Headlines

Investors who backed a rebranding of Cambridge Analytica are in a stand-off with former chief executive Alexander Nix after he allegedly withdrew more than $8m from the scandal-hit data firm shortly before it collapsed, the Financial Times reported. Several people involved in the dispute told the Financial Times the withdrawal came shortly after Mr Nix learned British media was reporting on allegations about his company’s role in a massive leak of Facebook user data in March. Mr Nix did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Sitting in a cramped office a few streets away from the headquarters of Greece’s Public Power Corporation, trade unionist Giorgos Adamides admitted that the privatisation of the sprawling state-owned electricity utility could no longer be postponed, the Financial Times reported. “It’s a national crime that the government is selling off power plants and we [the union] fought hard against it but the troika [of Greece’s international creditors] have the upper hand,” said the president of Genop-DEH, the power workers’ union.

Italy’s turbulent political environment took its toll on businesses last month, as worries over the underlying trend in activity growth bubbled up despite a pick-up in growth in the country’s services sector that bucked a slowdown in Germany and France, the Financial Times reported. The purchasing managers’ index of activity in Italy’s services sector picked up to 53.1 in May, from 52.6 in April. That compared to a fall from 57.4 to 54.3 in France and from 53 to 52.1 in Germany — a 20-month low.

After more than two years on the back-burner, there are signs that China is once again focusing on its efforts to increase the yuan’s status in global finance, Bloomberg News reported. The yuan grabbed a record 2.8 percent slice of global payments three years ago, before a crackdown on outflows in the wake of the 2015 devaluation saw that figure shrink to 1.7 percent as of April. These days -- with China’s foreign reserves rising and volatility staying low -- officials have a window to refocus on President Xi Jinping’s quest for a bigger Chinese role in global finance.

What do Toys “R” Us bonds, the populist threat to the European Union, and Turkish external debt have in common? All were tolerated by market players until, quite suddenly, they weren’t. Investors seem increasingly prone to flee assets at the first hint of trouble, fueling concern more cracks are appearing in global markets that have been papered over for years by easy money, Bloomberg News reported. That climate saw cash simply herded into any investment with a respectable yield. The swift reaction to a twist in Italy’s political drama last week looks like the latest sign.

Abraaj Group, which has been roiled by allegations of misused funds, will meet shareholders and lenders on Monday to discuss the restructuring of the Dubai-based asset manager, Bloomberg News reported. Chief Executive Officer and founder Arif Naqvi and other senior managers will update stakeholders on the talks with potential acquirers of its asset-management business, ongoing deals and media speculation, Abraaj said in a statement. The Middle East’s biggest buyout firm is facing growing concern about its viability amid impending loan repayments and greater regulator scrutiny.

The ECB has come under fire from Italy’s new populist government after revealing that it scaled back the proportion of Italian sovereign bonds it bought as part of its economic stimulus programme during Rome’s political turmoil last month, the Financial Times reported. The central bank purchased a net €3.6bn of Italian government debt under its long-running programme in May, new figures show. Although this is higher than the amount it bought in some recent months, such as March and January, it was smaller as an overall proportion of its net purchases.

This month’s EU summit has long been billed as a deadline for the UK to produce answers on the two most pressing Brexit questions: Britain’s customs relationship with the EU and the Northern Ireland “backstop”. But while there are still more than three weeks to go until the Brussels gathering, hopes of a breakthrough are rapidly receding, the Financial Times reported. Peter Ptassek, Germany’s Brexit envoy, tweeted at the weekend that he was far from hopeful that any meaningful progress would be reached at the June 28-29 summit. “Not many are expecting very much now,” he wrote.

Household spending in Japan shrank for a third month running in April, suggesting a sluggish end to spending in the first quarter of 2018 carried on into the second, the Financial Times reported. Spending fell 1.3 per cent year on year in April, sharpening from a fall of 0.7 per cent in March and defying expectations of a rebound, per a median estimate of 0.8 per cent growth from economists surveyed by Reuters.

Credit insurers have decided to withdraw insurance cover for South African retailer Steinhoff International's loans, Steinhoff's Austrian subsidiary Kika/Leiner said on Monday. "The loss of the credit insurance is a result of the Steinhoff crisis," Kika/Leiner said in a statement. Steinhoff, whose retail chains include Britain's Poundland, Mattress Firm in the U.S. and Conforama in France, has been fighting to recover from the fallout from accounting irregularities discovered in December, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story.