The government of Austria presented a series of measures Wednesday to counter the impact of inflation, including a three-year cap on rent increases for many apartments and a freeze on fees to use highways, the Associated Press reported. The package foresees a 5% cap on annual rent increases in 2024-2026 even if inflation is higher than that. According to the government, the cap will prevent hikes of some 15% next year in some public housing.
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Austria’s largest insolvency in a decade is turning into a race for workers from companies desperate to fill open jobs, Bloomberg News reported. Retailers, banks, insurers, the postal service and even the country’s tiny military have offered to take some of the 1,034 workers initially set to be laid off from furniture chain Kika/Leiner. The bankrupt firm is itself organizing a jobs fair to aid the process.
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Clovis Oncology has agreed to sell its approved cancer drug Rubraca to a privately held Austrian company as part of an auction associated with its ongoing bankruptcy proceedings, BioPharmaDive reported. Pharma& Schwiez submitted the highest bid at the auction, according to a regulatory filing, and will pay $70 million upfront for rights to Rubraca, which is approved in the U.S. for prostate and ovarian cancers. The company could pay another $65 million if certain regulatory and sales milestones are later met. The sale is subject to approval by the U.S.
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Russian natural gas deliveries to Austria are continuing unrestricted and there is no indication that will change, its government said on Wednesday while adding it is scrambling to find alternative sources, Reuters reported. Austria obtains 80% of its natural gas from Russia, a heavy dependency that it says will take time to end now that Russia's invasion of Ukraine has made plain the need to shift away from Europe's cheapest source of gas. "Since the start of the war delivery volumes have not changed. In fact, they have increased," Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer told a news conference.
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Austria’s government is stepping up its efforts to urge fellow European Union nations to quicken a return to cautious budget policies, as the latest wave of the pandemic will require less stimulus, Bloomberg News reported. Finance Minister Gernot Bluemel said further measures to support economies were unlikely despite an increase in infections, as higher vaccination rates allowed governments to avoid lockdown measures. Instead, EU member states should look ahead and start rebuilding state financial coffers to prepare for future crises.
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Austria has experienced plenty of scandalous bank failures in the past decade, not least at Hypo Alpe Adria, the house lender of the late Freedom Party leader Joerg Haider, Bloomberg News reported. Yet the fraud that brought down tiny Commerzialbank Mattersburg im Burgenland AG raises questions for financial regulators and auditors that have uncomfortable echoes of the Wirecard AG debacle in neighboring Germany.
Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI) on Tuesday posted a 44% slump in second-quarter profit, largely due to the economic impact of the pandemic in the countries in which it operates, but confirmed its 2020 targets, Reuters reported. The Austrian lender, which does business across central and eastern Europe, said consolidated net profit came in at 192 million euros ($226 million) in the three months per end-June, beating analyst expectations of 143 million euros.
Austrian short-haul budget carrier Level Europe plans to file for insolvency, it said on Thursday, becoming the latest airline casualty of the coronavirus crisis despite the financial might of parent IAG, Reuters reported. The small airline, previously known as ANISEC, began operating in 2018. It has six Airbus short-haul jets and is part of IAG-owned Vueling Group. British Airways owner IAG also operates a long-haul airline called Level, which is separate from Level Europe, an IAG spokeswoman said.
Switzerland and Austria pledged to help Lufthansa with state-backed loans as the German airline pursues talks with Berlin over a 9 billion euro ($9.8 billion) rescue package, Reuters reported. The Swiss government said on Wednesday it will ask parliament for 1.275 billion francs in loan guarantees for Lufthansa (LHAG.DE) units Swiss and Edelweiss. Strict travel restrictions to contain the coronavirus pandemic have brought flights to a near-halt across the world and there is no end in sight for when they can restart, leaving many airlines begging governments for rescue packages.
The heated auction between buyout firm Bain Capital and Austria’s AMS AG for the German LED-maker Osram Licht AG has ended in no deal, a Bloomberg View reported. The prospect of a transaction being rekindled in the near term looks bleak — though not impossible over the longer run. It beggars belief that a tense round of bidding can culminate in no more than a tangled mess. But this is regrettably often the way with German M&A.