Almost half a million businesses in the UK are in significant financial distress, the highest number on record, according to Begbies Traynor, the insolvency firm, the Financial Times reported. Data from the restructuring specialist found that businesses outside London in particular had shown signs of financial difficulties, raising additional questions for Boris Johnson’s government as it talks about ‘levelling up’ growth in the regions.

Polish carrier LOT is acquiring Thomas Cook’s German airline Condor, creating a leading aviation group in Europe carrying more than 20 million passengers a year, the companies said on Friday. Condor, which according to sources was sold for about 300 million euros ($333 million), operates a fleet of more than 50 aircraft while LOT has a fleet of 80 aircraft, Reuters reported. LOT chief executive Rafal Milczarski said he sees a possible order of around 30 planes from Boeing and Airbus.

Argentina’s top exporter of processed soy, Vicentin, is in talks over a potential takeover deal with firms including European grains giant Glencore to help resolve a debt crisis, according to two sources close to the negotiations, Reuters reported. The near 90-year-old firm, which defaulted on payments to suppliers late last year, has also told grains farmers it owes money to that it will make a debt restructuring offer in the days ahead, the sources said on Friday.

The Chinese group buying British Steel has reached an agreement with trade unions over its rescue of the failed manufacturer, as it races to wrap up a takeover by the end of next month, the Financial Times reported. Executives from Jingye and union officials have reached an understanding for the basis of new employment contracts and other aspects of a turnround plan, three people with knowledge of the discussions said.

One of the riskiest corners of the European bond market is enjoying its busiest January ever as companies rush to grab ultra-cheap yields and some of the more dubious instruments popular ahead of the financial crisis resurface, Bloomberg News reported. Junk-rated borrowers lined up close to 7 billion euros of issuance into the market this week, with sales nearing the 10 billion euro mark ($11 billion) this month, Bloomberg data show.

Eurozone bank executives have launched a fresh lobbying push to convince policymakers of the dangers of long-term negative interest rates, warning they will hurt savers and pensioners while fuelling price bubbles in riskier assets, the Financial Times reported. Bank chief executives have spent the past two years trying to force the European Central Bank to reverse its negative interest rates, which were first introduced in 2014. Other European central banks including Switzerland and Denmark also have negative rates.

A judge in London has ordered the former owners of Russia’s Trust Bank and their wives to pay the country’s central bank $900m to compensate for their role in an offshore scheme that led to its collapse, the Financial Times reported. Mr Justice Bryan, a judge in the English High Court, ruled on Thursday that Ilya Yurov, Sergei Belyaev, and Nikolai Fetisov had conspired to “evade banking standards” to falsify Trust’s accounts and use the bank’s 1.5m retail deposit base to help fund companies where they were the ultimate beneficiaries.

Deutsche Bank AG and a Singapore based hedge fund bought more debt of an embattled Indian shadow lender, highlighting the growing foreign interest in the discounted assets of the financier at the center of a credit crisis, Bloomberg News reported. Deutsche Bank has almost doubled the debt it holds of Altico Capital India Ltd. to 3 billion rupees ($42.1 million) in the last four months, while Singapore-based Broad Peak Investment Advisers Ltd. has acquired debt of about 1 billion rupees, people familiar with the matter said.

Credit Suisse has hit back against Mozambique in a case in Britain’s High Court, arguing a government guarantee for a $622 million loan - part of a $2 billion debt scandal - is valid and that it is entitled to claim damages, Reuters reported. Mozambique sued the investment bank last year, alongside a number of other defendants, in a bid to cancel the guarantee and seek compensation for losses related to the debt saga, which tipped its economy into crisis. Credit Suisse rejected Mozambique’s arguments in its defense papers and submitted a counter claim, dated Jan.

Slovenia’s largest food retailer Mercator refinanced a debt of its Serbian unit Mercator-S to the value of 90 million euros ($99.8 million) with Serbian bank AIK, Mercator said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. It did not give details of the deal but said the conditions of the refinancing were “much more favourable” than those of the previous syndicated loan which was taken in 2014 and would expire in March. It added the refinancing will improve liqudity of the Serbian unit over the next five years and enable further development of Mercator in Serbia.