Business Diary: Goldman's charitable work doesn't cut it

Until yesterday, the Goldman Sachs homepage was plastered with a single large number – 134,237. That's not, before you get cross, this week's bonus payout, but the total number of hours worked this year by Goldman staff for "non-profit community partners worldwide". Will the bank's worthy record on charity prevent the world sticking it to them following yesterday's profits? In a word, no.

Just six hours to save the world

Just one thing about that Goldman claim, by the way. The hours were racked up by 22,800 staff, according to the bank's website. By our calculation, that's less than six hours per person. So the poor blighters weren't detained from time that could have been spent splashing the cash for too long then.

The flakes aren't fakes says Kellogg's

Much indignation at Kellogg's at suggestions that a story it was putting around earlier this week might be an elaborate publicity stunt. It really does have the technology to laser its logo on to individual cornflakes, it insists, and the story wasn't a joke. Still, you'll note the process is still at the test phase – let's see if it goes further.

Darling called in for a telling off

Don't be too cross with Alistair Darling if the economy has a bad day in the next couple of weeks. According to a press release put out by InsureandGo, the Chancellor has been "summoned to a meeting" with its boss Perry Wilson, who intends to give him a piece of his mind about airport duty tax. Mr Darling is bound to drop everything, naturally, so he won't be able to concentrate on small matters like the recession.

Driven by high Standards?

It's nice to see in these reccession hit times that there's still a place for a bit of good old fashioned British snobbery. And the exclusive RAC Club in Pall Mall has that commodity in spades. Staff always used to hand out the London Evening Standard to members, but a sign has gone up informing members that they will have to obtain it elsewhere since "London's Paper" became a freesheet.

Number of the day: $1.9bn

The value of a deal to sell Skype, which the telephony's original founders are seeking a court injunction to block.

businessdiary@independent.co.uk