one year before. The spokesman said that at the time when the company supposedly had given these unpublished figures to analysts, the results were not even ready.
Read MoreKiwibank received another $15 million from parent New Zealand Post during the first quarter, meaning the three-year-old Government-owned bank has now received $138 million from the taxpayer. The $15 million figure is in Kiwibank’s latest quarterly general disclosure statement compiled for the Reserve Bank along with a $2.42 million post-tax profit in the three months to March 31. The additional funding will be used to pay for ongoing growth including a push into the small and medium-sized business banking market.
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