With an offer of $5 million, U.K.-based outdoor and sports gear retailer Mountain Warehouse has emerged as the stalking horse bidder for Eastern Mountain Sports’ intellectual property. The bankruptcy auction ends by Aug. 30, when the deal is scheduled to close, per court documents, RetailDive.com reported. After that date, EMS will close any inventoried stores until the deal is complete, and it would be up to Mountain Warehouse to reopen them. If EMS accepts a higher bid, Mountain Warehouse is entitled to a $150,000 break-up fee, according to court filings.

Yorkshire-based developer Harworth has filed a winding-up petition against modular firm TopHat, HousingToday.uk reported. A petition was filed at the High Court on 15 July by Harworth Estates Residential Development Limited against TopHat Enterprises Ltd. The case will be heard at the business and property courts in Leeds on 13 August, with Harworth claiming it is a creditor of TopHat. A winding up petition is a legal action that can be taken by a creditor against a company that owes it £750 or more.

Credit default swaps tied to the UK’s largest pub operator have plunged in value as investors fear the company’s recent debt refinancing has left the contracts worthless, meaning bondholders have no way to hedge, Bloomberg News reported. The contracts have fallen in value since Stonegate Pubs — owner of the Slug & Lettuce and Be At One chains — closed on a refinancing last week, selling more than £2 billion ($2.54 billion) of bonds at double-digit yields.

Cash-strapped Thames Water is seeking to strike a deal with its regulator to avoid a fine of £104 million ($133 million) for polluting rivers, Bloomberg News reported. Industry regulator Ofwat said the utility released raw sewage from wastewater treatment works for years without permission. It also fined Yorkshire Water £47 million and Northumbrian Water £17 million for similar failures at treatment plants.

Retail sales unexpectedly fell in June in the eurozone as a consumption-led recovery continued to prove elusive, the Wall Street Journal reported. Total retail trade was 0.3% lower than in May, figures from the EU statistics agency showed Tuesday, bucking economists’ expectations for a continued rise in sales. Indeed, the eurozone has failed to book two consecutive months of higher retail sales so far this year despite a steady increase in real incomes as inflation eases and wages rise. Spending both on food and other goods declined compared with May, while fuel sales increased.

German manufacturing orders climbed for the first time in six months in June, driven by a revival in orders in the car industry, a potential sign of hope for the beleaguered industrial sector, the Wall Street Journal reported. Industrial orders were 3.9% higher than the prior month, German statistics office Destatis said Tuesday, rebounding after they fell 1.7% in May. That was better than the 0.5% rise expected by a consensus of economists polled by The Wall Street Journal. The uptick was the first since December last year.

The universities regulator has announced a contract of up to £4mn for professional services companies to manage a potential wave of insolvencies, as the sector faces a looming funding crisis, the Financial Times reported. The Office for Students (OfS) announced the tender last week after education secretary Bridget Phillipson made it clear that the government will not bail out universities despite warnings from university leaders that several institutions are already on the brink of insolvency.