Greek lawmakers yesterday approved a bill aimed at unlocking €2.8 billion ($3.15 billion) in aid for the country that includes deeply unpopular plans to transfer state-controlled water companies to a privatization fund, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Greece is hoping to meet conditions needed to be paid the next tranche of aid from its third bailout worth up to €86 billion this week, ahead of an Oct. 10 meeting of eurozone finance ministers who can sign off on the payment.

Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydlo sacked her finance minister on Wednesday and gave the job to the influential economy minister, saying a reshuffle was needed to make the government's wide-reaching economic stimulus plan more effective, Reuters reported today. Since winning an election last October, Szydlo's Law and Justice (PiS) party has pledged to spend billions of euros of private and public money to boost growth and wealth in Poland, while also giving the state more say in the economy.

The cost of insuring Deutsche Bank AG’s subordinated debt rose to a record amid growing concerns about the lender’s financial health, Bloomberg News reported today. Credit-default swaps on the German lender’s junior bonds jumped as much as 37 basis points to 536 basis points, the highest level in CMA prices going back to 2007. The lender’s 1.75 billion euros ($2 billion) of 6 percent additional Tier 1 bonds, the first to take losses in a crisis, fell about 2 cents on the euro to a more than seven-month low of 71 cents, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Allianz is in talks with interested parties about the partial or total sale of regional private bank Oldenburgische Landesbank AG (OLB), which is 90 percent owned by the German insurer, Reuters reported today. U.S. private equity group Apollo and Germany's Commerzbank had submitted non-binding offers for the bank, which has assets of 13 billion euros ($14.6 billion), according to the report.

The International Monetary Fund has piled pressure on eurozone governments to take bolder action to alleviate Greece’s debt burden, saying that current plans do not go nearly far enough to address the country’s chronic problems, the Financial Times reported. The fund’s warning shot comes as it weighs whether or not to take part in the latest bailout of Greece — a key decision for some EU nations, such as Germany, that see IMF participation as vital to the credibility of Greek rescue programme.

An unexpected revival in France’s economy may have helped the eurozone avoid a further slowdown in the three months to September, according to surveys of purchasing managers at manufacturers and service providers in the currency area, The Wall Street Journal reported. However, with Germany slowing, there are few signs of the acceleration in the anemic pace of recovery that would be needed for the European Central Bank to meet its inflation target over coming years, although the surveys also found that businesses raised their prices for the first time in over 12 months.

Portugal’s fragile recovery is losing momentum, with growth held back by sluggish investment and weak exports as uncertainty and corporate debt weigh on the economy, the International Monetary Fund has warned. The consumption-based recovery of the past three years is running out of steam, the fiscal stance remains expansionary, the current account is weakening and the banking system is plagued by low profitability,” the fund said on Thursday in its latest report on Portugal’s progress since a 2011-14 bailout programme.

The liquidators of Clerys say the winding up of the old Dublin department store is being delayed by legal proceedings and could take a further two years to complete. They also confirm they have made reports to the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement (ODCE) about the alleged conduct of its directors, the Irish Times reported.

Norway’s central bank is predicted to leave its key policy rate unchanged at a record low as the economy of western Europe’s biggest oil producer fights off the biggest slump in crude prices in a generation, Bloomberg News reported. The central bank will keep its key policy rate at 0.50 percent at a meeting on Thursday, according to 15 of 22 economist surveyed by Bloomberg. Seven predict a cut to 0.25 percent. The bank will likely keep an easing bias to avoid the krone from strengthening too much, according to DNB ASA and Nordea Bank.

Europeans told the world’s top banking regulator that they’ve had enough. In two heated meetings in the past week, regulators from countries including Germany and Italy told the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision that proposed changes to how banks assess credit, market and operational risks must be scaled back and slowed down, according to two people with knowledge of the matter, Bloomberg News reported.