Headlines

Eurozone finance ministers will meet Monday to build on measures agreed last month to tame the debt crisis, seeking to provide fresh momentum as the economy slows and markets turn sceptical, Agence France-Presse reported. A June 28-29 EU summit was hailed as a breakthrough, promising fresh capital for Spain's struggling banks, a European bank union to keep the lenders in line and making it easier for the bloc's new bailout fund to help states in trouble.

On July 1, the Gillard government quietly slipped through a set of laws designed to crack down on phoenix companies - those that collapse one day with a pile of debts and, like the bird in Greek mythology, rise from the ashes with the same assets and customers using a slightly different name. The fraudulent practice enables them to avoid taxes, wages and other bills, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

Greece's three-party coalition government will try to get the economy out of its deep recession by encouraging private investment and making privatizations its "highest priority," finance minister Yannis Stournaras said Saturday, the Associated Press reported. "The privatization program aims at attracting important international capital that will be invested mainly in property development and infrastructure," Stournaras told parliament on the second day of the debate on the new government's policy platform.

Spain is ready to create a single “bad bank” to house the distressed assets of its teetering financial sector, as it prepares to finalise terms of an EU bailout that is dividing the eurozone and spooking markets, the Financial Times reported. Eurozone finance ministers gather in Brussels on Monday aiming to agree broad conditions for Spain to unlock up to €100bn of loans to recapitalise its banks, as well as addressing the fraught issue of how the risks are shared in the long term.

Britain's banks are "throttling" the economic recovery because of an anti-business culture which focuses on short-term profits, the business secretary, Vince Cable, has said. As Ed Balls warned of widespread outrage if the ousted Barclays chief executive, Bob Diamond, receives a £16m pay-off, Cable accused banks of undermining multibillion-pound measures to help businesses, The Guardian reported.

Debt-burdened poultry group Doux, which went into administration last month, threatening the livelihood of 3,400 workers and 800 farmers in France, has attracted 11 takeover offers, unions at the firm said, Reuters reported. Bidders included rival poultry producers LDC and Tilly Sabco, co-operative Terrena, agribusiness firm La Financière Turenne La Fayette, and a consortium led by oilseed group Sofiproteol, union officials said. Doux's administrators had organised a bidding round with a deadline for offers on Thursday as part of efforts to rescue one of the world's largest poultry exporters.

About 160 academics published a petition Thursday calling on German citizens to put pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel to block any further moves toward European integration that would make German taxpayers foot the bill for the debts of other euro-zone countries. The petition specifically hits out at Ms. Merkel's concessions to other euro-zone governments at a summit of European leaders last week. In all-night negotiations, Ms.

Central banks around the world took major steps Thursday to stave off fears of global recession, with the European Central Bank slashing interest rates, China unexpectedly cutting bank lending rates and the Bank of England pumping billions of pounds into Britain’s stimulus program, The Washington Post reported. The measures reflect a growing sense of international urgency about faltering economies and underline the continued power of central banks to take unilateral measures to fight the crisis, even as elected policymakers haggle over their own long-term responses.

Greece’s new government has dropped a plan to seek softer terms for its second bailout following warnings that it would be rejected by international lenders, the Financial Times reported. Yannis Stournaras, finance minister, said the governing coalition would have to accelerate reforms before asking for modifications in a €174bn programme agreed in February with the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. “The programme is off-track and we can’t ask for anything from our creditors before we get it back on course,” Mr Stournaras told the Financial Times.

British lawmakers backed a government plan on Thursday to hold a parliamentary inquiry into the professional and cultural standards of bankers brought into focus by the Barclays rate-rigging scandal that has deeply divided politicians, Reuters reported. They rejected a call by the opposition Labour party for an independent judge-led investigation, along the lines of an existing wide-ranging inquiry into British media standards. Legislators voted 330 to 226 in favor of the parliamentary inquiry, announced by the government on July 2.