One of the most successful traders ever in the Nordic power market has been barred from trading on Nasdaq Inc. after massive losses at the start of this week. Einar Aas, who’s been active in the market for about two decades, had taken on a position that was too big in relation to the liquidity in the market, Dagens Naeringsliv reported, citing a statement from Aas. After “extraordinary price changes,” in the Nordic and German contracts he was forced to pay the exchange his last free liquid funds, Bloomberg News reported. That wasn’t enough and on Tuesday he was put under administration.

The European Central Bank is set to wind down the most important part of its crisis-era stimulus at the end of the year after Mario Draghi delivered an upbeat economic assessment despite risks from trade wars and emerging markets, the Financial Times reported. The ECB confirmed that it would slow the expansion of its quantitative easing programme, reducing monthly bond purchases from €30bn to €15bn from October until the end of the year. It also looks increasingly likely to halt new purchases under the €2.5tn programme in December.

The European Central Bank pushed forward Thursday with its plan to gradually phase out its monetary stimulus, saying it is confident in the region's growth. But its president, Mario Draghi, warned that the United States' trade dispute with several major powers has become a key economic concern, the International New York Times reported on an Associated Press story. The chief monetary authority for the 19 countries that use the euro confirmed Thursday that its bond-buying stimulus would be cut to 15 billion euros ($17.4 billion) a month from 30 billion euros after September.

Moody’s has issued a stark warning that the risk of a no-deal Brexit has “risen materially” in recent months, spelling out the extent of the possible damage on the UK economy from crashing out without an agreement, the Financial Times reported. Britain would risk entering recession, according to the rating agency. While the UK and the EU would “likely take swift steps to limit short-term disruption”, a disorderly exit would “clearly pose more significant challenges than a negotiated exit”, the chief author of Moody’s report, Colin Ellis, said.

In a related story, the Financial Times reported that a wide-ranging measure of eurozone industry unexpectedly dipped in July, setting a gloomy tone for the third quarter. Industrial production in the eurozone fell by 0.1 per cent on the year, according to data published by the EU’s official statistics office. It was the first drop on this basis since January 2017. Economists polled by Reuters had expected the measure to go up by 1 per cent.

Bolton Wanderers have avoided administration after agreeing a deal to pay off their main creditor BluMarble Capital Ltd, club owner Ken Anderson said on Wednesday. Anderson had warned on Monday that the Championship outfit was facing the prospect of insolvency and a points penalty after an initial offer to repay the financial company was turned down, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. However, Anderson confirmed an agreement was reached and the club now has one of the lowest debt positions in the second division.

Italy’s industrial sector hit a rough patch in July with total industrial output decreasing 1.3 per cent on the year, the first decline since June 2016, according to new data released on Wednesday, the Financial Times reported. Economists polled by Reuters had expected output growth to remain stable, rising at 1.4 per cent. Monthly figures — which are often volatile — showed a 1.8 per cent decrease in output, far more than the 0.4 per cent dip forecast in a Thomson Reuters poll. Italy is not the only eurozone economy suffering a production slump.

While the war in Ukraine’s east continues to rage four years on, the battle between Russia and Ukraine is returning to the calm and order of a London courtroom. There, British judges, unwilling to play diplomat, are this week set to rule on an appeal by Ukraine that it must repay part of a $3 billion bond in default, Bloomberg News reported. The Court of Appeal will rule on the case after Russia won an early verdict last spring in a lower court. The dispute “has multiple venues, and courtrooms are one of them," said Orysia Lutsevych, a research fellow at the Chatham House thinktank in London.

Two of the most storied names in German department stores are combining in a deal orchestrated by an Austrian real estate billionaire, highlighting the pressures facing traditional retailers amid the rise of Amazon.com Inc. Karstadt, controlled by Rene Benko’s Signa Holding GmbH, agreed to take over Galeria Kaufhof, owned by Saks Fifth Avenue parent Hudson’s Bay Co., creating a retail company with 5.4 billion euros ($6.3 billion) in revenue, Bloomberg News reported. Benko has long wanted to merge the brands, having had an overture rejected as recently as February.

It is said that generals often plan to fight the last war. Ten years on from the collapse of Lehman Brothers, many experts fear a new financial crisis, the Financial Times reported. In fact, the global financial system is much more robust than before 2008, but the global economy is still threatened by excessive debt. The financial crisis began because of dangerous features within the financial system itself. Massively leveraged investment banks engaged in socially useless trading of huge volumes of complex credit securities and derivatives.