As many as 4,000 jobs could be lost at German home improvement retailer Praktiker and its Max Bahr chain following insolvency filings, Bild reported on Saturday, citing the group's deputy board chairman, Reuters reported. "That's a shocking number," the newspaper quoted deputy supervisory board chairman Ulrich Kruse as saying. About a dozen Praktiker stores could shortly be closed, mainly shops that were about to be converted to the Max Bahr brand which traditionally had better profit margins, Wirtschaftswoche reported, without citing the source of the information.

The Greek parliament approved a final piece of legislation on Thursday to reduce the bloated civil service payroll after international lenders threatened at the last minute to withhold the disbursement of a €4bn aid tranche, the Financial Times reported. Lawmakers held a special session to reverse an amendment passed last week exempting education ministry employees with doctorates and masters’ degrees from being transferred to a “mobility reserve” on reduced pay.

Ireland's Electricity Supply Board's unions are threatening to strike and are refusing to co-operate with further cost-cutting measures at the State-owned energy group as the row over the €1.7 billion pension shortfall continues, the Irish Times reported. The ESB group of unions claims the company is refusing to recognise the pension pot’s shortfall, which would leave current staff with just 4 per cent of their benefits should the plan be wound up.

German home improvement retailer Praktiker said on Thursday insolvency proceedings would be filed for its Max Bahr units in Germany after a trade credit insurer stopped providing insurance coverage to suppliers, Reuters reported. A company statement said the application would be made "shortly" with a court in Hamburg on grounds of over-indebtedness and lack of liquidity. It said the Praktiker group's international operations remain unaffected by the insolvency proceedings. Read more.

The euro zone has delayed its decision on whether to approve its next aid payment for Greece until Friday after Athens failed to fulfill all the conditions it had set out earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported. The Greek Parliament needs to adopt the last of 22 promised measures by Thursday for the €4 billion ($5.3 billion) to be released, the Eurogroup President and Dutch Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem said Wednesday. Greek Finance Ministry officials have played down the delay, saying they would easily meet the deadline.

The insolvency profession has welcomed the long-debated ruling in Nortel and Lehman Brothers v The Pensions Regulator , after a four-year battle over pension fund debts after a company has entered administration, Economia reported. The case stems from the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the Canadian telecoms group Nortel Networks four years ago, which left behind major UK pension funds deficits. The European administrators of Nortel brought the issue to the Supreme Court - along with the administrators of Lehman Brothers – following a $3.1bn claim from the UK pension scheme on insolvency.

Loewe, the last major manufacturer of high-end television sets in Germany, is fighting for survival in a sector increasingly dominated in recent years by Asian rivals, The Sun Daily reported. Ironically, it is also hoping that its saviour would hail from Asia, the very region which is at the root of many of its current woes. Asked by the weekly magazine Der Spiegel whether Loewe will still exist in 12 months' time, the group's chairman Matthias Harsch replied: "That's the question I ask myself every morning.

Spanish banks may have to swallow more losses to shake off the legacy of a property crash, real estate experts warn, as they struggle to sell plots of land that have ended up on their books and which are now worth less than many have accounted for, Reuters reported. Lenders were forced by the government to take billions of euros in provisions against losses last year after property values collapsed in 2008, with the steepest writedowns destined to cover land they were saddled with as developers went bust.

Europe’s biggest banks, which more than doubled their highest-quality capital to $1 trillion since 2007 to meet tougher rules, may have further to go as regulators scrutinize how lenders judge the riskiness of their assets, Bloomberg reported. Deutsche Bank AG, Barclays Plc and Societe Generale SA are among European banks that issued stock, sold units or hoarded earnings to bring capital, as a proportion of assets weighted by risk, into line with new global rules.

Chinese state-controlled firm AVIC is to buy the commercial business of German aircraft engine maker Thielert, banking on a surge in demand for diesel plane engines in China and other emerging markets, Reuters reported. AVIC and Thielert, which filed for insolvency more than five years ago, did not provide financial details of the deal announced on Tuesday.