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Another minister has joined the calls on the EU to show solidarity with Ireland by agreeing to a deal on the country’s bank debt, the Irish Times reported. Speaking in Paris at the weekend, Minister for Transport Leo Varadkar said Europe had an obligation to do a deal on the Anglo Irish Bank promissory notes in recognition of Ireland having “stood in the breach” when the global financial crisis struck.

Moody’s Investors Service cut the debt ratings of six European countries including Italy, Spain and Portugal and revised its outlook on the U.K.’s and France’s top Aaa ratings to “negative,” citing Europe’s debt crisis, Bloomberg reported. Spain was downgraded to A3 from A1 with a negative outlook, Italy was downgraded to A3 from A2 with a negative outlook and Portugal was downgraded to Ba3 from Ba2 with a negative outlook, Moody’s said. It also reduced the ratings of Slovakia, Slovenia and Malta.

The spectre of financial meltdown returned to British football on Monday after Rangers and Portsmouth both applied to be placed into administration, The Guardian reported. Rangers, one of the game's great institutions and by far the biggest club to have their existence thus threatened in the modern era, have claimed they are facing a tax bill of "substantially more than £50m" after lodging papers confirming the move in Edinburgh on Monday The club are virtually certain to appoint an administrator to take control of affairs at Ibrox within the next 10 working days.

Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos won parliamentary approval for austerity measures to secure an international bailout after rioters protesting the measures battled police and set fire to buildings in downtown Athens, Bloomberg reported. A total of 199 lawmakers voted in favor and 74 against, Parliament Speaker Filippos Petsalnikos said in remarks carried live on state-run Vouli TV. When, on Nov.

A mountain of debt is coming due and the principal is unpayable, so governments have agreed to extend maturities. This could be a description of a bail-out package for Greece. Instead, it is what China is doing to prevent scores of provinces and cities from defaulting on bank loans, the Financial Times reported. Does that mean China is another Greece? Far from it. For starters, China’s economy will expand more than 8 per cent this year, while the eurozone is confronting the likelihood of recession.

The trustee supervising the liquidation of MF Global Holdings Ltd.'s brokerage on Friday said that more than $1.6 billion in customer cash remains out of his grasp, more than previously estimated, The Wall Street Journal reported. Included in that figure for the first time is roughly $700 million in client money residing in the U.K., which is likely to be the center of a legal fight with KPMG, the U.K.-based administrator overseeing the unwinding of MF Global's London-based division. "We now know we're in for a long haul with the U.K.

A new breed of bank debt that turns into equity if a lender hits trouble is becoming the instrument of choice for some Southern European governments as they prop up their ailing banks, The Wall Street Journal reported. The instruments, known as "contingent convertibles," began to get attention following the financial crisis and have been issued by a few banks. "Co-cos," as they are called, are sold as interest-bearing debt that has to be paid back. But they convert to equity in the event that a bank's capital ratios fall below certain levels.

The U.K. economy will remain subdued during 2012 as the euro-zone crisis weighs on sentiment, but it will avoid slipping back into recession due to an improvement in net trade and business investment, one of the country's main business groups is expected to say Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported. The Confederation of British Industry, in an advance news release, said the level of uncertainty surrounding the economic outlook had led it to cut its forecast for 2012 gross domestic product growth to 0.9% from its November forecast of 1.2%.

As Korea's economy entered a depression, the number of monthly personal bankruptcy cases soared to over 10,000 in just three months, The Chosunilbo reported. The Supreme Court said Monday that as many as 10,169 personal bankruptcies were filed last month, an increase from 8,786 in September. The month-on-month increase rate of personal bankruptcies was 117 cases, or 2 percent, in September and 1,383 cases, or 15.7 percent, in October, showing a steep climb since the Lehman Brothers farrago.

Sceptical eurozone finance ministers refused Thursday to release a second bailout for Greece, despite a last-minute deal in Athens on austerity measures demanded by creditors, Agence France-Presse reported. After rival Greek parties agreed more deep cuts, triggering another general strike, Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker said the Eurogroup of finance ministers could wait until next week. The Greek government had hoped to unlock a bailout package worth 130 billion euros ($171 billion) that would banish the spectre of a devastating default.