Headlines

AIB and Bank of Ireland are among a number of banks who have been criticised in the UK for not working hard enough to compete for customers, the Irish Times reported. However, in a move that will be welcomed by Britain’s biggest financial institutions, none are to be broken up or forced to ditch free banking services to improve competition in the industry.

The European Commission has vowed to press ahead with controversial plans for eurozone nations to support each other in the event of a bank collapse by bailing out depositors, despite protests from Berlin, the Financial Times reported. German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble had sought to pour cold water on the initiative. A paper Germany submitted to a meeting of EU finance ministers last month made it clear that “to now start a discussion on further mutualisation of bank risks through a common deposit insurance or a European deposit reinsurance scheme is unacceptable”.

Embattled Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has long been criticized by business interests for her economic policy as growth sputtered, budget deficits ballooned and inflation and interest rates soared. But now she facing increasingly strident calls for the ouster of her finance minister from an unusual source: her own left-wing party, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The IMF has asked Saudi Arabia for more details of its plans to deal with its ballooning fiscal deficit, warning the world’s biggest oil producer could deplete its financial reserves within five years unless it builds on efforts to balance the budget, the Financial Times reported. Masood Ahmed, the IMF’s regional director, pressed Riyadh to outline details of its proposed spending cuts and clarify its position on additional revenue generation measures such as taxes, as it deals with a fiscal deficit hovering around 20 per cent this year and next.

Greece’s new bailout program is already slipping behind schedule as the country’s foreign creditors visit Athens this week for negotiations over disputed austerity measures, The Wall Street Journal reported. Under the €86 billion ($97.6 billion) bailout plan, agreed in August after months of diplomatic brinkmanship between Greece and the eurozone, Athens was supposed to enact dozens of economic-policy overhauls by mid-October to unlock to first of its aid loans.

Starbucks and Fiat Chrysler must each pay as much as €30 million in back taxes after the European Union said they were handed illegal fiscal deals by the Netherlands and Luxembourg. The coffee company and the Italian carmaker are the first two companies facing repayment orders as EU regulators seek to clamp down on tax-dodging multinationals, the Irish Times reported. The decision now sets up a showdown with Apple and Amazon, which are also embroiled in the two-year-long tax probe. “Tax rulings that artificially reduce a company’s tax burden are not in line with EU state aid rules.

Eurozone central bankers gather in Malta this week, where they are expected to discuss options for beefing up a €1.1tn quantitative easing programme should growth and inflation in the currency area continue to disappoint, the Financial Times reported. The European Central Bank launched its unprecedented QE package in January with a promise to buy €60bn-worth of mostly government bonds until September 2016 in an effort to kickstart the weak eurozone recovery.

Iceland moved a step closer to lifting capital controls imposed following its 2008 financial meltdown, with creditors of one failed bank on Tuesday proposing the nationalisation of the successor bank in which they hold a majority stake, Reuters reported. The process is part of a settlement agreed between the creditors of three institutions that crashed in 2008 and the government and is a necessary step before money can be allowed again to flow out of the country.

The Irish lost more of their personal wealth than any other euro zone country in the aftermath of the financial crash while Germany and the Netherlands gained the most, fresh data from the European Central Bank shows. In an analysis of the years between 2009 and 2013, ECB experts discovered that Ireland lost more than €18,000 per person, while Spaniards saw wealth dwindle by almost €13,000 as property in both nations plummeted. Greeks saw their notional wealth decline by almost €17,000 for the same reason.

Barclays appears to be considering ways to defy the strict separation of its high street operations from its investment bank, in a move likely to inflame the debate over whether rules designed to prevent a second banking crisis are being watered down, The Guardian reported. The bank, which is poised to name ex-investment banker Jes Staley as its next boss, is considering a plan that would put its retail banking arm under the ownership of its investment bank. Although temporary, the arrangement could last years.