Britain's financial watchdog said on Monday it had told four 'buy now pay later' firms (BNPL) to change their contracts after identifying "potential harms" to consumers, Reuters reported. BNPL firms, which are unregulated, typically offer on-the-spot interest-free short-term loans that spread payments for retail goods like clothing. The market more than trebled in size during 2020 to 2.7 billion pounds ($3.65 billion), when COVID-19 lockdowns saw more people struggling to make ends meet. "The four firms involved, Clearpay, Klarna, Laybuy and Openpay, have fully cooperated with our work.

The sudden emergence of the fast-spreading Omicron variant of the coronavirus in Britain late last year stalled the country’s economic recovery, data confirmed on Friday, though the impact was milder than expected, the New York Times reported. Britain’s gross domestic product fell 0.2 percent in December from the previous month, the Office for National Statistics said, as the government told people to work from home where possible. High case numbers and voluntary social distancing led to a wave of cancellations for restaurants, bars, theaters and other social activities.

The U.S. is considering offering Ukraine up to $1 billion in sovereign loan guarantees to help Ukraine’s economy amid pressures from the Russian military build-up, a senior Biden administration official said on Monday, Reuters reported. The White House official was confirming what a source familiar with the matter had earlier recounted to Reuters about a conversation by national security adviser Jake Sullivan with congressional leaders.

Collateralized loan obligation managers in Europe are preparing for the post-pandemic world of rising credit risk by adding more flexibility to their traditionally strict structures, Bloomberg News reported. CLOs -- which package speculative debt into bonds -- have been including options to participate in restructurings and remain involved in financings even if they go south. And while managers don’t expect a sudden deterioration of junk-rated loans and bonds anytime soon, with defaults in Europe still historically low, they want to be prepared in case things sour.

The Bank of England has begun talks with the U.K. Debt Management Office and the Treasury over how to handle active sales of bonds held in its quantitative easing portfolio, Bloomberg News reported. The discussions come as the central bank last week said it would begin running down its 875 billion pounds ($1.2 trillion) of government bond holdings for the first time by letting expired gilts fall off its balance sheet, and reiterated it would consider active sales once interest rates hit 1%.

It’s “unrealistic” that the European Central Bank will raise interest rates in June, Governing Council member Gabriel Makhlouf told the Financial Times, Bloomberg News reported. The central bank may stop net bond purchases in June or a few months later, after which it would raise rates, he told the newspaper, adding that there’s “a bit of difference” between its schedule and the one market participants are anticipating.

Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi played down concerns that widening government bond spreads may put the improvement of the country’s finances at risk, Reuters reported. “Spread rose for almost every country,” Draghi said at a press conference Friday in Rome, adding that sustained growth and budget discipline are key to keeping finances in check. Yields on Italian bonds rose sharply this week after the European Central Bank signaled mounting inflation concerns and a potential acceleration in dialing back monetary stimulus.

Inflation in countries using the euro, which has soared to record heights in recent months, is expected to peak in the first quarter of this year, the European Commission said on Thursday, as consumers feel the bite of higher energy prices and rising costs of key goods, the New York Times reported. Inflation in the euro area for the January-to-March period will reach 4.8 percent, up from 4.6 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, which was a record since the bloc started measuring inflation collectively in 1997, the commission said in its quarterly economic forecast.

Over the past decade, Credito Real SAB was the rising star of a booming new business in Mexico: cutting small loans -- and charging double-digit interest rates -- to the millions of traditionally unbanked all across the country. Now, with its cash hoard shrinking, Credito Real faces a moment of truth, Bloomberg News reported. It either pays off 170 million Swiss francs ($184 million) of bonds due by the end of Wednesday, or goes the way of a smaller peer in the non-bank lending industry that has already fallen into default.

The European Central Bank's German policymakers openly discussed prospects for an interest rate hike on Wednesday, with new Bundesbank chief Joachim Nagel arguing that a move could come this year, as inflation remains uncomfortably high, Reuters reported. The ECB last week walked back on a pledge not to raise rates in 2022 and policymakers are now looking at how best to dismantle unconventional policies that have kept the euro zone afloat for much of the past decade.