British credit card borrowing grew at the fastest pace since 2005 in the 12 months to July, Bank of England data showed on Tuesday, in a potential sign that some households are struggling to make ends meet as the cost of living soars, Reuters reported. Credit card borrowing rose by a net 740 million pounds ($869 million) on the month, down from a 945 million-pound increase in June but 13% higher than the year before, the biggest annual increase since October 2005. The average interest rate on credit card borrowing rose to 21.7% in July, the highest since late 1998, the data showed.

German inflation accelerated to the most since the euro was introduced on soaring energy prices, bolstering calls for a jumbo interest-rate increase when the European Central Bank meets next week, Bloomberg News reported. Consumer prices in Europe’s biggest economy, calculated under European Union harmonized standards, jumped 8.8% from a year ago in August, matching the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of analysts.

French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne urged businesses to cut energy use or face possible rationing this winter if Russia halts gas deliveries, Bloomberg News reported. “It’s urgent to stop any energy consumption that isn’t indispensable immediately,” Borne said on Monday in a speech to business leaders at a conference near Paris. If not “there could be brutal gas outages overnight and serious economic and social consequences,” she said, adding that “companies would be the first hit” by any rationing.

August 31 China Evergrande Bondholders Push Own Plan for Debt Restructuring Global funds that invested in China Evergrande Group's bonds have come up with their own debt restructuring plan for the property developer and demanded that its chair repay liabilities with his own fortune, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday, according to Reuters. With more than $300 billion in liabilities, Evergrande, once China's top-selling developer, has been at the centre of the crisis and its debt restructuring plan is seen as a possible template for others.

German energy giant Uniper SE is seeking to extend a government credit line to 13 billion euros ($13 billion) in the latest sign of how Europe’s energy crisis is getting worse, Bloomberg News reported. The utility has requested an additional 4 billion euros from Germany’s state-owned lender KfW after fully using its existing 9 billion-euro credit line, Uniper said in a statement on Monday. The additional funding request is about double the Dusseldorf-based company’s current market value.

European Central Bank Chief Economist Philip Lane urged a “steady pace” of interest-rate increases in fighting record inflation to minimize negative consequences -- seeming to push back after some of his colleagues floated a 75 basis-point hike at next week’s meeting, Bloomberg News reported.

The Czech Republic will convene an emergency meeting of European Union energy ministers on Sept. 9 to find a bloc-wide agreement on tackling surging power costs, potentially through capping the price of gas used in electricity production, Reuters reported. Europe's electricity costs have soared since Russia curbed gas supplies to Europe, sending prices of the fuel sharply higher, and there are fears Moscow could cut flows further in retaliation for Western sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine.

The volume of retail sales fell by 8.1 per cent in the year to July as sales of motors, food, beverages, and tobacco all saw double digit reductions despite the easing of the Covid-19 emergency, the latest data from the Central Statistics Office shows, the Irish Times reported. Four sectors showed an annual increase in the volume of sales. The largest of these was in bars where sales soared by 56.8 per cent compared with July 2021 when some Covid-19 restrictions still applied. However, bar sales remained 8.4 per cent lower than pre-Covid-19 levels in February 2020.

SAS AB, which is working its way through a chapter 11 restructuring in the U.S., warned that much more needs to be done to persuade stakeholders to invest in the ailing Scandinavian airline, Bloomberg News reported. The airline is also having to overcome the effects of a pilots’ strike and travel disruptions that have hampered its important summer season, just as the price of kerosene has skyrocketed and inflation is accelerating.

Some European Central Bank officials want to begin a debate by year-end on when and how to shrink the almost 5 trillion euros ($5 trillion) of bonds accumulated during recent crises, Bloomberg News reported. Deciding how to go about the process -- known as quantitative tightening -- is the logical next step after the ECB raised interest rates for the first time since 2011 in July. The Governing Council hasn’t discussed the issue yet, and it’s unclear when the best moment would be to start reducing the balance sheet, given the increasing likelihood of a recession in the 19-member euro zone.