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Bankas Snoras AB, Lithuania's fifth- biggest bank by assets, is insolvent and will file for court protection from creditors to avoid a costly bailout for taxpayers, Bloomberg News reported today. The bank's financial situation is "worse than previously identified" and saving the bank "would cost significantly more and would take longer than the available liquidity" at Snoras, the central bank said in a statement. Some 3.4 billion litai ($1.3 billion) in assets are missing, Governor Vitas Vasiliauskas added. The government took over Snoras on Nov.

Data released by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission showed that Queensland's small business owners continue to bear the brunt of uneven economic conditions, making up more than 80 percent of the state's initial insolvency reports, the Courier-Mail reported today. Queensland's small business insolvency is higher than the national average of 78 percent. Of the 1468 initial external administration reports filed for Queensland businesses, 1192 involved companies that employed fewer than 20 people.

The Czech Republic's fourth mobile network operator MobilKom has filed a petition to start insolvency proceedings, laying the blame for its woes squarely at the door of the regulator, the Czech Telecommunication Office (CTU), Telegeography.com reported yesterday. The company claims that the CTU repeatedly delayed its competitive entry into the GSM market and has reportedly initiated its own insolvency proceedings in the wake of its failure to adequately redress its poor credit history.

The Irish Bank Resolution Corp., formerly Anglo Irish Bank, launched a formal application yesterday to overturn the bankruptcy declaration made by Ireland's former richest man, Sean Quinn, Reuters reported yesterday. Quinn, who developed a rural quarrying operation into a fortune of 4 billion euros ($5.34 billion) before investing massively in the now failed Anglo Irish, made the declaration in Northern Ireland earlier this month.

Hungary lost its investment-grade rating at Moody’s Investors Service after 15 years as the Cabinet seeks International Monetary Fund help to boost confidence in the European Union’s most-indebted eastern member, Bloomberg News reported today. The foreign- and local-currency bond ratings were cut one step to Ba1, the highest junk-level score, from Baa3, Moody's said. Moody's, which awarded Hungary its investment grade in 1996, assigned a negative outlook. The country is rated the lowest investment grade at Standard & Poor’s and Fitch Ratings.

China's government said yesterday that it has increased scrutiny of trading houses, and that exchanges set up without Beijing's approval will be banned from trading derivatives and other financial products, the Wall Street Journal reported today. In the January-October period, 58 trading houses were established, the state-run China Daily newspaper said Thursday. "Currently, some trading houses are conducting stock futures trading without regulatory approval.

The International Monetary Fund revamped its credit line program to encourage countries facing outside shocks to turn to the fund with few conditions attached, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The IMF said yesterday that the new instrument, the Precautionary and Liquidity Line, can be tapped by countries with strong economies currently facing short-term liquidity needs. Funding available will be capped at a percentage of countries' contributions to the fund, limiting the role the instrument can play in preventing the debt crisis from spreading in Europe.

Banks clamored for emergency funds from the European Central Bank on Tuesday, borrowing the most since mid-2009 in a clear sign of the damage the sovereign debt crisis is inflicting on financial institutions, the New York Times reported today. Lenders took out €247 billion ($333 billion) in one-week loans, the E.C.B. said, the biggest amount since April 2009. Euro zone bonds reflected continuing stress. Spain’s 10-year bonds were at 6.57 percent, up 6 basis points, while Italy’s 10-year bonds were up 16 basis points at 6.81 percent.

The European Commission may abandon plans to require auditing companies to share work with smaller rivals because of concerns over the costs of implementing the measure, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The commission is still likely to propose in its draft law that businesses should rotate the auditors they use. The EU is reviewing audit rules following the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., which raised questions about "the context of the audit" of the bank, Michel Barnier, the EU's financial services commissioner, told lawmakers last year.

A bankruptcy judge approved the sale of Peregrine I LLC's offshore oil-drilling vessel to La Patagonia Offshore Inc. for $5 million, Dow Jones DBR Small Cap reported today. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Carey signed off on the sale to La Patagonia on Monday following an auction last month, and the buyer has also agreed to pay about $2.7 million to cure defaults. Read more. (Subscription required.)