Headlines

Ukraine has to generate $15.3 billion over four years with the help of a debt restructuring plan agreed upon last March, with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF, which approved a new $17.5 billion loan for Ukraine and issued the first $4.9 billion tranche, expects that Ukraine and its creditors will agree on the terms of Ukraine’s commercial debt restructuring before the IMF’s review of the assistance program, scheduled for June, IMF First Deputy Managing Director David Lipton said in a recent statement (UNIAN, April 14), The Ukrainian Weekly reported.

The Quinn family and Anglo Irish Bank will go back to court next month after a deal to settle their multibillion-euro dispute fell through, the Irish Times reported. Minister of State at the Department of Finance Simon Harris confirmed the negotiations between the two parties had collapsed and the case would “likely be settled by the courts”. The two are pencilled in for June 6th with the case likely to last six months and potentially spill into next year.

The Supreme Court has ruled that Olympic Airlines is unable to enter the Pension Protection Fund (PPF) because it did not have an establishment in the UK during its insolvency proceedings, Employee Benefits reported. The case, Trustees of the Olympic Airlines SA Pension and Life Assurance Scheme (Appellants) v Olympic Airlines, relates to the airline’s insolvency in 2009. It entered insolvency in Greece and despite having UK-based operations and a UK defined benefit (DB) pension scheme, it did not have a subsidiary firm in the UK.

Insolvency specialist Begbies Traynor Group warned yesterday that its full year results would be below market expectations thanks to the declining rate of company failures, domain-b.com reported. According to Begbies, the number of UK corporate insolvencies in the first quarter of 2015 were 4,014, a 11.3 per cent decline against the same period last year, and was the lowest level of quarterly appointments since the fourth quarter of 2007.

Klagenfurt am Wörthersee, an Alpine lake city almost 350km from Vienna, was once the idyllic backdrop to one of the most calamitous banking collapses in Europe. Now, it is closing in on a new claim to fame: as the venue for a trial run for as-yet-untested rules within the EU on who foots the bill when banks go bust, the Financial Times reported.

Bahrain's central bank said on Thursday it had placed two Iran-linked companies, Future Bank and Iran Insurance Co, into administration to protect the rights of depositors and policyholders, Reuters reported. In a brief statement, the central bank did not elaborate on why it took the action or give any information about the two companies. It said it wished "to reassure both the local and international financial community that this measure is an isolated incident and will not impact any other bank or insurance company in the kingdom.

The European Central Bank provided more financial assistance to Ireland at the height of its banking crisis in 2010 than any central bank has ever provided to any country, according to the bank’s former president. Jean-Claude Trichet told Irish politicians on Thursday that the ECB had extended emergency liquidity assistance to the country’s banking sector equivalent to 100 per cent of its gross domestic product, the Financial Times reported. “That was one quarter of the ECB’s total lending at the time and was totally unprecedented,” he said.

More State banks have defended the standard variable rates (SVR) they impose on some mortgage customers. They said that while rates are kept under review there are no imminent plans to lower them, the Irish Times reported. Permanent TSB claimed that its SVR of 4.5 per cent was “competitive in the current market” adding that it “broadly reflects the various cost inputs including the cost of funds which the bank raises from a variety of sources including the retail deposit market in Ireland and the international money markets”.

Royal Bank of Scotland warned it faced a tough 2015 as it plunged to a loss in the first three months of the year, weighed down by £856m of misconduct and litigation charges, The Guardian reported. The 79%-taxpayer-owned bank prepared the way for further penalties for foreign exchange rigging – including possible criminal charges – by setting aside a further £334m for manipulation of the £3.5tn-a-day global currency markets.

Carcraft, once described as the UK's leading car supermarket, has gone into administration today, resulting in the loss of around 550 jobs, The Telegraph reported. The announcement was made to shocked staff at the Rochdale head office at 10.30am today. Grant Thornton, the financial services company, has been appointed as administrator. Carcraft will now cease trading and all employees have been made redundant. According to a statement made by Grant Thornton today, Carcraft is "heavily loss-making", recording losses of £8m per annum "for a number of years".