A group of banks led by UniCredit SpA is considering options including a state-backed guarantee for a 850 million euros ($929 million) bridge-loan for troubled Italian engineering firm Saipem SpA, Bloomberg News reported. The team of banks, which includes Intesa Sanpaolo SpA, started discussing the option in a confidential meeting on Tuesday. The banks plan to ask Sace SpA, Italy’s trade-credit insurer, for the guarantee. No final decision has been taken and the plan could change, according to sources.

Ukraine has suffered about $10 billion in damage to infrastructure since Russia invaded the country, Infrastructure Minister Oleksander Kubrakov said on Monday, Reuters reported. He said in televised comments that the figure stood as of Sunday, and added: "The majority of (damaged) structures will be repaired in a year, and the most difficult ones – in two years." Kubrakov said 40,000 people had been evacuated from the eastern city of Kharkiv on Sunday.

Securities traders and hedge funds trying to trade Russian securities that aren’t subject to foreign sanctions over the country’s invasion of Ukraine have been running into the problem that some clearinghouses are still refusing to settle the trades, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Bank of New York Mellon Corp.’s Pershing, one of the main clearinghouses that settle securities trades, told clients on Thursday that both U.S. and non-U.S. custodians, mutual-fund companies and liquidity providers have imposed restrictions “above and beyond” sanctioned Russian securities.

Foreign companies that want to leave Russia will receive fast-tracked bankruptcy protections or can hand their stakes over to local managers until they return to Russia, First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov said on Friday, Reuters reported. Western sanctions imposed on Russia in punishment for its invasion of Ukraine have prompted dozens of global companies to pause operations in the country and some, including energy majors BP and Shell have said that they will exit the country entirely.

The cost of insuring Russia’s government debt rose to a record high after President Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing it to repay foreign creditors in rubles, raising concerns about the prospects of a default across the country’s $33 billion of dollar bonds, Bloomberg News reported. Credit-default swaps insuring $10 million of the country’s notes for five years were quoted at about $5.8 million upfront and $100,000 annually on Monday, signaling around 80% likelihood of default, according to ICE Data Services. ICE is the main clearing house for European CDS.

Some holders of a $1.3 billion Gazprom PJSC bond due Monday said they received payment in dollars, even after Russian President Vladimir Putin gave issuers the option of repaying foreign-currency debt in rubles, Bloomberg News reported. Bondholders said they received cash to pay off the bonds Monday. The bond paid Monday was among those snapped up at distressed prices last week as Wall Street investors eyed buying opportunities amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Banks may continue to drift away from London if the European Central Bank intensifies its scrutiny of their presence in the bloc, the Bank of England’s deputy governor said, Bloomberg News reported. Jon Cunliffe said the ECB may require some business to move back to the European Union following its ongoing review of banks’ booking models and trading desks. He added that firms may respond by moving to the U.S. instead or elsewhere in the coming years.

After a pandemic and a global chip crunch, Russia’s war in Ukraine has unleashed auto makers’ third supply-chain crisis in as many years, the Wall Street Journal reported. The fighting in Ukraine has shut down small but important industry suppliers, shutting plants far away from the conflict zone, while sanctions and severed trade routes are hindering car and parts shipments to and from Russia, once seen as a growth market.

Textile and leather goods' makers in Istanbul's garment district are feeling the impact of Russia's invasion of Ukraine as customers in Moscow and Kyiv have canceled $200 million in orders in the past week, industry officials say, Reuters reported. The loss of trade adds to strains on Turkey's economy, with officials estimating that more than $1 billion is directly at risk to the textile industry alone if the conflict in Ukraine continues.

High energy prices are forcing some manufacturers to halt production in a foretaste of what may become a more widespread shutdown that if the war in Ukraine leads to acute shortages of natural gas, Bloomberg News reported. A survey by Make UK, the manufacturing industry group, found that 17% of companies have had to “temporarily halt production of products that are energy intensive to fabricate” this year. Gas prices have risen 59-fold since May 2020, and oil prices are at a seven year high, making it increasingly costly for factories to maintain output.