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The football financier Keith Harris is spearheading a bid to buy a 45% stake in the Premier League football club Crystal Palace in a deal that could be worth close to £200m.

Sky News has learnt that Mr Harris is advising a group of businessmen including Zechariah Janjua and Navshir Jaffer on an offer to acquire the shareholding from Eagle Football, a vehicle created by American businessman John Textor and owner of a number of major clubs around the world.

Sources said on Thursday that the consortium advised by Mr Harris was a leading contender to buy the stake in the Eagles, although they cautioned that at least one, and possibly two, other parties were also in discussions with Mr Textor.

Mr Harris’s group, which would probably execute its deal through a recently established corporate vehicle called Sportbank, may also require financing from other investors as part of its plans, the sources added.

Eagle Football is said to be hopeful that a deal to offload its Crystal Palace shareholding would value the club, which recorded its first win of the Premier League campaign against Tottenham Hotspur last weekend, at more than £400m.

Stanley Tang, one of the founders of the US-based food delivery company DoorDash, is also understood to have expressed an interest in acquiring Eagle Football’s stake in Crystal Palace.

A spokesman for Mr Tang denied that he was in discussions to buy Eagle Football’s Crystal Palace stake.

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Mr Textor, who declined to comment, is keen to own a controlling interest in a club in English football’s top flight, and came close to securing a deal to buy Everton during the summer.

Instead, Everton’s long-standing owner agreed a transaction with Dan Friedkin, the owner of Italian Serie A side AS Roma.

Eagle Football’s other footballing interests include Olympique Lyonnais in France, Botafogo, which currently leads Brazil’s top division, and RWD Molenbeek in Belgium.

This week, the holding company issued a statement confirming that it is preparing to file confidentially with US regulators ahead of a public listing in the first quarter of next year.

Sky News revealed in August that Eagle Football had lined up Stifel and TD Cowen, the investment banks, to work on the initial public offering (IPO).

The stake in Crystal Palace is being sold by The Raine Group, which has been involved in recent deals involving Chelsea and Manchester United.

In its statement this week, Eagle Football said it would seek $100m from the sale of shares in the company ahead of an IPO, as well as a further $500m as part of the flotation itself.

It also wants to raise “up to $500m to retire existing senior debt, to be achieved through the sale of its interest in Crystal Palace Football Club and, possibly, the placement of long-term senior notes”.

Collectively, these moves are expected to help Mr Textor achieve an enterprise value for Eagle Football of around $2.3bn (£1.74bn), they said.

In the past, Mr Textor has spoken about his belief that public ownership of football teams provides fans with greater transparency about the running of their clubs.

He has described this as the democratisation of ownership – an issue set to face greater scrutiny now that a bill on football regulation has been reintroduced to parliament by the new Labour government.

Some clubs with listed shares, including Manchester United, have, however, endured a torrid relationship with supporters, partly as a result of their voting rights being controlled by a single dominant shareholder.

Mr Harris declined to comment on Thursday.

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IMF upgrades UK economic growth forecast – but issues tariffs warning

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IMF upgrades UK economic growth forecast - but issues tariffs warning

The UK economy will grow more than previously thought, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which has upgraded its latest forecast.

It also said the Bank of England should “continue to ease monetary policy gradually”, indicating it expected further reductions in interest rates.

But it warned trade tensions linked to US tariff plans will reduce UK economic growth next year.

The Washington-based UN financial agency said the UK economy will expand 1.2% this year and “gain momentum next year”.

The upgrade in forecasts, however, is slight, up from an expected 1.1% announced in April as the world reeled from the global trade war sparked by US President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

That April figure was a 0.5% downgrade from the projected 1.6% growth for 2025 the IMF foresaw in January and the 1.5% forecast issued in October.

It means the IMF expects the UK economy to grow less this year than it forecast in October and January.

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Tariffs warnings

This anticipated lower growth is largely due to tariffs – taxes on goods imported to the United States – and the uncertainty caused by shifting trade policy in the US, the world’s largest economy.

While many tariffs have been paused until 8 July, it’s unclear if deals will be in place by then and if pauses may be extended.

The effect of this has been quantified as a 0.3 percentage points lower growth by 2026 in the UK, the IMF said.

The organisation held its prediction that the UK economy will grow by 1.4% in 2026.

“The forecast assumes that global trade tensions lower the level of UK GDP by 0.3% by 2026, due to persistent uncertainty, slower activity in UK trading partners, and the direct impact of remaining US tariffs on the UK,” it said.

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It comes despite the UK having agreed a deal with the Trump administration to circumvent the 25% tariffs on cars and metals.

The IMF also cautioned that “weak productivity continues to weigh on medium-term growth prospects”.

Lower productivity has been an issue since the global financial crash of 2008-2009, but has been caused by “chronic under-investment”, low private sector research and development, limited access to finance for businesses to expand, skill gaps, and a “deterioration in health outcomes”, it said.

Interest rates

Interest rates “should” continue to come down, making borrowing cheaper, though the IMF acknowledged rate-setters at the Bank of England now have a “more complex” job due to the recent rise in inflation and “fragile” growth.

The author of the report on the UK, Luc Eyraud, said the IMF expected the Bank to cut interest rates by 0.25 percentage points every three months until they reach a level of around 3%, down from the current 4.25%.

Praise was given to the UK government as the IMF said “fiscal plans strike a good balance between supporting growth and safeguarding fiscal sustainability”.

“After a slowdown in the second half of 2024, an economic recovery is under way,” the IMF said.

Global factors – “weaker export performance in the challenging global environment” – are blamed for the slowdown last year.

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The news is being taken as a win by Chancellor Rachel Reeves.

