Recent debt restructurings of distressed Italian corporates, including ferry operator Moby, construction group Astaldi and building product company Officine Maccaferri, highlight bondholders’ exposure to greater complexities and uncertainties in Italian corporate restructuring processes compared to more creditor-friendly European jurisdictions, Fitch Ratings said in a report released today.

The Irish government has moved in Finance Bill 2021 to close off a potential loophole in laws introduced during the summer to impose a 10 per cent stamp duty on bulk buyers of 10 or more houses within a one-year period, the Irish Times reported. The Bill, published on Thursday, seeks to insert a clarification into law that the stamp duty also applies to the “indirect” acquisition of a house by way of, for example, the purchase of shares in a company that owns a property.

European Union leaders pressured a defiant Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki Thursday to fall back into line on recognizing that EU law trumps national decision-making, hoping that dialogue will stave off a fundamental crisis in the bloc, the Associated Press reported. Morawiecki instead painted a picture of an overbearing union treating its 27 member nations as mere provinces, usurping ever more powers and feeling free to impose its values at will against the wishes of sovereign peoples.

The global upswing in trade is leaving the U.K. behind, an early sign of the challenge Brexit is presenting its economy, the Wall Street Journal reported. The U.K. formally began its new relationship with the European Union Jan. 1. Before then, and before the Covid-19 pandemic upended world trade, Jason Wouhra’s food wholesale business in England’s West Midlands, Lioncroft Wholesale Ltd., generated up to a quarter of its annual revenue from customers in Spain, Portugal and other markets in the EU. Lioncroft has now stopped exporting to the EU altogether.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak plans to extend a program of state-backed loans for U.K. businesses, one of the measures to aid the economy’s recovery from the worst recession in a century, Bloomberg News reported. The Recovery Loan Scheme was due to end Dec. 31 but will now be extended for a further six months, according to a person familiar with the Treasury’s plans who asked not to be named because discussions are still underway. Sunak is set to announce the decision in his budget on Oct. 27, the person said.

Investors are coming to terms with the prospect that the Bank of England could scale back support for the gilt market sooner than expected, Bloomberg News reported. Traders are now betting the BOE will raise the key interest rate to 0.5% in February. That’s the threshold after which the bank may let gilts that mature in its 875-billion pound ($1.2 trillion) asset purchase program roll out of the portfolio without being replaced.

Frankfurt Hahn Airport, a German international budget flights hub, has filed for insolvency, according to a court filing published on Tuesday, Reuters reported. It was not immediately clear how the insolvency would affect flight operations. The airport, which is primarily used by low-cost airlines such as Ryanair and cargo airlines and served about 1.5 million passengers in 2019, is 82.5% owned by Chinese airport group HNA, while the German state of Hesse has a 17.5% stake.

The European Union began work this week revising its fiscal rules as it considers new exceptions to allow for the massive investments needed to help member states make their economies more climate friendly, Bloomberg News reported. The European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm, launched a public consultation on the so-called Stability and Growth Pact, a fiscal framework that dictates countries’ debt and deficit levels. The EU suspended the SGP in March of 2020 to give member states the flexibility to react to the Covid-induced recession.

Poland's prime minister repeatedly came under criticism during a tense debate in the European Parliament on Tuesday, with the EU's chief executive warning Warsaw that its challenge to the supremacy of the 27-nation bloc's law would not go unpunished, Reuters reported. "You're arguments are not getting better. You're just escaping the debate," said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, visibly exasperated with Poland's Mateusz Morawiecki after more than four hours of back-and-forth.

Credit Suisse Group AG has agreed to pay nearly $475 million to American and British authorities to resolve charges in connection with Mozambican bond offerings, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The charges centered on the Zurich-based bank's role in a $2 billion scandal involving government-guaranteed loans. The SEC said Credit Suisse fraudulently misled investors and violated U.S. bribery laws in a scheme involving two bond offerings and a syndicated loan that raised funds on behalf of state-owned entities in Mozambique.