Headlines

Global Counsel, the advisory firm co-founded by Peter Mandelson, is to collapse into administration, blaming the “maelstrom” caused by revelations about the former peer’s relationship with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, The Guardian reported. Companies including Barclays, Tesco and the Premier League have all deserted Global Counsel, despite the company’s efforts to sever ties with Mandelson and the company’s co-founder Benjamin Wegg-Prosser.

Warrington council has asked to borrow £354mn from the government to fund day-to-day services and stave off bankruptcy after years of warnings that the authority’s high-risk investments could threaten its financial viability, the Financial Times reported. The government last year sent in a team of experts to the Labour-run council, one of the most indebted in the UK, after a review concluded it had been making risky investments to avoid spending cuts.

The U.K’s rate of inflation slowed in January, furthering the chances of a rate cut by the Bank of England when policymakers next meet in March, the Wall Street Journal reported. Consumer prices rose 3.0% in January on year, compared with a 3.4% uptick in December, the Office for National Statistics said Wednesday. A fall in inflation suggests a rate cut by the U.K. central bank could come sooner rather than later.

Corporate failures in New Zealand reached their highest level in 15 years in 2025, with construction and hospitality among the hardest-hit sectors, according to a new Deloitte report, InsuranceBusinessMag.com reported. The firm’s New Zealand Insolvency Trends report found that formal appointments – covering liquidations, receiverships, and voluntary administrations – totalled 3,080 in 2025. This represents a 12% increase on 2024 and the highest annual figure since 2010.

The International Monetary Fund faulted China’s economic policies for causing waste at home and damage abroad and called for a reorientation by Beijing to embrace a model based on domestic consumer spending, Bloomberg News reported. "Transitioning to a consumption-led growth model should be the overarching priority,” the IMF’s executive directors said in a statement Wednesday released alongside the Washington-based lender’s annual review of China’s economy, known as an Article IV consultation.

Canada's trade deficit narrowed in December even as its share of exports to the United States dropped to the lowest level on record, barring two months during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, data showed on Thursday, Reuters reported. The latest numbers indicate that Canada has managed to reduce its exposure to the world's largest economy, which is also its largest trading partner, as non-U.S. exports hit an all-time high. Statistics Canada said the country recorded a C$1.31 billion ($957 million) deficit in December, led by metals and non-metallic mineral exports.

The Philippine central bank cut rates at its first meeting of the year, a widely expected move as weak growth underlines the need for more economic support, the Wall Street Journal reported. Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas lowered its benchmark overnight reverse repurchase rate by 25 basis points to 4.25% from 4.50% on Thursday, delivering a sixth straight round of easing. It reduced its benchmark lending rate to 4.75% from 5.00%.

Indonesian and U.S. companies on Wednesday signed deals worth $38.4 billion ahead of Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto's meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump to sign a final trade pact, the Indonesian government said in a statement, Reuters reported. The 11 deals, signed at a dinner for Prabowo hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, were for partnerships in mining, energy, agribusiness, textiles, furniture and technology sectors, according to the statement.

Now-bankrupt Celtic Tiger property developer Seán Dunne told the High Court on Wednesday he believed he may be the only “dual bankrupt” in the world, the Irish Times reported. He made the comment in a case in which he is representing himself in his challenge to the validity of the appointment of the Irish officials who oversaw and continue to oversee his bankruptcy estate. The businessman was adjudicated a bankrupt in the United States and in Ireland in 2013, with bank debts of hundreds of millions of euro. He remains a bankrupt in both jurisdictions.

Earlier this month, President Trump found the latest pressure point to extend his leverage over Canada: a new bridge connecting the country to the United States that is expected to open this year, the New York Times reported. Trump threatened to block the opening, just hours after the billionaire owner of a competing U.S.-Canada bridge met with Howard Lutnick, Trump’s commerce secretary. It wasn’t that the president was particularly passionate about the new bridge.