European finance officials tentatively approved a change to the region's budget policies that is likely to lighten the austerity required of Spain and other countries hardest hit by the sovereign-debt crisis, The Wall Street Journal reported. The change responds to criticism that European Union rules have aggravated the bloc's downturn by requiring that governments narrow their budget deficits—even in countries with deeply depressed labor markets or shrinking economies.

After cross-border banks created huge headaches for European governments during the financial crisis, officials are pushing a new solution to the problem: Create more cross-border banks, The Wall Street Journal Brussels Beat blog reported in an analysis. Proponents of the plan want governments to give up long-standing resistance to having their banks taken over by foreign lenders as one possible remedy following new stress tests.

Up to five investors are understood to be willing to bid at least €950 million to buy the loans given to the property group controlled by Michael O’Flynn from Nama, although the State agency has yet to put them on the market, the Irish Times reported. Mr O’Flynn, the main shareholder behind Cork-based O’Flynn Construction and Tiger Developments, was one of the “top 10” developers whose loans were the first taken over by Nama when it began buying property-backed debt from the Republic’s banks in 2010.

Belgian financial group Dexia has entered into exclusive talks with New York Life Investments to sell its asset management unit, it said late on Thursday. The group, which has to sell Dexia Asset Management as part of a deal with European regulators in exchange for state aid it received in recent years, did not say how much New York Life Investments planned to offer. Dexia had initially agreed to sell the asset management arm to Hong Kong-based GCS Capital for 380 million euros ($507 million), but that deal fell through in July.

As Europe moves closer to establishing a banking union in 2014, Saxo Bank CEO Lars Christensen tells RT it will destroy rather than strengthen the economy, warning the effects could be similar to the ones from the failed euro currency experiment. The Frankfurt-based European Central Bank will officially take over supervision of more than 6,000 eurozone banks as early as October 2014, after European lawmakers voted on uniting their banking regulators. Not all bankers are convinced creating more solidarity and liability between banks is the right prescription for Europe’s banks.

More than a year before a key European banking-rescue program is set to end, banks are starting to lobby for a plan to replace the old one, a sign of how rickety the continent's financial system remains, The Wall Street Journal reported. Starting in late 2011, the European Central Bank doled out roughly €1 trillion ($1.34 trillion) of emergency three-year loans to hundreds of European banks. The program, known as the long-term refinancing operation, or LTRO, was designed to save ailing banks that were struggling to borrow money through ordinary channels.

Tiimari Oyj, a Finnish retailer that sells stationery and craft materials, filed for bankruptcy protection after failing to find funding, Bloomberg Businessweek reported. Tiimari wasn’t able to secure enough financing to stay in business, the Vantaa, Finland-based company said in a statement to the Helsinki stock exchange today. The shares were halted at 0.07 euros at 4:17 p.m. yesterday in the Finnish capital pending an announcement from the company.

Insolvent Spanish fishing firm Pescanova will ask its bank creditors to accept losses of between 70 percent and 75 percent on loans they made the company, a source with knowledge of the matter said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. Pescanova's new chairman Juan Manuel Urgoiti is due to meet with banks on Wednesday to discuss a plan to re-float the firm, which an audit by KPMG showed had debt of 3.6 billion euros ($4.81 billion), making it one of Spain's biggest bankruptcies. Pescanova's creditor banks include Sabadell, Popular, Caixabank and nationalised lender NovaGalicia.

The Netherlands’ newly inaugurated King Willem-Alexander has made his first annual appearance before parliament one to remember, with a speech effectively announcing the end of the generous Dutch welfare state, the Financial Times reported. The king delivered the speech as part of the annual celebration of “Prinsjesdag”, or “Prince’s Day”, when the Dutch live up to their money-conscious reputation by turning the government’s presentation of its budget for the forthcoming year into a whimsical political festival.

Slovenia's largest retailer Mercator has appointed advisers to help with a 1 billion euro debt restructuring, according to finance industry and banking sources close to the negotiations, Reuters reported. The restructuring is a condition of a proposed sale of a 53.12 percent stake in Mercator to Croatian food and retail group Agrokor. In June, Agrokor said it would pay pay 120 euros per share for the food retail group, valuing the company - Slovenia's largest employer - at about 452 million euros.