Swedish landlord SBB’s offer to buy back some of its bonds at steep discounts may be tantamount to a default, according to a statement from S&P Global Ratings, Bloomberg News reported. The ratings agency placed Samhallsbyggnadsbolaget i Norden AB, as it is otherwise known, on watch for a possible downgrade to selective default in a statement Friday. S&P said it would be able to assess further once the final results of the buyback were published.
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Resources Per Country
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Three Bank of England policy makers warned markets to brace for UK interest rates to remain elevated for a lengthy period of time, the latest efforts by officials to dampen bets on a reduction in borrowing costs by mid-2024, Bloomberg News reported. Deputy Governor Dave Ramsden said firms must adapt to a higher rate world after the shift away from the low borrowing costs that marked the post-global financial crisis period.
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Germany's lower house of parliament on Friday passed the Financing for the Future Act, to promote start-ups and improve access to capital markets, Reuters reported. The objective of this law is to make Germany more attractive for entrepreneurs and to help drive the economy of Europe's industrial powerhouse. In the future, companies will be allowed to go public with a minimum market capitalization of one million euros instead of the previous 1.25 million. In addition, an underwriter such as a bank is no longer required.
The Norwegian Competition Authority is moving to block Norwegian Air’s plan to buy regional airline Widerøe, in the latest sign that European regulators are taking a tougher stance against the latest wave of airline mergers, Airline Weekly reported. The regulator highlighted the reduction in competition to two airlines from three on many domestic routes in the country amid reasons for its objections to the 1.13 billion Norwegian kroner ($104 million) deal.
Italy is no longer in danger of a cut to junk at Moody’s Investors Service, which raised its rating outlook to stable in a huge win for Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Bloomberg News reported. The country’s assessment was kept at Baa3, the lowest investment grade, but the company removed the threat of a downgrade after more than 15 months with a negative view instituted just before the populist premier won power.
Germany’s top court struck down a key element of the government’s plans to address climate change and transform the economy, dealing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition a major setback that throws its budget policy into disarray, Bloomberg News reported. The Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the shifting of €60 billion ($65.2 billion) earmarked to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic into an off-budget fund violated German constitutional law.
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It was one of very few economies to get a boost from the Covid-19 pandemic. That unusual dividend is now unraveling, in a fresh blow to Europe’s already weakened growth outlook, the Wall Street Journal reported. Home to large U.S. technology and pharmaceutical companies that saw their sales boom during the pandemic, tiny Ireland recorded annual growth of 10.5% on average between 2020 and 2022 while other economies contracted under the effect of lockdowns. No other country grew as fast during this time apart from smaller Guyana, which enjoyed an oil boom.
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Inflation in Britain slowed last month, bringing the rate to its lowest level in two years, in a welcome easing of stubborn price pressures, the New York Times reported. Consumer prices rose 4.6 percent in October from a year earlier, the Office for National Statistics said on Wednesday, down from 6.7 percent in the previous month. Last year, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine made wholesale energy prices soar, but price caps on bills in Britain meant that households felt these increases with a lag. The same has been true as wholesale prices have dropped this year.
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A U.K. city council facing a £23 million in-year budget gap has said that it could declare bankruptcy if it is not feasible to balance its books, the Darlington & Stockton Times reported. Nottingham City Council has said that while it is “not ‘bankrupt’ or insolvent”, it will need to assess whether it can deliver a balanced budget. It comes after concerns that the council will follow the likes of Birmingham and others in issuing a Section 114 notice, meaning a council is effectively bankrupt.
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Germany’s highest court ruled on Wednesday that the government’s plan to repurpose tens of billions of euros from a pandemic fund to help finance environmental projects violated the nation’s Constitution, the New York Times reported. The decision threatens to rip a hole in the country’s budget and complicate its transition to a greener economy.
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