Troubled low-cost African carrier Fastjet Plc said on Thursday it had enough cash to operate until Dec. 21 and that it had met the conditions for an open offer and equity refinancing to raise funds, Reuters reported. The company in September announced a fundraising and equity refinancing aimed at increasing its equity base by at least $40 million, which will give the airline enough working capital until the end of 2019. The airline said it had cash balance of $7 million as of Wednesday, of which $6.5 million was restricted cash held inside Zimbabwe.
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
Famar, a contract manufacturer to pharmaceutical industries, has completed a 174 million euro ($197 million) debt restructuring and secured new funds from private equity-backed Pillarstone to strengthen its capital position, Reuters reported. Pillarstone is a platform set up by private equity firm KKR and John Davison in 2015 to partner with European banks to create value by managing their on-balance sheet non-core assets. Pillarstone’s Greek subsidiary has been licensed by the Bank of Greece to provide long-term capital to large corporate borrowers and manage banks’ sour loans.
Credit Suisse’s plans to buy back as much as SFr3bn of shares and modestly increase its dividend received a lukewarm reception from analysts and investors, who were pushing for more capital to be returned after a sharp fall in the stock, the Financial Times reported. The Swiss bank said it expected to repurchase SFr1bn ($1bn) in each of the next two years and would attempt to buy back a further SFr1bn if market conditions allow, while increasing the dividend by 5 per cent a year.
Britons may not get a second referendum on European Union membership, but tonight’s vote of confidence in Prime Minister Theresa May among Conservative lawmakers is a proxy for it: The elected representatives of a party whose supporters chose overwhelmingly to leave the EU will fight over which vision of Brexit makes more sense. Nearly all want to honor the result of the 2016 referendum; they just disagree over how to do that.
Italy’s rail company Ferrovie dello Stato (FS) is working to get airlines easyJet or Delta involved in the rescue of ailing carrier Alitalia, Industry Minister Luigi Di Maio was quoted as saying by union sources on Wednesday. Last month state-appointed commissioners running Alitalia accepted a binding purchase offer by FS, Reuters reported. The flagship airline had been put on sale after being in special administration since early last year.
London-based augmented reality startup Blippar is said to be facing administration and is “on the brink of collapse” after a dispute between its investors, British luxury property developer Nick Candy and Malaysia’s sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd. A report by The Times said Khazanah has blocked an emergency fundraising by the unicorn startup, causing Blippar to reach out to its shareholders, saying it had been left with “no current option other than to give notice to start insolvency proceedings”.
Losses more than doubled at Dublin-headquartered social media monitoring company NewsWhip last year as the company invested heavily in its technology platform as it looks to grow recurring subscription revenues. Founded by Paul Quigley and Andrew Mullaney in 2011, NewsWhip uses predictive data and analytics to identify breaking news stories of relevance to their clients. The company has more than 500 of the world’s leading publishers, brands and agencies as customers, including big names such as Reebok, the Washington Post, IBM, Ford, Condé Nast, L’Oréal and Walmart.
The European Central Bank didn’t overstep its mandate by setting up a quantitative easing (QE) programme to stave off deflation, judges at the European Union’s top court ruled, the Irish Times reported. The ECB’s programme “for the purchase of government bonds on secondary markets does not infringe EU law,” the EU Court of Justice said, dismissing the latest in a series of challenges from critics who argue the tool deployed by ECB president Mario Draghi clashes with a ban on so-called monetary financing.
Dealing with the gilets jaunes protests has been difficult for Mr Macron’s government, the Financial Times reported. The leaderless movement stretches across the political spectrum and has a range of often contradictory demands. In Monday’s 13-minute speech, watched by 23m people, Mr Macron spoke of the need to address a “state of economic and social emergency” and accepted responsibility that the government had not been able “to provide a sufficiently fast and strong response” and acknowledged that “I may have hurt some of you with my words”.
A no-deal Brexit could almost halve Irish economic growth next year, the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) has warned, the Irish Times reported. In its latest economic commentary, the think tank modelled the short-term impact of various Brexit scenarios on the Irish economy. It found that if the UK left the EU without a deal, and assuming World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules then apply, this would curtail growth here to 2.6 per cent compared to 4.2 per cent in the absence of Brexit.