Renewable energy group Abengoa SA filed for insolvency late on Monday, after its latest attempt to restructure its debts fell apart, Bloomberg News reported. The parent company of the renewable-energy producer, which is the entity that filed for insolvency, had around 1 billion euros ($1.22 billion) of liabilities in 2019. The group as a whole had 7.9 billion euros in liabilities as of March 31, according to its latest earnings statement.
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Resources Per Country
- Albania
- Austria
- Belarus
- Belgium
- Bosnia and Herzegovina
- Bulgaria
- Croatia
- Czech Republic
- Denmark
- Estonia
- Finland
- France
- Germany
- Gibraltar
- Greece
- Guernsey
- Hungary
- Iceland
- Ireland
- Isle of Man
- Italy
- Jersey
- Kosovo
- Latvia
- Liechtenstein
- Lithuania
- Luxembourg
- Macedonia
- Malta
- Moldova
- Monaco
- Montenegro
- Netherlands
- Norway
- Poland
- Portugal
- Romania
- Russia
- San Marino
- Serbia
- Slovakia
- Slovenia
- Spain
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- Ukraine
- United Kingdom
- Vatican City
Unemployment in the UK edged higher to 5.1% in December as the government’s furlough scheme continued to prevent a steep rise in job losses in the run-up to Christmas, The Guardian reported. With much of the economy still in enforced hibernation, the unemployment rate in the three months to December increased from 5% in November and was up by 1.5 percentage points from a year earlier, according to the Office for National Statistics.
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More expensive services and industrial goods led a rebound in inflation in January after months of falling prices, offsetting the downward pull of cheaper energy, data showed on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The European Union’s statistics office Eurostat confirmed earlier estimates that consumer prices in the 19 countries sharing the euro rose 0.2% month-on-month for a 0.9% year-on-year increase, as expected by economists. Volatile energy prices were 3.8% higher on the month but still 4.2% lower than a year earlier and unprocessed food was 1.2% more expensive on the month and 2.0% year-on-year.
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Planemakers Airbus and Boeing are bracing for hefty jet order cancellations from troubled Norwegian Air amid restructuring proceedings, Reuters reported. Norwegian last year won protection from bankruptcy in both Norway and Ireland, where most of its assets are registered, and is aiming to emerge with fewer aircraft and less debt. The Irish High Court this week is hearing arguments concerning the repudiation of some of Norwegian’s liabilities including aircraft leases. Norwegian has 88 A320neo-family narrow-body jets on order from Airbus, according to the manufacturer.
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Sovereign wealth funds pulled $16.3 billion from public market investment strategies, largely equities, in the fourth quarter, the most in almost four years, driven largely by redemptions, according to data and research firm eVestment, Reuters reported. The move followed a year in which some funds, including those from Norway, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, planned withdrawals to help their governments cope with the coronavirus crisis. Net outflows from equity strategies managed by third-party fund managers reached $18.5 billion in the final three months of 2020, eVestment data showed.
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Ulster Bank executives confirmed on Tuesday that the bank’s 88-strong branch network in Ireland forms part of discussions with Permanent TSB, which is looking to acquire a large part of the exiting bank’s assets, the Irish Times reported. Sources said on Friday that PTSB is in talks to acquire much of Ulster Bank’s €14 billion mortgage book and up to €700 million of small business loans in a deal that could almost double its assets and potentially require a capital injection from the Government. PTSB is 75 percent State-owned.
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European banks have seemingly weathered the coronavirus crisis well, but there are still some major challenges ahead that have the potential to rattle the sector, CNBC.com reported. There’s been a noticeable difference between the pandemic and the global financial crisis of 2008: European banks have a much stronger capital position now than they did before. This is in part thanks to much tougher requirements imposed by regulators in the wake of the 2008 shock — and it looks to be paying off.
German brewers have been forced to throw away unsold beer and have asked the government for financial aid as the coronavirus lockdown reduces demand, they said on Monday, Reuters reported. German pubs, hotels and restaurants have been closed since November in the country’s second lockdown following the first one earlier last year. The brewers called on the German government to give beer breweries aid under the country’s programmes to help industry recover from the impact of the coronavirus crisis. Germany’s government has given financial aid to pubs and bars but not breweries.
European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde said her institution is “closely monitoring” the market for government bonds, in a sign that she might act to prevent rising yields undermining the economic recovery from the pandemic, Bloomberg News reported. Yields are on the increase worldwide as investors bet that vaccinations will soon enable countries to end coronavirus restrictions, potentially unleashing a burst of consumer spending -- also fueled by fiscal stimulus -- that could boost inflation.
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Borrowers with higher debt burdens than the current Central Bank of Ireland’s rules allow are more likely to have sought payment breaks during the current crisis, the Irish Central Bank’s deputy governor Sharon Donnery has said, according to a Irish Times report. This was proof that the regulator’s mortgage lending rules had helped the financial sector “absorb rather than amplify the shock of the pandemic”, she said. The Central Bank’s rules curtail consumers to borrowing within strict loan-to-value (LTV) and loan-to-income (LTI) limits.