Europe

Bond-buying under any new anti-crisis tool from the European Central Bank would probably involve selling other securities in its portfolio so purchases don’t upset efforts to curb record inflation, Bloomberg News reported. Policy makers are determined to neutralize any interventions in debt markets so they don’t exacerbate upward price pressures, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are private.

Russia promised on Thursday to speed up talks about increased gas sales to China and warned that Europe would pay a hefty price for its oil embargo against Russia, Reuters reported. Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said Europe would pay an extra $400 billion in higher energy prices and could face a shortage of oil products. He did not give a time frame. Russia is heavily reliant on its multi-billion dollar energy exports for its financial health, while more than half the European Union's gas imports come from Russia, leaving the bloc exposed to any supply disruptions.

Sanctions on Russia, offset by a windfall from high-price energy exports, haven’t inflicted enough economic pain so far to hurt Moscow’s war effort or push President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table, the Wall Street Journal reported. That resilience isn’t expected to last, with many economists predicting a deep recession later this year, a rise in poverty and a long-term degradation of the country’s economic potential.

French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Wednesday that the euro zone was "in the middle of an inflation peak" which would last until the end of the year "at least", but added there was still a lot of uncertainty, Reuters reported. Le Maire told Les Echos in an interview that he expects inflation levels to remain high until the end of 2023, adding that "even after 2023, inflation will be structurally higher than what we have been experiencing for the last few decades." Euro zone inflation rose to another record last month, boosting government bond yields.

A row of hulking concrete domes loom along the Danube-Black Sea Canal in Cernavoda, about two hours east of Bucharest. Two of the structures house nuclear reactors feeding Romania’s electrical grid. Two others were begun decades ago and are still waiting for completion — though, perhaps, not for long. “We have major plans,” said Valentin Nae, the site director. The nuclear complex was conceived during the regime of Nicolae Ceausescu, the Communist dictator who ran Romania for a quarter century before he was overthrown and executed in 1989. Mr.

Mallinckrodt plc on Monday announced that it expects to complete its reorganization process, emerge from Chapter 11 and complete the Irish Examinership proceedings in the coming days, according to a press release. On the effective date of emergence, all of Mallinckrodt's existing ordinary shares will be canceled pursuant to the company's reorganization plan and the Irish scheme of arrangement. Mallinckrodt expects to issue at emergence 13,170,932 new ordinary shares to its guaranteed unsecured noteholders in accordance with the provisions of the plan and the scheme.

France's economy should avoid falling into recession during the current quarter after contracting in the first three months of the year, the central bank said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The euro zone's second-biggest economy will grow around 0.25% in the three months to the end of June from the first quarter when it shrank 0.2%, the Bank of France said, revising its second quarter estimate marginally higher from 0.2% last month.

European Union financial services chief Mairead McGuinness on Tuesday urged the bloc's lawmakers to agree on bank capital rules to keep the sector resilient as it emerges from the pandemic and markets fragment due to war in Ukraine, Reuters reported. The EU is approving a law to implement capital requirements agreed at the global Basel Committee of banking regulators, but intends to deviate from some of the Basel norms for exposures to residential real estate and unrated companies.

Polish President Andrzej Duda has signed into law regulations replacing the controversial body disciplining judges with a new accountability panel in the hope it will persuade the European Union to release billions of euros in pandemic funds frozen over Poland’s political control of the judiciary, the Associated Press reported. Duda signed the changes into law late Monday, his office said.

Hungary raised objections over the implementation of a global minimum tax in the European Union on Tuesday, saying it can only support a proposal that does not disadvantage firms operating in Hungary, and citing additional risks due to the Ukraine war, Reuters reported. Nearly 140 countries reached a two-track deal in October brokered by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) on a minimum tax rate of 15% on multinationals.