Headlines

Australia's takeover regulator declined a request from Oaktree Capital Management and Centerbridge Partners to delay a $359 million refinancing deal surfwear for company Billabong International Ltd on anti-trust concerns, Reuters reported yesterday. The two U.S. hedge funds, whose own refinancing proposals were rebuffed by Billabong, had asked the Takeovers Panel to intervene in the deal with Altamont Capital Partners because some elements, including a hefty break fee, were "anti-competitive and coercive". The panel declined to stop the sale but would still investigate the deal.

The Group of 20 largest economies is set to back a major overhaul of international taxation designed to eliminate loopholes that enable many companies to keep their tax bills low, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. The 15-point action plan has been developed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and is being discussed by finance ministers from the G-20.

As Brazilian banks kick off their second-quarter reporting season this week, there are concerns that a hoped-for recovery after a couple of sluggish years will be marred by the possibility of losses related to the troubled industrial group of Brazilian tycoon Eike Batista, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Brazil's largest banks have grown rapidly over the past decade, as lending soared amid economic stability and rising employment and salaries. But profits have slid since 2011 as Brazil's economy has slowed sharply and is struggling to recover.

U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron said the U.K. economy is “healing” and that should allow the government to cut taxes, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. With recent data showing strength in the economy, Cameron may find it easier to achieve his deficit-reduction goals as part of the biggest fiscal squeeze since World War II. Due to a weaker-than-expected recovery after the global financial crisis, Cameron’s Conservatives and their Liberal Democrat coalition partners have had to extend budget cuts until 2017-18, beyond the country’s next general election in 2015.

Hedge funds holding bonds in insolvent German DIY retailer Praktiker want to convert a 250 million euro ($327 million) bond into Praktiker shares, Reuters reported yesterday. Praktiker filed for insolvency last week after talks with creditors failed, triggering fears of heavy job losses. The insolvency administrators are continuing to keep the business running while they review options for a restructuring of the German chain. Read more.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble opened the possibility of further Greek debt relief as he urged the country to stand by its commitments to scale back its debt and overhaul the economy, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. On his first visit to Greece since it spawned the financial crisis in 2009, Schaeuble said that there are no “shortcuts” to austerity even as he lauded the Greeks’ “determination.” The minister warned against focusing on possible debt relief for the country, though he signaled that Germany would be ready to talk if conditions were met in 2014.

Efforts in China to broaden a pilot program that deploys property taxes aimed at taming the real estate market are running into difficulties, showing the limits of a tool that supporters say could help stem rising housing costs and official corruption, the Wall Street Journal reported today. New housing data released yesterday underscore the challenges that Beijing faces in controlling home-price increases.

The European Central Bank, European Commission and the International Monetary Fund said yesterday that Ireland's government has passed its second-to-last review, another step toward exiting the bailout program it agreed to in late 2010, the Wall Street Journal reported today. But while the government is confident that it can finance itself entirely from the international bond markets next year, talks continue on its access to precautionary credit lines from the euro zone, the IMF or both that it can fall back on should events outside the country interrupt its ability to sell bonds.

The Asset Management Company of Nigeria, which holds non-performing assets of troubled banks, said it had named Citigroup and Africa-focused investment bank Vetiva Capital to manage the sale of its shares in one nationalized bank, Reuters reported yesterday. Nigeria fully nationalized Afribank, Spring Bank and Bank PHB in 2011 when they failed to find new investors before a recapitalization deadline. It then recapitalized them and changed their names to Mainstreet, Enterprise Bank and Keystone Bank, respectively.

Banks and payment card providers would face caps on the transaction fees they can demand from retailers under European Union plans to rein in charges that have been attacked by regulators as anticompetitive, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The European Commission, the 28-nation EU’s executive arm, will propose that interchange fees paid by retailers on card transactions should be capped at 0.2 percent for debit card payments and 0.3 percent for credit cards, according to draft plans obtained by Bloomberg News.