Share Sounds

Hello and welcome to today's edition of The Apprentice Investor. Regular listeners to the show will know that our Apprentices are four members of the Share Radio team who've each been given fifteen thousand pounds of virtual money to build their own share portfolios. They have a minimum of eight stocks, which they've been buying and selling through The Share Centre for the past couple of years. Today Share Radio's Simon Rose was joined in the studio by Apprentices Alexi Phillips and Olivia Demitriades. Standing by with advice and useful observations was Share Radio's sparkling Senior Analyst Ed Bowsher.

Share Radio's Simon Rose brings you Market Wrap, a roundup of what's been happening in the businesses of Britain and the world. To help put the day's events in context, Simon was joined by Share Radio's Senior Analyst Ed Bowsher. On today's show: Barclays has seen a jump in its annual pre-tax profits which nearly treble; British Gas owner Centrica has reported an annual pre-tax profit of £2.2bn, against a loss of £1.1bn the year before; pressure on the sales of French bonds eased earlier today, as the likelihood of a win for Marine Le Pen decreased. All this and much more on the Market Wrap.

"The Investment Trust Show", brought to you in association with Henderson Global Investors. Each week we explore the main features, factors and developments affecting investment trusts. This week we're going to be looking at using investment trusts to invest for income. To do so, Share Radio's Simon Rose was joined on the phone by Alan Borrows from the Seneca Global Income & Growth Trust and Simon Elliot, Head of Research at Winterflood. Also with Simon, as ever, was Share Radio's senior analyst Ed Bowsher.

Barclays has reported a surge in profits, from a net loss of almost £400 million in 2015 to net profit of £1.6 billion in 2016, but the share price is slightly softer - for more on why, Richard Hunter, head of research at Wilson King Investment Management, joined Share Radio's Ed Bowsher to talk through the day's biggest company stories.

With increasingly busy lives many of us struggle to fit a healthy and affordable lunch into the working day. It's that experience that inspired Becky Alexander and nutritionist Michelle Lake to put together recipe book Packed. To find out more about workplace lunch trends and how to save time and money on food Share Radio's Tom Hill spoke to the two authors.

What would a Marine Le Pen victory in the French presidential election mean for markets? Panmure Gordon's chief economist Simon French says the right-wing candidate could win and, given a possible exit from the Euro, the impact would be more immediate than Brexit and 'strike at the heart of an economic system'. He joined Share Radio's Ed Bowsher to talk through this and the day's big economic stories including possible US rate increases, gold price rise and more.

Now if you're a manager - looking to shake things up in the office, have you thought about taking a deep breath... ...And trying Mindfulness Author Philip Cox-Hynd reckons it can increase employee motivation and help leaders adapt to the fast evolving workplace. His latest book is Mindfulness and The Art of Change by Choice

Latest minutes from the Federal Open Markets Committee (FOMC) came out yesterday. Apparently committee members want an interest rate rise sooner rather than later. Gregory Daco, Head of US Macroeconomics at Oxford Economics, joined Share Radio's Ed Bowsher to discuss.

Georgie Frost was joined by financial planner David Braithwaite from Citrus Financial. Today on the agenda, they discussed the confusion around how switching mobile phone providers is costing us 5.8 billion pounds every year. Plus they look into why doubling your fruit and veg intake to 10 portions a day may give us longer lives. All these stories and more on The News Review.

In the first round of the French presidential election, polls see support for far-right candidate Marine Le Pen growing. Aarti Shankar, Policy Analyst at Open Europe joined Share Radio's Ed Bowsher to give her on take on this.