When it opened in 2020, business was booming at Chunks, a store serving dozens of portions each day of Britain’s best known takeout meal: battered and deep-fried cod with fries, or chips as they are known here. But even before the war in Ukraine further pushed up the shop’s bills for energy, fish and cooking oil, inflation had already forced the owners, Sayward and Michael Lewis, to raise their prices twice, the New York Times reported. Now, with another spike in prices driving away customers, Chunks is on the brink of failing.

Russia will take legal action if the West tries to force it to default on its sovereign debt, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told the pro-Kremlin Izvestia newspaper on Monday, sharpening Moscow's tone in its financial wrestle with the West, Reuters reported. "Of course we will sue, because we have taken all the necessary steps to ensure that investors receive their payments," Siluanov told the newspaper in an interview. "We will present in court our bills confirming our efforts to pay both in foreign currency and in roubles. It will not be an easy process.

Russia will halt bond auctions for the remainder of 2022 due to prohibitive borrowing costs, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov was quoted as saying by Izvestia, Bloomberg News reported. “We do not plan to go to the local market or foreign markets this year,” Siluanov told the Russian outlet. “It makes no sense because the borrowing cost would be cosmic.” With Russia under financial and economic sanctions by the U.S.

Germany's energy network regulator on Friday said it would ensure ongoing operations at Gazprom Germania, a trading, storage and transmission business abandoned by Russia's Gazprom, and called on market operators not to cut ties, Reuters reported. With assets and subsidiaries in Germany, Britain, Switzerland, Belgium, the Czech Republic and outside Europe, the firm's activities are essential for the European gas market and its supply to industry and households.

The Russian central bank sharply cut its key rate to 17% on Friday and said future cuts were possible, as emergency steps had contained the risk to financial stability, brought deposits back to banks and helped limit the threat of inflation, it said, Reuters reported. Last month, the central bank kept its key interest rate at 20% following a massive emergency hike in February and said it would start buying OFZ government bonds, warning of an imminent spike in inflation and a looming economic contraction. Russia sent troops into Ukraine on Feb.

German tennis great Boris Becker was on Friday found guilty of four charges, including failing to disclose, concealing and removing significant assets, under the Insolvency Act 1986 following his bankruptcy trial in London, Reuters reported. The 54-year-old six-times Grand Slam champion, who was on trial at Southwark Crown Court, was facing 24 counts under the act relating to the period from May to October 2017.

The derivatives market is flashing signals that the tit-for-tat between the U.S. Treasury and the Kremlin is increasing the likelihood of a Russian government default after Russia’s Ministry of Finance announced Wednesday it will restrict the ability of some foreign investors to convert their payments into dollars, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The fallout of the Russia and Ukraine war has just helped tip two of world's poorest countries into full-blown crises, and the list of those at risk - and the queue at the International Monetary Fund's door - will only get longer from here, Reuters reported. They may be far from the fighting in Ukraine, but a mass resignation of Sri Lanka's cabinet on Monday read more and drastic weekend manoeuvres by Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan to avoid his removal read more , show how far the economic impact spreads.

Annual inflation in Ireland neared an almost 40-year high of 6.7% in March, a jump from 5.6% a month earlier on the back of soaring energy prices, data from the Central Statistics Office showed on Thursday, Reuters reported. Diesel and petrol rocketed by 46% and 35% respectively year-on-year while food prices rose by 3.1%. Prices overall were 1.9% higher than February, the fastest month-on-month rise since monthly figures were first collected in 1997.