Headlines

The bankruptcy court has rejected Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) Undertaking’s application to direct the liquidator of Spark Green Energy (Satara) Ltd to categorise it as a secured financial creditor and also admit its claim of Rs 156 crore, the Economic Times of India reported. The city-based public utility undertaking had approached the Mumbai bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) after the liquidator of Spark Green Energy (Satara) rejected the company’s claim to admit the amount.

The Board of Directors of Romania’s 2 Mai Mangalia Shipyard (2MMS) has scheduled an extraordinary general shareholders meeting (EGSM) on November 28, aiming to terminate its association with Dutch partner Damen Holding in the ailing shipyard Damen Shipyards Mangalia, Ziarul Financiar reported. State-owned 2MM is the majority owner of Damen Shipyards Mangalia (51%), managed by Damen group (49%) under a contract negotiated by the Romanian government at the time the Dutch company took over the majority stake in the shipyard from Korean group Daewoo.

Esprit Holdings Limited announced the bankruptcy of its two U.S. subsidiaries, adding to insolvency filings in Europe and Asia as the brand struggles to stay afloat, RetailDive.com reported. Both Esprit U.S. Distributions Limited and Esprit U.S.Retail Inc. filed notices of chapter 7 bankruptcy on Monday, according to a company announcement. Esprit U.S. Distributions, an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary of Esprit Holdings, and Esprit U.S. Retail, a direct wholly-owned subsidiary of Esprit U.S.

Italy is struggling to find a "strategic" buyer for its stake in lender Monte dei Paschi di Siena before a year-end deadline, leaving it with little alternative but to turn to the market and broaden a fragmented shareholder base, Reuters reported. Italy must cut its 26.7% stake below 20% by the end of December to show the European Union authorities it no longer controls MPS, in line with re-privatisation commitments agreed during a 2017 bailout. The original EU deadline was extended after Italy failed to sell MPS to UniCredit in 2021.

The eurozone’s economy grew more rapidly than expected in the three months to the end of September, a boost to hopes that the bloc is set for a soft landing from the surge in inflation that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Wall Street Journal reported. The pickup in growth will ease worries that a long period of high interest rates has stalled the currency area’s recovery, and reassure policymakers at the European Central Bank that rapid cuts to its key interest rate aren’t urgently needed.

German inflation quickened more sharply than expected and exceeded the European Central Bank’s 2% target – underpinning the challenges for policymakers in deciding on the pace and extent of further monetary-policy easing, Bloomberg News reported. Consumer-price growth in Europe’s largest economy picked up to 2.4% in October from 1.8% the previous month – well above the 2.1% median estimate in a Bloomberg survey. Base effects linked to energy helped drive the uptick, with services, goods and food also contributing, according to statistics agency Destatis.

Britain’s new Labour government presented its plan to jolt the U.K. out of years of moribund growth: more taxes and a bigger state, the Wall Street Journal reported. Standing in Parliament, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves Wednesday said her government will raise taxes by £40 billion, equivalent to around $51.9 billion, one of the biggest tax hikes in a generation, and borrow billions in the coming years to invest in the country’s infrastructure.

Mexico’s economic growth accelerated more than expected in the third quarter on solid domestic demand and a recovery of the agriculture sector, marking a pace that’s unlikely to be sustained going forward, Bloomberg News reported. Gross domestic product expanded 1% in the three months through September, above the 0.65% median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. From a year ago, GDP grew 1.5% in the quarter, more than the 1.3% median estimate, but less than the 2.1% the previous period, according to preliminary data published Wednesday by Mexico’s national statistics institute.

In January, the Catalan regional government in Spain created a specialized desk dedicated to increasing investment and trade with China, the world’s second-largest economy. In July, the Port of Barcelona approved plans to build a terminal with direct access to the port’s railway for electric vehicles that China is exporting to Europe, the New York Times reported. Last month, during a visit to Beijing by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, the Chinese wind turbine giant Envision Energy agreed to team up with his government and invest $1 billion to build a green hydrogen industrial park.

Brazil's net imports of crypto assets in the nine months through September 2024 increased by 60.7% over the same period last year, already exceeding the full-year total for 2023, central bank data showed on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The surge in Brazil's crypto market, the world's tenth-largest according to blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis, was fueled by a significant increase in so-called stablecoins - which are pegged to real-world assets like the U.S. dollar.