Europe moved closer to adopting the world's first artificial intelligence rules on Wednesday as EU lawmakers endorsed a provisional agreement for a technology whose use is rapidly growing across a wide swathe of industries and in everyday life, Reuters reported. Three years in the making, the AI Act comes as generative AI systems such as Microsoft-backed OpenAI's ChatGPT, and Google's chatbot Gemini become more popular, fuelling concerns about misinformation and fake news.

A Signa Prime Selection AG creditor committee has rejected plans to sell a portfolio of Austrian property to the Schoeller Group, Bloomberg News reported. The initial decision casts doubt on a deal that insolvent Signa Prime had hoped would help address a bottleneck in its restructuring efforts. Negotiations between the firm and its lenders are ongoing. The luxury unit in the property and retail empire founded by Rene Benko was looking to sell several Austrian assets, including the Park Hyatt hotel and the Golden Quarter luxury shopping area.

Sweden's DSAM Sverige has withdrawn its bankruptcy petition against rival real estate company Oscar Properties after receiving confirmation that its claims had been paid, the Stockholm District Court said on Monday, Reuters reported. Shares in Oscar Properties were up about 40% to 0.58 Swedish crowns ($0.0567) at 1217 GMT after the court's announcement on Monday, but are still trading at a fraction of their historical highs reached in 2017. Oscar Properties was not immediately available for comment.

German electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer Next.e.Go Mobile, which planned to build a factory in Bulgaria, has filed for insolvency amid industry challenges and capital market volatility, SeeNews.com reported. It is expected that other subsidiaries, including New York-listed Next.e.GO N.V., will initiate corresponding insolvency proceedings, German business news magazine Wirtschaftswoche reported last week. Next.e.Go Mobile intended to build three new micro-factories across Europe and the U.S., aiming to expand production of its small EVs for urban settings.

Deutsche Bank's chief executive officer said on Tuesday that he expects the current crisis in commercial real estate to continue in 2024 and that provisions for loan losses will be at the upper end of its projected range, Reuters reported. There won't be "overall big relief" to the challenges facing commercial real estate in 2024, CEO Christian Sewing said. Deutsche Bank is Germany's largest lender and also has the most in outstanding loans to the commercial real-state sector among its domestic competitors, data show.

U.K. wage growth eased marginally, as the unemployment rate ticked up, a small relief to Bank of England policymakers hoping that labor pressures would ease ahead of expected interest-rate cuts later this year, the Wall Street Journal reported. The headline measure of average annual pay growth, excluding bonuses, was 6.1% in the three months to January, compared with 6.2% in the final quarter of 2023, a fifth fall in as many months, according to data published Tuesday by the Office for National Statistics. The rate was the lowest since October 2022.

UniCredit faces court hearings in Britain and Russia in the second quarter after a Russian energy company sued the Italian bank for failing to honour guarantee payments because of international sanctions, UniCredit said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. Italian lenders Intesa Sanpaolo and UniCredit still have businesses in Russia, as Western sanctions following the Ukraine conflict curtailed the number of potential buyers and Moscow then passed laws that restrict divestments.

Signa’s flagship property unit is close to an agreement to sell a portfolio of luxury Austrian assets to Germany’s Schoeller Group, Bloomberg News reported. A deal may help Signa Prime Selection AG resolve a deadlock in its broader restructuring related to a previous loan deal with Schoeller. It would also be the first major transaction with property held by Rene Benko’s troubled empire since its insolvency at the end of last year.

The majority of North East councillors have agreed to accept Budget proposals aimed at saving the local authority from effective bankruptcy, the Northern Echo reported. The Full Middlesbrough Council met at the town hall on Friday to cast their vote on the plans which include the maximum council tax rise, along with a charge for green waste collection. They also agreed to accept exceptional financial support from the Government allowing the council to borrow £13.4m. The vote saw 25 councillors vote for the Budget plans and 16 against while five abstained.

The curators managing the VanMoof bankruptcy administration are in talks with a major financier of the e-bike brand about an agreement that would allow a group of disadvantaged customers to get their money back, NL Times reported. The lender promised VanMoof that customers who ordered bikes shortly before the bankruptcy would be compensated in the event the company went bust. This arrangement is for customers who ordered the SX4 and SA5 e-bike models, but never received them.