Headlines

Romania’s low-cost airline, Blue Air, has been given a new lease of life after Bucharest’s municipal court approved its request to enter a form of bankruptcy protection, SimpleFlying.com reported. The procedure allows the carrier to continue operations and generate revenue for the next 18 months without having to pay back creditors or refund passengers. The agreement between the airline and its creditors will see the airline repay loans in full at a later date. Like many European Airlines, Blue Air has struggled massively to cope with the financial impact of COVID-19.

Italy plans to dramatically expand public investment, focusing on boosting growth rather than reining in debt as the government plots its way out of the worst recession in a century, Bloomberg News reported. State investment will rise above 3 percent of gross domestic product over the next four years from 2.3 percent in 2019, according to an overnight statement from Giuseppe Conte’s cabinet following a minsters’ meeting.

The Italian government approved a package of measures today aimed at cutting the complicated red tape that has long been blamed for crimping growth in the euro zone’s third-largest economy, Reuters reported. The “simplification decree,” approved after weeks of fraught political negotiation, has been touted by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte as “the mother of all reforms” to help relaunch an economy brought to its knees by the coronavirus. It was approved in a preliminary version at a late night cabinet meeting, leaving some final details still to be hammered out.

Insurer Aviva Canada faces a proposed class-action lawsuit that claims Canadian businesses have been denied contagious-disease coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Globe and Mail reported. Toronto law firm Thomson Rogers filed a request for certification of a class action last week in the Ontario Superior Court against Aviva Insurance Company of Canada, alleging that the company failed to honour its business-interruption claims for Canadian businesses with what is known as enterprise-insurance policies.

Edcon Holdings Ltd. agreed to sell part of South African clothing chain Edgars to a private equity-backed regional rival, potentially safeguarding a 91-year-old brand and saving thousands of jobs, Bloomberg News reported. Administrators led by Lance Schapiro and Piers Marsden struck a deal with Retailability Pty Ltd., a holding company for brands Legit, Beaver Canoe and Style, which owns 460 stores across southern Africa. Details of the transaction will be finalized based on further agreements, the business-rescue team said today.

Justin Bgoni, chief executive of the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange, received an unexpected call from a colleague last month: The government had decided to shut down the world’s best performing stock market, the Wall Street Journal reported. Until the suspension, announced June 26 in a tweet from Zimbabwe’s information ministry, the all-share index on the Harare-based exchange had jumped 677 percent since Jan. 1, even as local economists expect gross domestic product to shrink by more than 10 percent.

The coronavirus will hit Europe with a deeper recession than anticipated, with Ireland’s economy set to shrink 8.5 per cent this year,  according to a new forecast by the European Commission, the <em>Irish Times</em> reported. “The economic impact of the lockdown is more severe than we initially expected. We continue to navigate in stormy waters and face many risks, including another major wave of infections,” commission executive vice president Valdis Dombrovskis said.

A study by Institute for Fiscal Studies warned that thirteen universities, or colleges, in the U.K. are at risk of going bankrupt as the coronavirus pandemic hits their finances and challenges the entire sector, CNBC.com reported. Social distancing measures, travel restrictions and lockdowns have tested the ability of universities to survive without students. In the wake of the pandemic, many moved their teaching online and some do not have plans to return to their facilities until the summer of 2021. There’s also uncertainty as to whether non-U.K.

Ecuador reached a preliminary agreement with some of its largest bondholders to restructure $17.4 billion in outstanding debt, Bloomberg News reported. The nation intends to exchange 10 existing bonds maturing between 2022 and 2030 for three new notes due in 2030, 2035, and 2040, reducing the average coupon rate to 5.3 percent, according to a government statement. The plan still needs to be approved by a share of the remaining bondholders.

Fashion brands and retailers re-opening around the world to patchy demand, and carrying unsold stock from spring have cut fall orders by as much as two-thirds in moves spelling more pain for Asian suppliers, Reuters reported. With shoppers still wary of catching the coronavirus at stores, retailers are leaving buying decisions to the last minute and planning on selling all-season basics such as men’s chinos and t-shirts leftover from spring through into fall. “We don’t think orders for clothing will pick up anytime soon.