“The UK was the fastest growing economy in the G7 for the first three months of this year and today the IMF has upgraded our growth forecast,” she said.

“We’re getting results for working people through our plan for change – with three new trade deals protecting jobs, boosting investment and cutting prices, a pay rise for three million workers through the national living wage, and wages beating inflation by £1,000 over the past year.”

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What is the two-child benefit cap and will Labour scrap it?

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What is the two-child benefit cap and will Labour scrap it?

The government is considering getting rid of the two-child benefit cap first brought in by the Conservatives.

The policy has caused considerable consternation within the Labour Party, with a growing number of MPs calling to scrap it and ministers so far refusing to.

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But now, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has given the government’s strongest hint yet it may scrap the cap after she told Sky News ministers are “considering” lifting it.

We look at what the cap is and the controversy over it.

What is the two-child benefit cap?

Since 2017, parents have only been able to claim child tax credit and universal credit for their first two children, if they were born after April 2017.

An exception is made for children born as a result of rape.

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Child benefit reform ‘not off the table’

Who introduced it?

Then work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith first proposed the policy in 2012 under the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government.

It was not until 2015 that then chancellor George Osborne announced a cap would be introduced from the 2017/2018 financial year.

The coalition said it made the system fairer for taxpayers and ensured households on benefits faced the same financial choices around having children as those not on benefits.

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David Cameron on the 2015 campaign trail
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David Cameron’s government introduced the cap, though he was out of office by the time it came in

What is Labour’s position on the cap?

The party has long been divided over the issue, with Sir Keir Starmer ruling out scrapping the cap in 2023.

He then said Labour wanted to remove it, but only when fiscal conditions allowed.

Following Labour’s landslide victory last July, the prime minister refused to bow to pressure within his party, and suspended seven MPs for six months for voting with the SNP to scrap the cap.

Ministers have toed the party line for months, but the narrative started to shift in May, with Sir Keir reported to have asked the Treasury to see how scrapping it could be funded.

The publication of Labour’s child poverty strategy was delayed from the spring to autumn, fuelling speculation the government wants to use the next budget to scrap the cap.

Then the education secretary told Sky News on 27 May lifting the cap is “not off the table” – and “it’s certainly something that we’re considering”.

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Why did Labour delay their child poverty strategy?

How many children does the cap affect?

Government figures show one in nine children (1.6m) are impacted by the two-child limit.

In the first three months Labour were in power, 10,000 children were pulled into poverty by the cap, the Child Poverty Action Group found.

In May, it said another 109 children are pulled into poverty each day by the limit, adding to the 4.5 million already in poverty.

The Resolution Foundation said the cap would increase the number of children in poverty to 4.8 million by the next election in 2029-30.

Torsten Bell, the foundation’s former chief executive and now a Labour Treasury minister, said scrapping the cap would lift 470,000 children out of poverty.

Torsten Bell.
Pic: Dimitris Legakis/Athena Pictures/Shutterstock
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Torsten Bell has warned against keeping the cap. Pic: Dimitris Legakis/Athena Pictures/Shutterstock

How much would lifting the cap cost the taxpayer?

The cap means for every subsequent child after the first two, families cannot claim benefits worth £3,455 a year, according to the Institute for Government.

It estimates removing the limit would cost the government about £3.4bn a year – equal to roughly 3% of the total working-age benefit budget.

It is also approximately the same cost as freezing fuel duties for the next parliament.

Research has found the indirect fiscal impacts of lifting the cap could be higher, as some data shows investing in young children can pay for itself by causing better outcomes for them later in life.

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Donald Trump says he will postpone 50% tariffs on EU until July

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Donald Trump says he will postpone 50% tariffs on EU until July

Donald Trump says he will delay the imposition of 50% tariffs on goods entering the United States from the European Union until July, as the two sides attempt to negotiate a trade deal.

It comes after the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said in a post on social media site X that she had spoken to Mr Trump and expressed that they needed until 9 July to “reach a good deal”.

The US president had last Friday threatened to bring in the 50% tariffs from 1 June, as European leaders said they were ready to respond with their own measures.

But Mr Trump has now said that date has been put back to 9 July to allow more time for negotiations with the 27-member bloc, with the phone call appearing to smooth over tensions for now at least.

Speaking on Sunday before boarding Air Force One for Washington DC, Mr Trump told reporters that he had spoken to Ms Von der Leyen and she “wants to get down to serious negotiations” and she vowed to “rapidly get together and see if we can work something out”.

The US president, in comments on his Truth Social platform, had reignited fears last Friday of a trade war between the two powers when he said talks were “going nowhere” and the bloc was “very difficult to deal with”.

Mr Trump told the media in Morristown, New Jersey, on Sunday that Ms Von der Leyen “just called me… and she asked for an extension in the June 1st date. And she said she wants to get down to serious negotiation”.

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“We had a very nice call and I agreed to move it. I believe July 9th would be the date. That was the date she requested. She said we will rapidly get together and see if we can work something out,” the US president added.

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Shortly after, he wrote on Truth Social: “I agreed to the extension – July 9, 2025 – It was my privilege to do so.”

On his so-called “liberation day” last month, Mr Trump unleashed tariffs on many of America’s trade partners. But since then he’s backed down in a spiralling tit-for-tat tariff face-off with China, and struck a deal with the UK.

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Much of his most incendiary rhetoric on trade has been directed at Brussels, though, even going as far as to claim the EU was created to rip the US off.

Responding to his 50% tariff threat, EU trade chief Maros Sefcovic said: “EU-US trade is unmatched and must be guided by mutual respect, not threats.

“We stand ready to defend our interests.”

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