Buchler, fresh back from the Genoa Boat Show, tells me these brands and a third, Riva, all owned by the Ferretti Group, are the “Rolls-Royce, Bentley and Aston Martin” of the yachting world.

He did some work with the existing continental dealer in the summer and has now emerged with half the company, Ventura Maritime, and the right to sell into the UK.

Although the range will be at the London Boat Show, in January, Buchler has to explain to me gently that there will be none at the Mayfair showroom — it isn’t big enough. He is debating upgrading his own yacht, a British-made Princess. “If I change, it will be either a Ferretti, a Pershing or a Riva.”

ERNST & YOUNG is now installed in its new headquarters south of the Thames at Tower Bridge, in easy tomato-throwing range of that American idiot in a glass box. The new place is one of those open-plan, no offices monstrosities. So I hear one senior partner has gone to the length of acquiring a flat in the area to which he retires with laptop to get some quiet work done.

Hatts off to book

WHICH is the most filmed City church? St Bartholomew the Great, near Smithfield, has stood in as the Cathedral of Nottingham in a Robin Hood film, Westminster Abbey in Norman times, has been in Shakespeare in Love and is also in the climactic scene in Four Weddings and a Funeral.

I am indebted for this to London City Churches, definitely a niche publication and the first book from Bankside Press, a small independent publisher. It contains black and white drawings of all 41 churches in the Square Mile by Paul Middleton, with comments on each from Leigh Hatts, who used to edit the Diocese of London’s newspaper.

LEIGH HATTS tells me, by the by, that there is a newish occupier of the original site of Edward Lloyd’s coffee house, which is just behind St Mary Woolnoth, where Lloyd was buried after he died in 1712. The site is now a branch of J Sainsbury, which means customers will again be able to buy coffee there — after a break of several centuries.

Raw deals

JON MOULTON, the outspoken venture capitalist and managing partner at Alchemy, has produced a long list of examples of wrongdoing at (unnamed) firms he has approached.

The chairman of one quoted company responded: “It’s 60p if I’m in the deal, 70p else,” Moulton tells reach, a magazine produced by the Stock Exchange. Earlier this year Alchemy made serious but confidential approaches to four companies. Within three days their share prices had risen by 47, 122, 71 and 65 per cent.

Jon, shouldn’t you be telling the authorities? “A waste of time,” says Moulton, who admits he wrote the piece “for fun”. He claims: “In each case, the chances of anything being proved were near nil.”

AND now, another in our series in which we demonstrate how those City analysts earn their huge salaries. CSFB has had a bit of a down on Amersham, which announced a takeover approach last week. The broker grudgingly raised its price target from 475p to 610p a share, keeping its “underperform” rating and claiming a “limited number of potential acquirers”.

The bid arrived the very next day, from GE at 800p. CSFB has just raised its target price to, er, 800p. Yes, even I can see how they might be worth that.

city.diary@thetimes.co.uk

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