Portuguese banks will likely have to step up efforts to cut reliance on borrowed money in exchange for having some of the estimated €80 billion (about $114 billion) bailout earmarked for the country, senior bank officials say, The Wall Street Journal reported. Official negotiations between Portugal and officials from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund started Monday, after the country became the third in the euro zone to turn to its peers for help to tackle its persistently large deficit and low growth prospects.

Seán Quinn has blamed over-reliance on the banks and their economic predictions for the group’s problems, the Irish Times reported. Mr Quinn yesterday issued his first statement since he lost control of his manufacturing and insurance business, Quinn Group, to a receiver last week. Anglo Irish Bank has since appointed Kieran Wallace of KPMG as share receiver to Quinn Group ROI Ltd last Thursday. The group owes €2.88 billion to the bank.

Three European asset management firms accused banks including Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., HSBC Holdings Plc, Barclays Bank Plc, Citibank NA and Credit Suisse Group AG of conspiring to manipulate the London interbank offered rate, Bloomberg reported. The banks sold Libor-based futures, options, swaps and derivative instruments “at artificial prices that defendants caused,” harming investors, FTC Capital GmbH of Vienna, FTC Futures Fund SICAV of Luxembourg and FTC Futures Fund PCC Ltd. of Gibraltar said in an April 15 complaint in New York federal court.

A euroskeptic party was in the thick of a tight four-way race after voting concluded in Finland's national election Sunday, raising the chance that it could enter government and disrupt the euro zone's program of bailouts for the bloc's deeply indebted countries, The Wall Street Journal reported. According to exit polls Sunday evening, the nationalist True Finns party, led by Timo Soini, was in third place with 18.7% of the vote. The conservative party of current Finance Minister Jyrki Katainen was in the lead, with 20.2%, according to public broadcaster YLE. Mr.

Two of the biggest bondholders of insolvent Czech betting company Sazka have asked for an early repayment of its bonds due in 2021 worth a nominal 203 million euros ($292 million), their representatives said on Friday, Reuters reported. Sazka, the biggest lottery operator in the Czech market, was declared insolvent last month and a court appointed a preliminary creditors' committee.

Ireland’s Supreme Court last week ruled that the legislation governing the National Asset Management Agency was constitutional. In the appeal to the Supreme Court, developer Paddy McKillen challenged the legislation underpinning the state body. The court did not agree that the definition of eligible bank loans in the NAMA legislation was too broad and was unconstitutional, InsolvencyJournal.ie reported. Despite losing his appeal on the issue of the Constitutionality of the 2009 Act, Mr. McKillan did succeed on the issue of fair procedures.

Europe's struggling periphery is bracing for another blow to its already grim economic growth prospects, this time from the soaring euro, which touched a 15-month high against the dollar on Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reported. The euro's rise, which makes products from the single-currency zone more expensive in global markets, will affect exporters throughout the 17-member currency bloc—particularly with global trade set to slow dramatically this year. The euro is almost 10% higher against the U.S. dollar since the start of the year, and 4% higher against the British pound.

In a dramatic illustration of the upheavals in Ireland following the crash of the Celtic Tiger, the nationalised Anglo Irish Bank announced Thursday that it had seized control of the Quinn Group from ex-billionaire Seán Quinn and his family, Finfacts reported. Seán Quinn, Ireland's once richest man, built up a conglomerate originally from quarrying and later he moved into cement and glass production.

Saab Automobile's attempts to solve its acute liquidity crisis so that it can pay suppliers and restart production now lie in the hands of the Swedish government, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Sweden's National Debt Office Thursday received Saab's proposal to fix its immediate and mid-term financial issues and forwarded it--along with a recommendation--to the government to make a final decision.

Madrid has been forced to make an embarrassing clarification after claims that Spain had secured from China up to €9bn in investment in its troubled savings banks were denied by Beijing, the Financial Times reported. Spanish officials said an “error of communication” had led to reports that China Investment Corporation – one of the country’s sovereign wealth funds – was considering a €9bn investment after José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Spain’s prime minister, met Chinese leaders this week. A CIC official told Reuters that reports in the Spanish media of the investment were false.