European Union lawmakers were set on Thursday to back tougher safeguards for transfers of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, in the latest sign that regulators are tightening up on the freewheeling sector, Reuters reported. Two committees in the European Parliament have thrashed out cross-party compromises to be voted on. Crypto exchange Coinbase Global Inc. has warned the rules would usher in a surveillance regime that stifles innovation. The $2.1 trillion crypto sector is still subject to patchy regulation across the world.

Regulators are looking to update rules, which target companies abusing their market power and those setting up illegal cartels, to make them more efficient, EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said on Thursday, Reuters reported. Under the rules, known as Regulation 1/2003 and in force since 2004, the European Commission has taken on Alphabet unit Google, Apple, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Intel and imposed billions of euros in fines.

Europe's economy is increasingly strained by Russia's war in Ukraine as growth stalls, confidence plummets and inflation soars, data and warnings from policymakers made clear on Wednesday, Reuters reported. Sanctions on Russia following its invasion last month have pushed energy prices to record highs across the continent, sapping confidence and raising the risk of another recession, even before some states have recovered from a COVID-fuelled downturn.

Amid the mayhem provoked in the world energy market by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Spain and Portugal have emerged in a strategically advantageous position as an “energy island” in Europe, with a relatively low reliance on Russian natural gas, the Associated Press reported. Leaders in renewable energy thanks to solar, wind and hydraulic power, Spain and Portugal are now poised to reap the benefits of long-term investments in liquefied natural gas, or LNG.

Credit Suisse Group AG shareholders proposed a special audit over the collapse of a group of supply chain finance funds it ran with now-defunct Greensill Capital, after the bank refused to publish an internal report on the matter, Bloomberg News reported. The lender urged shareholders to vote against the proposal at the bank’s annual general meeting next month, saying it could complicate efforts to recover investor money that remains locked up more than a year after it was frozen. The audit is being proposed by the Ethos Foundation and seven Swiss pension funds.

The president of Britain’s Supreme Court said Wednesday that he and a colleague were stepping down from their roles on Hong Kong’s highest court because the administration of the Chinese territory had “departed from values of political freedom and freedom of expression,” the New York Times reported. Their resignations will heighten scrutiny of Hong Kong’s British-style legal system, which the former British colony kept even after it returned to Chinese control in 1997.

Lending to consumers in Britain rose last month by the most in nearly five years, driven by a record rise in credit card borrowing, according to data that analysts said could be a sign of the growing cost-of-living squeeze, Reuters reported. Figures from the Bank of England on Tuesday showed consumer credit rose by a net 1.876 billion pounds ($2.46 billion) in February, about 1 billion pounds more than expected in a Reuters poll of economists and the biggest increase since March 2017.

The head of the UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) was on Tuesday accused of "very, very basic errors in litigation" and hiding behind a review into the agency's failings in a tetchy grilling by lawmakers, Reuters reported. Lisa Osofsky said she was duty bound to wait for the recommendations of former High Court judge David Calvert-Smith before being drawn on how two convictions in the high-profile Unaoil bribery prosecution were quashed by the Court of Appeal.

The United States and its allies plan new sanctions on more sectors of Russia's economy that are critical to sustaining its invasion of Ukraine, including military supply chains, Deputy U.S. Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said yesterday, Reuters reported.

The conflict between Russia and Ukraine, which are exporters of steel products, will have a huge impact on global steel demand and trade if it lasts for a long time, the head of a Japanese steel industry group said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. "Even before the Ukraine crisis, we had faced three risk factors to dent steel demand -- China's slowdown, global chip shortage and soaring energy and natural resources prices," Japan Iron and Steel Federation Chairman Eiji Hashimoto told a news conference.