Italy’s turbulent political environment took its toll on businesses last month, as worries over the underlying trend in activity growth bubbled up despite a pick-up in growth in the country’s services sector that bucked a slowdown in Germany and France, the Financial Times reported. The purchasing managers’ index of activity in Italy’s services sector picked up to 53.1 in May, from 52.6 in April. That compared to a fall from 57.4 to 54.3 in France and from 53 to 52.1 in Germany — a 20-month low.

What do Toys “R” Us bonds, the populist threat to the European Union, and Turkish external debt have in common? All were tolerated by market players until, quite suddenly, they weren’t. Investors seem increasingly prone to flee assets at the first hint of trouble, fueling concern more cracks are appearing in global markets that have been papered over for years by easy money, Bloomberg News reported. That climate saw cash simply herded into any investment with a respectable yield. The swift reaction to a twist in Italy’s political drama last week looks like the latest sign.

The ECB has come under fire from Italy’s new populist government after revealing that it scaled back the proportion of Italian sovereign bonds it bought as part of its economic stimulus programme during Rome’s political turmoil last month, the Financial Times reported. The central bank purchased a net €3.6bn of Italian government debt under its long-running programme in May, new figures show. Although this is higher than the amount it bought in some recent months, such as March and January, it was smaller as an overall proportion of its net purchases.

This month’s EU summit has long been billed as a deadline for the UK to produce answers on the two most pressing Brexit questions: Britain’s customs relationship with the EU and the Northern Ireland “backstop”. But while there are still more than three weeks to go until the Brussels gathering, hopes of a breakthrough are rapidly receding, the Financial Times reported. Peter Ptassek, Germany’s Brexit envoy, tweeted at the weekend that he was far from hopeful that any meaningful progress would be reached at the June 28-29 summit. “Not many are expecting very much now,” he wrote.

Deutsche Bank AG’s new chief executive officer, Christian Sewing, suffered a fresh setback in his efforts to reinvigorate Europe’s largest investment bank as S&P Global Ratings cut the lender’s credit rating. S&P reduced the rating by one notch to BBB+, the third-lowest investment grade, citing “significant execution risk” after several management changes and strategy updates in past years, Bloomberg News reported. Shares of the lender rebounded from a record low as the credit rating company said Deutsche Bank has good capital and liquidity buffers.

Italy’s UniCredit is plotting to merge with French rival Société Générale in a bold move that would see two of Europe’s big banks join forces, leading the way for an expected round of banking mergers on the continent, the Financial Times reported. Jean-Pierre Mustier, Unicredit’s French chief executive, has been pioneering the idea for several months, according to people close to the situation. They said no formal approach has been made but SocGen directors have also been studying the possibility of a combination.

It is unfortunate that so many Europeans treat European integration as an act of faith. The Brexit debate pits Europhile true believers against sceptical atheists, which is why we are talking about the two equally absurd propositions: a second referendum and a hard Brexit. Italians treat the question of their euro membership in a similar way. You either belong to this camp, or that, the Financial Times reported in a commentary. If you are, like me, somewhere in the middle, people feel confused.

Cambridge Analytica, the U.K. political consulting firm that closed its doors after a scandal over how it harvested data to influence the last U.S. presidential election, now faces a group of Facebook users in its bankruptcy, Bloomberg News reported. “Data Breach Plaintiffs" filed a notice on Tuesday to appear in the company’s New York bankruptcy. The group is involved in two lawsuits against both Facebook and Cambridge Analytica that seek class-action status on claims that about 87 million Facebook users had their personal information taken without permission.

Lebara, the telecoms company that has already missed deadlines to file its accounts, has promised to buy back a small portion of its distressed €350m bond in exchange for more time to file audited results, the Financial Times reported. The value of its bond has plummeted in recent months after errors in its financial reporting which Lebara’s management described as a “genuine mistake”. The company sells low-cost international phone calls across Europe and is known for adverts that line many of London’s newsagents.

Britain’s pensions watchdog head Lesley Titcomb will step down at the end of her four-year contract in February 2019, The Pensions Regulator said on Thursday. The search for her successor will begin immediately and will be led by Chairman Mark Boyle, the watchdog said. Titcomb, who was appointed chief executive of the watchdog in 2015, oversaw the collapse of construction outsourcing company Carillion Plc earlier in the year and department store chain BHS in 2016, Reuters reported.