Banca Carige SpA reached agreement with a group of banks to underwrite a share sale of about 500 million euros ($590 million) after key investors pledged their support, allowing the lender to proceed with its restructuring plan, Bloomberg News reported. Malacalza Investimenti, Carige’s main investor, agreed to buy 17.6 percent of the stock, while the second-biggest shareholder Gabriele Volpi agreed to oversubscribe to the offer, increasing his stake to 9.9 percent from 6 percent, the Genoa-based lender said in a statement early Saturday.

As the panic in the eurozone has happily receded — even Greece is likely to exit its rescue lending programme next year — so space has opened up for a constructive debate about fixing the single currency’s manifest flaws. There is undoubtedly a sense of “never again” after the banking and sovereign debt crises that engulfed the eurozone from 2010, the Financial Times reported in a commentary. But the problem is one that has dogged the euro since its launch 18 years ago: a fundamental disagreement about how the currency should work and what it is for.

Carillion Plc lost a third of its market value after saying it’s in danger of breaching debt covenants, as the U.K. builder that only three years ago was trying to buy a rival now struggles for survival, Bloomberg News reported. The Wolverhampton-based construction company issued its third profit warning in half a year on Friday and said it’s in talks with creditors about “some form of recapitalization” in the first quarter of next year. Delays in projects and disposals will lead 2017 profits to be lower than expected, it said. Carillion’s spiral downwards has been swift.

For all the ambitious talk of creating new institutions to beef up the eurozone, Brussels is still struggling to agree on the basics of monetary union: the rules.  Budgetary rules on government debt and deficits underpin the single currency, the Financial Times reported. Fights over how they should be deployed have been erupting since the Maastricht treaty, when the totemic 3 per cent deficit limit and 60 per cent debt-to-GDP ceiling were first enshrined into law.

Greece, long the problem child of the eurozone, took a major step on Wednesday toward securing financial independence as it prepares to wean itself off the international bailouts that have kept it afloat for the last eight years, the International New York Times reported. The government’s announcement of a bond swap could help ease a staggering debt burden that at one point threatened to push Greece out of the eurozone.

Russia signed an agreement to restructure $3.15 billion of debt owed by Venezuela, throwing a lifeline to a crisis-wracked ally that’s struggling to repay creditors, Bloomberg News reported. The pact gives Venezuela some much-needed breathing room as it faces the much more complicated task of restructuring its $140 billion of bonds and foreign loans. For Russia, the deal underscores the costs that come with President Vladimir Putin’s geopolitical ambitions across the globe. A $900 million hole had been left in its 2017 budget plan by Venezuela’s failure to pay on time.

Italian clothing maker and retailer Stefanel SpA became famous for its knitted coats and cardigans. Many economists, investors and bankers know Stefanel as something starkly different: a zombie company. It has posted an annual loss for nine of the last 10 years and restructured its bank debt at least six times, including several grace periods when Stefanel only had to pay interest on what it owed, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Germany’s Lufthansa has offered 250 million euros ($294 million) to take on most of Alitalia’s fleet of aircraft and half of its staff, a source close to the matter said on Tuesday. Alitalia, which has made a profit only a few times in its 70-year history, was put under special administration earlier this year after staff rejected a plan to cut jobs and salaries, Reuters reported. Lufthansa is one of seven companies that submitted binding offers for Alitalia by Oct. 16.

The European Central Bank intensified its push for a tool that would hand authorities the power to stop deposit withdrawals when a bank is on the verge of failing, Bloomberg News reported. ECB executive board member Sabine Lautenschlaeger said that bank resolution cases this year showed that a so-called moratorium tool, which would temporarily freeze a bank’s liabilities to buy time for crucial decisions, is needed.

Rosneft, the world’s largest listed oil producer, has reported a lower than expected 81 per cent annual rise in net profits in the third quarter and falling free cash flow thanks to a spending spree on acquisitions, the Financial Times reported. The Kremlin-controlled company said net profit rose to Rbs47bn ($792m) in the third quarter, thanks to a rise in global oil prices and an increase in production. But free cash flow fell 83 per cent to just Rbs8bn, because of higher spending and upstream expenses.