Headlines

Eurozone policymakers will pay increasing attention to the bloc’s debt levels as part of its attempts to shore up the public finances of member states during a strong economic recovery, the Financial Times reported. Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the president of the Eurogroup, said reducing government debt levels “is becoming more and more important” at a time when many member states have made impressive progress in reducing their fiscal deficits.

Spain’s constitutional crisis in Catalonia will lower the country’s projected economic growth next year, according to Madrid’s finance minister. Luis de Guindos said the country’s GDP growth projection had been lowered by about 0.4-0.5 percentage points to 2.3 per cent next year — “a small impact” as a result of events in Catalonia, which accounts for a fifth of Spain’s GDP, the Financial Times reported. Speaking in Brussels on Monday, Mr de Guindos said the government’s projections would likely match the European Commission’s latest economic forecasts due on Thursday.

Growth in Italy’s services sector cooled to a one-year low in October as domestic demand struggled, a survey published on Monday showed. The Italian service sector still expanded in October according to the IHS Markit Italy services purchasing managers’ index — the third month in a row that activity has slowed, the Financial Times reported. But the index dropped to a one-year low of 52.1, down from September’s 53.2 and below analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll of a 53.0 reading.

The board of Brazil´s Oi SA has approved a change to the restructuring proposal of the debt-laden telecom provider to be submitted to creditors on Monday, the company said in a securities filing. Terms of the proposed changes will be filed by the company with the court in Rio de Janeiro that oversees Latin America´s largest-ever bankruptcy proceeding, which aims to restructure 65 billion reais in debt, Reuters reported.

Venezuela’s credit grade was cut deeper into junk territory by Fitch Ratings and S&P Global Ratings Friday, after President Nicolas Maduro called for a restructuring of the nation’s global debt, Bloomberg News reported. Fitch reduced the nation’s long-term foreign rating to C from CC and called a default "highly probable," according to a statement. S&P downgraded the sovereign and state run-oil company Petroleos de Venezuela to CC from CCC-, two notches from default.

In a related story, Bloomberg News reported that one day after President Nicolas Maduro left traders puzzled by pledging to both refinance and restructure Venezuela’s foreign bonds, his chief debt negotiator only added to the confusion. Tareck El Aissami, the country’s vice president, chose yet another term as he spoke Friday -- “renegotiate” -- to describe the government’s plans while simultaneously saying bond payments would continue to be made.

China’s financial system is getting significantly more vulnerable due to high leverage, according to central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan, who also flagged the need for deeper reforms in the world’s second-biggest economy, Bloomberg News reported. Latent risks are accumulating, including some that are "hidden, complex, sudden, contagious and hazardous," even as the overall health of the financial system remains good, Zhou wrote in a lengthy article published on the People’s Bank of China’s website late Saturday.

Brazil’s Odebrecht Oil & Gas filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. Friday to help implement a previously announced multibillion-dollar debt restructuring, The Wall Street Journal reported. Odebrecht Oil & Gas, an arm of engineering conglomerate Odebrecht SA, sought chapter 15 protection, the section of the bankruptcy code that deals with international insolvencies, in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York. Large foreign companies, particularly those with U.S. operations or dollar-denominated debt, often file for bankruptcy in the U.S.

Shareholders in AIB have voted overwhelmingly in favour of a restructuring of the bank aimed at meeting new European rules on minimising future taxpayer bailouts, the Irish Times reported. The bank, which cost €20.8 billion to rescue during the financial crisis, sought shareholder approval for the scheme at an extraordinary general meeting in Ballsbridge, Dublin, on Friday. The AIB board had unanimously recommended that shareholders vote in favour of the resolutions.

President Nicolas Maduro said Venezuela will seek to restructure its global debt after the state-owned oil company makes one last payment, blaming U.S. financial sanctions for making it impossible to find new financing, Bloomberg News reported. The government will transfer funds for a $1.1 billion principal payment on Petroleos de Venezuela bonds that came due Thursday, Maduro said from Caracas. From there on out, the nation will renegotiate its debt with banks and investors, he said in a national address.