Britain's largest arms manufacturer, BAE, just out with the widely anticipated news
Talk over the last 24 hours had been a figure of around 1000 so this somewhat adds fuel to an already burning fire.Most of the job losses will be at two plants in Lancashire, UK
The company has been trouble for a while with a slowdown in orders for the Eurofighter Typhoons. Qatar last month agreed to buy 24 but an expected order from Saudi Arabia failed to materialise and the Typhoon has reportedly won fewer orders so far in 2017 than a rival fighter jet built by France's Dassault Aviation.
The rumours of job losses had already given rise to call from union bosses to the UK govt to intervene with Unite Union assistant General Secretary Steve Turner saying:
"The UK government can end the uncertainty surrounding the future of thousands of British BAE defence jobs at a stroke by committing to building the next generation fighter jets here in the UK"
Not good news from BAE but, hey, we'll get some calm leadership from PM May eh? Grrrrr.
GBPUSD testing 1.3200 again now as general USD supply prevails. EURUSD up to 1.1783 again.
Dark times for BAE workers
