Headlines

The number of homeowners unable to meet their mortgage repayments is continuing to rise despite banks being ordered to deal with the crisis, the Irish Times reported. Figures published by the Central Bank yesterday showed homeowners are now a staggering €2 billion behind on their payments, with almost 30,000 mortgages two years in arrears, and close to 100,000 more than three months in arrears.

Depending on where one stands in the debate on the rising cost of housing in Britain, Paul Thomas and Abigail Walker, first-time home buyers, are either part of the solution or part of the problem, the International Herald Tribune reported. To buy a £248,000, or $386,000, two-bedroom house in Oxfordshire, west of London, Mr. Thomas, a 38-year-old electrician, and his 25-year-old partner, Ms. Walker, who works in an accounting office, are making use of a government program called Help to Buy.

A U.S. court has approved a multimillion-dollar settlement in a securities fraud class-action lawsuit against a bankrupt energy exploration company for which embattled Sen. Pamela Wallin was a director, The Globe and Mail reported. Between June 2007 and December 2011, Wallin was a paid member of the board of Oilsands Quest Inc., a Calgary-based exploration company. As a director, the Saskatchewan senator was named in the lawsuit along with fellow board members, TD Securities and Calgary consulting firm McDaniel and Associates.

Dublin-based Depfa Bank is to be sold off by its Munich-based parent, Hypo Real Estate, five years after both were rescued from collapse by a German state-backed guarantee. Depfa, based in the IFSC, plays no active role in the HRE group under the terms of a 2008 rescue plan that resulted in the property group’s nationalisation in 2009. A well-placed source confirmed to the Irish Times that a plan would be announced shortly to hive off the Irish institution in an auction, six years after it was bought by HRE.

Central banks in the developing world have lost $81bn of emergency reserves through capital outflows and currency market interventions since early May, even before renewed turmoil in emerging markets, the Financial Times reported. The figure, which excludes China, is equal to roughly 2 per cent of all developing country central bank reserves, according to Morgan Stanley analysts, who compiled the data from central bank filings for May, June and July. However, some countries have suffered more precipitous drops.

Canadian Pacific Railway has been ordered by a federal agency to resume the transfer of cargo traffic to Montreal Maine and Atlantic Railway, CTV News reported on a Canadian Press story. Calgary-based CP had expressed concerns about the "fitness" of the insolvent short-haul railroad to safely handle hazardous substances in light of the deadly derailment and crash last month that devastated Lac-Megantic, Que.

The need for a new rescue programme for Greece promises a drawn-out drama of late-night negotiations but is unlikely to trigger the sort of crisis that has threatened the breakup of the euro in the recent past, Reuters reported. That the collapse of the single currency is no longer an immediate danger reflects the solidity of the political bargain that saved Greece a year ago. Then, Germany, the euro zone's paymaster, agreed to keep aiding Greece so it could stay in the euro as long as it continued to tighten its belt and implement reforms to restore competitiveness.

Companies as diverse as retailers and gadget makers are reporting weakened results from China, as the economic slowdown there blunts Beijing's drive to make the nation's consumers a bigger driver of growth, The Wall Street Journal reported. Last month, Canon Inc. cut the Japanese company's year-end profit forecast to ¥380 billion ($3.89 billion), off 16% from forecasts three months earlier, citing in part the slowdown in China. Nike Inc.

Airfare search startup Everbread has been placed into insolvency in the UK after a four-year run trying to make in-roads into the world of travel shopping IT, Tnooz.com reported. The London-based company (TLabs here) was officially wound up with a notice to the UK’s Companies House on 14 August this year and its affairs are now in the hands of accountancy firm Carter Backer Winter. Documents state that the company’s liability to creditors is estimated to be in the region of £8.7 million.

The German real estate company IVG Immobilien AG has entered insolvency, but will be allowed to draw up its own refinancing plan in accordance with German law, IP Real Estate reported. In a surprise statement issued to investors and the public on Wednesday, IVG had announced its creditors had not agreed to a refinancing plan after all – contrary to statements from earlier in the month. The parent company of the IVG group, IVG Immobilien AG, has filed for a so-called Schutzschirmverfahren - or protective shield proceedings – introduced by Germany's Bundestag last year.