Bonds sold by Italy’s companies are outperforming the country’s sovereign debt, in an unusual situation that suggests investors have more confidence in its corporations than in its government. The Markit iBoxx Total Return index of Italian corporate debt is down 2 per cent so far this year, but the equivalent benchmark for sovereign bonds has fallen 3.3 per cent, the Financial Times reported. Italian energy and consumer goods groups are performing particularly well, as many have significant international revenues that help offset any weakness in domestic performance.

For Jaguar Land Rover, the only way out of its deep pothole may be to get a tow from China. The luxury unit of Tata Motors Ltd. posted dismal fiscal first-quarter results Tuesday, recording an unexpected pretax loss of 264 million pounds ($346 million) after running into trouble in many of its main markets, Bloomberg News reported. JLR, usually the profit engine for Tata, effectively wiped out a sharp turnaround at the rest of the Indian company’s business. About half the loss was because of China, where lower margins and declining prices weighed on performance.

Companies raising debt in Europe’s leveraged loan market have crowded the room and spoilt their own party. After raising more than 55 billion euros ($64.3 billion) through the end of July, already 70 percent of last year’s total, they have overwhelmed appetite from previously compliant lenders, Bloomberg News reported. July alone brought loans worth 7.1 billion euros to market, empowering investors to become more fussy and demand better terms. Numerous issuers have been forced to pay more for their debt and to stomach tighter restrictions on loan documentation.

House of Fraser is fighting for its survival after the Hong Kong-listed company that also owns toy shop Hamleys abandoned plans to rescue one of the UK’s oldest and more storied retail chains, the Financial Times reported. C.banner International, a Chinese fashion group, said on Wednesday it was “impracticable and inadvisable” to proceed with acquiring a controlling stake in the department store, which would have given the company a £70m lifeline, because of a collapse of its own share price over the past month.

Italian utility Enel SpA has called a halt to further acquisitions in Brazil for the time being as it gears up to complete asset sales of up to 1.5 billion euros (1.34 billion pounds) in the second half of the year, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. "I don't see appetite for further acquisitions in Brazil at this stage," Enel CEO Francesco Starace told analysts on a conference call on Tuesday after the company released first-half results.

Concerns over a slowdown in the eurozone rose on Tuesday after official figures showed growth in the region hit its weakest rate in two years in the second quarter, the Financial Times reported. Gross domestic product expanded 0.3 per cent in the second quarter from the first, according to Eurostat, the eurozone’s statistics agency — a weaker figure than forecast and the lowest since the second quarter of 2016.

The International Monetary Fund has warned eurozone governments that they need to give Greece more long-term debt relief to stop the country from being locked out of financial markets as Athens prepares for life outside a bailout programme, the Financial Times reported. In a swipe at EU capitals that have pushed back at Greek demands for greater debt relief, the IMF has calculated that Greece’s long-term debt costs will be unsustainable in 20 years’ time because of the high budget surplus targets demanded by European creditors as part of Athens’ post-bailout conditions.  Wit

The Government should invest €22 million in education, training and access to apprenticeships in an effort to halve long-term youth unemployment by the end of 2019, the National Youth Council of Ireland (NYCI) said in its pre-budget submission, The Irish Times reported. Young people from economically and socially disadvantaged backgrounds with limited formal qualifications should have greater access to apprenticeships, while schemes should be developed across the country to “provide supports and address barriers”, the organisation said.

Ryanair has invited pilots’ union representatives to talks in anticipation of a fourth strike at the airline this week, The Irish Times reported. The move came as pilots employed by Ryanair in Germany voted for industrial action in support of a pay claim. Members of the Irish Airline Pilots’ Association (Ialpa) – part of trade union Fórsa – plan a fourth one-day strike on Friday, August 3rd in a dispute over base transfers, promotions, leave and other issues.

To wire a car, you need copper. To make batteries, you need zinc. And to build a house, you need both of these metals and more -- steel for the pipes, aluminum for the frames and tin for the roof, the Financial Times reported. Base metals like these are used in thousands of different ways in nearly every industry, so many analysts look at their prices for a read on the global economy. Recently the Bank of England’s Tom Wise wrote about this dynamic and found that metal consumption tracks PPP-weighted global GDP growth.