Bank lending to U.K. businesses fell again in August, an indication that a long-standing drag on growth has yet to be eliminated, The Wall Street Journal reported. Lending to businesses has been weak in the years following the 2008 financial crisis, a hindrance to business investment that economists believe has contributed to a significant decline in the productivity of the country's workers.

Sweden's Volvo Group, the world's second biggest lorry manufacturer, announced Tuesday a 5 billion kronor (580 million euros, $780 million) restructuring plan over two years, the Economic Times reported. "The programme encompasses both reduction of white collar employees and consultants and efficiency enhancements in the global industrial system," the company wrote in a statement, without indicating the number of jobs affected. The Volvo Group, which also makes buses, construction equipment and engines, indicated that the restructuring would mainly concern its lorry business.

While Greece's lenders are on firmer footing after getting capital from euro-area and International Monetary Fund bailout funds, they still need to reduce the non-performing loans that have tripled to 29 percent of the total in three years and threaten their new-found solvency, Bloomberg reported. One obstacle is a five-year ban on foreclosures that prevented thousands of Greeks from losing their homes after the economy went into free-fall. The government is now considering a plan to ease the restrictions by the end of this year to satisfy its creditors’ demands.

Spain emerged from two years of recession late this summer, but it faces a long period of more austerity and painful adjustments before it can regain its footing and put most of its six million unemployed back to work, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said on Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported. "Spain is out of recession but not out of the crisis," Mr. Rajoy said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, cautiously touting the effects of budgetary and structural overhauls that have been among the deepest in the euro zone.

The European Central Bank is ready to inject more liquidity into banks “if needed,” Mario Draghi, its president, said on Monday, despite further signs that the eurozone is sustaining its weak recovery, the Financial Times reported. Speaking in Brussels, Mr Draghi said the bank stood ready to conduct another round of liquidity-providing operations for banks in the form of a long-term refinancing operation or LTRO, which it used in 2011 and 2012 to inject €1tn in cheap three-year loans into the banking system.

Air France-KLM will strengthen its role in Italian airline Alitalia SpA, Italian transport minister Maurizio Lupi said on Monday, Reuters reported. "I expect that Air France will strongly reaffirm that Alitalia is a strategic asset for Air France, and therefore that there will be a strengthening of Air France's role," Lupi said at the margins of an industry conference in Milan.

Monte dei Paschi di Siena has cancelled coupon payments on three hybrid loans coming due at the end of the month to meet European conditions for approving a €4.1 billion state bailout, the Irish Times reported. Italy’s third-biggest bank, brought close to collapse by the euro zone debt crisis, is set to unveil a turnaround plan this week after the EU told it to toughen up a previous set of restructuring measures. The new plan is already known to include a €2.5 billion share sale imposed by Brussels, more than twice the €1 billion cash call originally pencilled in by the bank.

As the quaterly rent day approaches - when retailers pay three months’ rent in advance – research from insolvency trade group R3 has found 31% of retailers currently have a “higher than normal risk” of entering insolvency, economia reported. By comparison, 25% of all UK businesses have the same risk of failure. Liz Bingham, president of R3, said, "High Street retailers have had a tougher time of it than other sectors in the past few years.

Years of recession and financial crisis have turned almost one in ten of the UK’s 2.5 million companies into “zombies”, threatening a “surge of insolvencies” as they are left behind by the improving economy, The Scotsman reported. In new report published today, financial health monitoring group Company Watch says the number of so-called zombie businesses has soared by 108 per cent in the last five years, to 227,000.

Slovenia's banks are weak and trust in the system is limited, Finance Minister Uros Cufer told parliament on Friday, as expectations grew that the country may need financial help from abroad, Reuters reported. Slovenia's banks are crippled by at least 7.5 billion euros ($10 billion) of bad loans - more than a fifth of national output - with stress tests set to reveal in November how much help the sector will need.