Portugal is having trouble selling the bank salvaged from the wreckage of one of the country’s biggest private lenders, the International New York Times reported. The Portuguese central bank on Tuesday missed its own deadline for selling the salvaged entity, Novo Banco, after talks with the front-running bidder faltered. The Bank of Portugal did not identify the bidder, but it has been widely reported to be a Chinese insurance and asset management company.

Loans to Irish households fell 2.8 per cent in July, new data from the Central Bank has shown, while lending to companies showed a decline of 6.9 per cent year on year, the Irish Times reported. The figures showed household loan repayments exceeded drawdowns by €346 million during the month, continuing a trend seen the previous month, as the number of loans issued for house purchases fell. During July, the number of loans drawn down for consumption and other purchases fell by €99 million.

Eurozone consumer prices were barely higher than a year earlier in August, keeping pressure on the European Central Bank to consider additional stimulus measures to bring inflation closer to its target near 2%, The Wall Street Journal reported. The European Union’s statistics agency Monday said consumer prices in August were 0.2% higher than a year earlier, a rate of inflation that was unchanged from June and July. Inflation was restrained by a renewed fall in energy prices, which were down 7.1% from a year earlier.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will discuss “possible mutual steps” to stabilize the global price for oil at a meeting with Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in China on Thursday, a Kremlin aide said, as both countries grapple with lower prices for their main export, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The upcoming Greek election may reopen the can of worms that the 86 billion euro bailout deal with creditors was supposed to close, the International New York Times reported. Given that no party is likely to emerge from the Sept. 20 vote with a majority, it may be hard to form a strong government that can implement the program. There’s even a risk that there will be yet more elections, tipping Greece back into crisis. When Alexis Tsipras set the election in motion by resigning as prime minister, he probably thought he would win fairly easily.

The private equity fund that backed the buyout of parts of the former Quinn Group last year is poised to swoop on the Irish arm of troubled Dutch engineer, Imtech, saving 700 jobs, the Irish Times reported. The parent of Waterford engineering business, Imtech Suir, confirmed yesterday that it is in talks about a possible sale of the company to US and European investment fund Endless LLP and predicted that a deal would close next week.

The opening of regular insolvency proceedings on the Walsum Papier magazine paper mill in Germany has been postponed to the start of October, EUWID Pulp and Paper reported. According to information from the administrators' office, the payments of insolvency benefits covered by the German state could have been extended for another month until the end of September. Meanwhile, operations at the 205,000 tpy LWC paper machine PM 10 are running to capacity as the mill's customers continue placing orders with the company, despite it being in preliminary administration.

Ukraine and its main creditors agreed on Thursday to restructure $18 billion of the country’s foreign debt, in a rare deal between bond funds and a wobbly, emerging-market government, the International New York Times reported. If the deal is approved by the Parliament of Ukraine, it would write off 20 percent of the nation’s foreign debt, helping to avoid a drawn-out, Greek-style negotiation with large bondholders. The terms would also offer financial relief to Ukraine during a deep recession and an armed conflict with pro-Russia separatists.

John Purcell, a former executive director of Irish Nationwide Building Society, has launched a High Court challenge to the constitutionality of the Central Bank’s inquiry into alleged regulatory breaches at the financial institution, the Irish Times reported. Mr Purcell, along with several others, is the subject of an inquiry into allegations that certain proscribed contraventions were committed by INBS, and certain persons concerned with its management, between August 2004 and September 2008. Irish Nationwide was nationalised in 2010 after receiving a €5.4 billion bailout.

Romania's financial regulator ASF withdrew the operating licence of the country's second-largest insurer Astra Asigurari on Wednesday and said it will start the process of declaring it insolvent. ASF chief Misu Negritoiu said Astra Asigurari, which has a market share of just over 10 percent, had a liquidity coverage ratio of 0.03 at the end of June and additional capital needs of 968 million lei ($248.19 million). The company has been under special administration since early 2014.