Headlines

The Irish Banking Federation has rejected the findings of a Central Bank report that claims Ireland is second only to Greece in terms of refusing loans to small businesses, the Irish Times reported. The Central Bank report published this morning found that Irish banks reject more business loan applications than any other state in the euro zone except Greece, with small and medium businesses in Ireland twice as likely to have a loan application turned down as the average across the region.

Germany's Hahn airport needs government funding to avoid insolvency, a shareholder representative was quoted as saying on Wednesday, as falling passenger numbers exacerbate losses, Reuters reported. Jochen Riebel, a former local secretary of state who represents minority shareholder Hesse on the airport's board, said Hahn would use up all its cash within about six months without more finance.

Egypt's new government hopes to secure a $4.8 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund before the end of the year, government officials said, in a fresh effort to heal the country's ailing economy, The Wall Street Journal reported. At a news conference on Wednesday following meetings with President Mohammed Morsi and his senior economic team, Christine Lagarde, the IMF's managing director, said the global lender would return to stalled negotiations.

Troubled German shipbuilder P+S Werften, which operates two of the country's biggest shipyards, has asked some of its customers to pay for ships in advance to bridge a liquidity shortfall and avert insolvency, Reuters reported. New Chief Executive Ruediger Fuchs has approached Danish shipper DFDS, passenger ferry operator Scandlines and Greenland's Royal Arctic Line, a P+S spokesman said on Wednesday. P+S had planned to file for insolvency on Wednesday, the spokesman said, the possibility of receiving funds from customers gave Fuchs a couple more days to come up with a rescue plan.

Belize’s government aims to restructure its debt through negotiations with bondholders and will consider any proposal presented, Prime Minister Dean Barrow told reporters in Belize City Wednesday, Bloomberg Businessweek reported. The country has worked in “good faith” with its creditors and is willing to discuss alternative restructuring scenarios, Barrow said, while stating that the government would only accept proposals that involved sustainable debt levels. “Debt sustainability is the whole and entire object of this exercise,” Barrow said.

Britain’s public finances deteriorated in July as corporation tax receipts plunged, highlighting the coalition government’s struggle to balance the books while the economy is in recession, the Financial Times reported. Public sector net borrowing is £9.3bn higher so far this year than at the same stage last year, excluding some distorting effects, putting strain on the coalition’s plan to close the structural current deficit within five years.

China's four biggest banks, which rank among the world's most prolific lenders, are set to report first-half earnings, and investors are likely to gauge their health not by their profits but by how fast their loans are turning sour, The Wall Street Journal reported. Signs of rising bad debt, a key measure of how Chinese companies are faring amid the slowest growth since the financial crisis in 2008, already have pushed the shares of the four state-controlled banks down an average 19% from their highs this year in February.

Failed Japanese chipmaker Elpida Memory Inc, which has agreed to be bought by U.S. rival Micron Technology Inc, said on Tuesday it had submitted a restructuring plan to the Tokyo District Court, the next step in efforts to ensure the survival of some of its operations, Reuters reported. Micron agreed in early July to buy Elpida for about $750 million in cash and pay creditors a total of $1.75 billion in annual instalments through 2019. A group of Elpida bondholders said Micron is offering too little for the chipmaker. Elpida did not elaborate the content of the plan.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel faces one of the toughest choices of her career in the coming weeks: whether to risk the unraveling of the euro zone—or her government, The Wall Street Journal reported. After a summer lull, Greece is again Ms. Merkel's biggest headache. The Greek government, struggling with depression-like conditions that have pushed the economy to the brink, is likely to need many billions of euros of additional aid to avoid bankruptcy.

Bondholders of Brazilian consumer lender Banco Cruzeiro do Sul, who stand to lose half of their investment under a repurchase program, questioned the plan at a creditors meeting on Tuesday, in an indication that they will press for a sweeter offer, Reuters reported. Investors who attended the meeting in Miami said the buyback, announced last week as part of efforts to save Cruzeiro from liquidation, treats them unequally.