Now the economy is recovering, is it a good idea to buy Poundland shares?

‘Satan seizes control of saintly bank’ would be a fair summary of much of the coverage of the deal that has rescued the crippled Co-operative Bank from oblivion, or ‘resolution’ as it is technically called. In order to avoid that fate, the parent Co-op Group has had to inject £462 million into the bank while accepting a reduction in its own equity stake to 30 per cent. Dominant among the holders of the other 70 per cent will be a group of hedge funds from New York and Los Angeles who may or may not represent the prince of darkness but are certainly looking for what Co-op Group chief Euan Sutherland calls ‘recovery value’. That means their aim is to get out at a handsome profit as soon as they can, and not to become long-term investors in the Co-op model of banking biodiversity for which many of us once had high hopes.