Atos SE said that it is seeking more cash to finance its business and might need to further reduce its debt, as the embattled French IT company delayed a deadline it set for proposals from its creditors and banks to finance a rescue plan, Bloomberg News reported. The deadline, originally on Friday, will be moved back to May 3 after first quarter performance was hurt by customers postponing signing contracts, the company said in a statement on Thursday. Atos plans to submit its new needs “in the coming days,” according to the statement.

The Bank of England found a number of UK banks were unable to measure their exposure to private equity giants and their portfolio companies and ordered them to begin stress testing those relationships, Bloomberg News reported. The central bank’s Prudential Regulatory Authority reminded lenders’ chief risk officers in a letter Tuesday that it expects them to “comprehensively identify, measure, combine, and record risks” tied to buyout funds and the companies they back.

More than 60 former employees of a collapsed contractor have waited more than five years to be paid money they are owed, ConstructionNews.co.uk reported. A new report, filed earlier this month at Companies House by administrators at Begbies Traynor, said that the ex-employees were still expected to be paid in full, but the liquidators were “continuing to liaise” with the government-backed Redundancy Payments Service (RPS) over their claims.

German business sentiment improved to its highest level in a year — reinforcing recent signs that Europe’s largest economy is exiting two years of struggles, Bloomberg News reported. An expectations gauge by the Ifo institute rose to 89.9. in April from a revised 87.7 the previous month. That exceeds the 88.9 median forecast in a Bloomberg survey. A measure of current conditions also advanced. “Sentiment has improved at companies in Germany,” Ifo President Clemens Fuest said. “Companies were more satisfied with their current business. Their expectations also brightened.

Former Liverpool and England football star John Barnes has been banned as a company director after his firm failed to pay more than £190,000 ($236,290) in tax, Bloomberg News reported. The UK’s Insolvency Service said on Wednesday that Barnes’ media company paid no taxes between November 2018 and October 2020 despite making more than £400,000 in earnings. The ex-footballer, who makes regular appearances on TV, has been banned for the next three-and-a-half years, it said.

Heubach GmbH, part of the Germany-headquartered Heubach Group, a global provider of colour solutions, has filed an application for the opening of regular insolvency proceedings over its assets with the competent insolvency court in Braunschweig, SustainablePlastics.com reported. At the same time, it applied for the jurisdiction of the Braunschweig insolvency court as the group court for the German subgroup of the Heubach Group.

Hungary further slowed the pace of cuts to the European Union’s highest key interest rate, with policymakers seeking to anchor the volatile forint in a riskier economic environment, Bloomberg News reported. The National Bank of Hungary reduced the benchmark interest rate by 50 basis points to 7.75% on Tuesday, matching most forecasts in a Bloomberg survey. The unanimous decision compared with a 75 basis-point reduction in March and a full percentage point cut in February.

A first cut in the Bank of England’s key interest rate remains some way off, its chief economist said Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported. Huw Pill said there had been little news on the U.K. economy since March, when he laid out his case for leaving the key rate at a 16-year high for the time being. “While we are making satisfactory progress in returning inflation to target, in my baseline scenario the time for cutting [the] bank rate remained some way off,” Pill said.

Hong Kong developer Lai Sun Development Co. is considering options for a planned office tower in the City of London, including a potential sale of a stake in the project, Bloomberg News reported. The group has appointed Eastdil Secured and DBS Group Holdings Ltd. to advise on finding a partner for the 100 Leadenhall Street project, according to people with knowledge of the appointments. The financial advisers are currently undertaking due diligence on the project and could seek a funding partner later in the year or in early 2025.

The U.S. is drafting sanctions that threaten to cut some Chinese banks off from the global financial system, arming Washington’s top envoy with diplomatic leverage that officials hope will stop Beijing’s commercial support of Russia’s military production, the Wall Street Journal reported. But as Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads to Beijing on Tuesday, the question is whether even the threat of the U.S.