Patrick Neary, the former chief executive of the now-defunct Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority (Ifsra), told an inquiry into Irish Nationwide Building Society that the authority’s board was not willing to tackle a series of problems at the company for fear of upsetting its planned sale, the Irish Times reported.

Europe’s largest economy cooled sharply in the first quarter amid a drop in government spending and weak exports—a sign that a stronger euro and global tensions are beginning to leave a mark on the German economy, The Wall Street Journal reported. Germany’s annualized growth rate slowed to 1.2% from 2.5% in the fourth quarter of last year, the Federal Statistical Office said Tuesday. This means that the German economy was growing more slowly than the U.S., which registered growth of 2.3% in the same period.

A flutter of hawkish feathers at the European Central Bank has caught the attention of the markets. The euro is in demand and investors are dropping eurozone government bonds — lifting their yields across the euro area — after a sign from a senior ECB official that a rate rise could follow the end of its stimulus spending more quickly than previously thought, the Financial Times reported.

Britain's Mothercare, the struggling mother and baby products retailer, said on Monday it would ask investors for more money as part of a major restructuring it plans to announce this week, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. The firm has seen sales and profit hammered by intense competition from supermarket groups and online retailers in its main UK market as well as by rising costs. Its shares have lost 86 percent of their value over the last year and in April it replaced Chief Executive Mark Newton-Jones with David Wood, a former Tesco executive.

Manolete Partners, which focuses on taking over claims from liquidators of insolvent companies, is the latest litigation funder to weigh up a float on the London Stock Exchange (LSE), the Law Society Gazette reported. Chief executive Steven Cooklin confirmed to the Gazette this morning that the London-based company was ‘looking very seriously’ at listing. It has not revealed any financial details of the proposed float.

Bailout inspectors have returned to Athens as Greece races to comply with the final terms of its rescue program, which ends in August. Negotiations resumed Monday, with Greece still facing dozens of measures to address in the next ten days to remain on track for an agreement next month on the terms of bailout debt repayment after the program ends, the International New York Times reported on an Associated Press story.

Leaders of Croatia's ruling coalition met on Friday to discuss opposition demands that Deputy Prime Minister Martina Dalic resign over conflict of interest allegations linked to the restructuring of the country's largest private firm, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. Dalic, who is also economy minister, led efforts to save food producer and retailer Agrokor after it was put under state-run administration in April 2017, weighed down by debt accrued during an ambitious expansion drive.

Carillion Plc, the failed U.K. outsourcing company, has been criticized by lawmakers investigating its collapse for misclassifying borrowings, Bloomberg News reported. As much as 498 million pounds ($674 million) of Carillion’s liabilities were incorrectly identified as “other creditors,” the U.K. Parliament Work and Pensions Committee said in a statement on Monday, citing estimates from Moody’s. Carillion’s board had discussed the issue in 2015, attributing mounting short-selling of the company’s shares to UBS Group AG broker research highlighting issues with its debt, the committee said.

The head of the European Central Bank is urging political leaders to repair gaps in the way the euro is set up to prevent another crisis — including by finding money to help governments hit by deep recessions. Mario Draghi said Friday in a speech in Florence, Italy, that sharing some government funds could provide "an extra layer of stabilization" for countries facing economic and market turmoil that can't be calmed through national budget and economic policies, the International New York Times reported on an Associated Press story.

Customers of collapsed UK brokerage Beaufort Securities have voted in favour of retaining PwC as administrator and accepted its proposals to use up to £100m of private investors’ funds to pay insolvency fees, following a fiery creditors’ meeting on Thursday, the Financial Times reported. PwC confirmed on Friday that clients of the broker, which was shut down by the UK regulator in March, had voted in favour of its proposals, which include a worst-case scenario of spending £100m to return cash and assets valued at £550m to customers.