Headlines

Bundesbank president Jens Weidmann challenged the landmark stimulus package agreed by European Union leaders this week, emphasising the importance of controls for the funds that seek to pull the region’s economies out of the worst recession in memory, the Irish Times reported. In an interview with German newspaper Funke Mediengruppe on Sunday, Mr Weidmann questioned aspects of the package, saying it shouldn’t serve as “a springboard for large-scale EU debt for regular household financing.” While the creation of the €750 billion fund to address the fallout from the pandemic was the

Utico FZC, the Middle Eastern suitor of embattled Singaporean water treatment company Hyflux Ltd., said it has submitted a binding offer to restructure the group’s debt, Bloomberg News reported. The move caps a prolonged negotiation for one of the highest-profile restructurings in the city-state, after Hyflux said last year that it had received a non-binding letter of intent. The latest binding offer will remain open for acceptance until July 31, according to a filing Friday with the Singapore Exchange. Hyflux’s collapse has left some 34,000 retail investors in the lurch.

Argentina’s government reaffirmed on Saturday that it would not budge from its latest proposal to restructure around the $65 billion (51 billion pounds) in debt, but signaled it would be willing to negotiate on the fine print around the deal. The South American country is facing a standoff with bondholders after creditor groups joined forces to reject the government’s proposal earlier in July and put forward one of their own. The government has repeatedly said it cannot offer more, though sources told Reuters this week it would be willing to negotiate key contractual terms.

A record number of Canada’s largest businesses are seeking protection from creditors, a testament to the strains companies are under because of the coronavirus pandemic, Bloomberg News reported. In the three months through June, 27 firms were granted protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, a federal law that gives insolvent corporations that have debt of more than C$5 million ($3.7 million) an opportunity to restructure and avoid liquidation.

Russia’s central bank cut its key interest rate to a record low as the coronavirus pandemic has pushed the economy into a deep recession, forcing President Vladimir Putin this week to delay a flagship $360 billion national development plan by six years. The bank on Friday lowered its benchmark rate by 0.25 percentage point to 4.25%, following a one-percentage-point cut in June to a post-Soviet low. The bank’s move makes lending to businesses and consumers cheaper in an economy hit hard by a twin strike of lockdowns and lower oil prices.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. will pay $2.5 billion to the government of Malaysia for its role in the alleged theft of billions of dollars from a government investment fund, bringing the Wall Street bank close to ending one of the worst scandals in its history, The Wall Street Journal reported. Goldman also guaranteed the recovery of $1.4 billion in assets allegedly stolen from the fund, according to the agreement announced separately by the bank and Malaysia’s Finance Ministry on Friday.

It is hard to know just how close to the edge Government Covid-19 travel restrictions are pushing Aer Lingus. Irish Airline Pilots’ Association president Evan Cullen warned the Oireachtas Special Committee on Covid-19 Response on Friday it was not sustainable for the carrier to continue burning €1.5 million a day with little revenue being generated, the Irish Times reported. Cullen noted such a rate of cash burn is not sustainable for any business. These were common sense points.

In the summer of 2012, it took Mario Draghi three words to alter the course of the eurozone debt crisis. Eight years later, a breakthrough from EU political leaders battling the Covid-19 threat took months of haggling, culminating in a marathon five-day summit that ended this week, the Financial Times reported. Despite the differing timescales, investors are already comparing Tuesday morning’s deal to establish a EU-wide €750bn recovery fund — from money raised in the bond markets — to the former European Central Bank chief’s pledge to do “whatever it takes” to preserve the euro.

Irish travel tech company CarTrawler has seen a rise in bookings in recent months although it doesn’t expect business to fully recover until next summer at the earliest, The Irish Times reported. UK private equity group TowerBrook took control of the company in return for a €100 million cash injection in May after it was thrown into emergency debt restructuring talks due to the grounding of airline fleets globally amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Bank of England interest-rate setter Jonathan Haskel said he was worried that Britain’s economic recovery from the coronavirus crisis could be slow and it would depend heavily on whether people felt confident that it was safe to go out, Reuters reported. Haskel, who backed the BoE’s latest 100 billion-pound expansion of asset purchases last month, also warned that unemployment had the potential to be worse than during the 2008-09 financial crisis.