Headlines

He was a symbol of French fashion, the creator of clothes illuminated by the colours of his native Provence and by his extraordinary artistic talents. But yesterday, the house of Christian Lacroix was reduced to little more than a small trading office as it crumbled under the weight of debts and losses, The Australian reported. After six months in administration amid a desperate search for a saviour, Lacroix was forced to abandon haute couture as the Paris Commercial Court approved a restructuring plan.

The ouster of General Motors Chief Executive Fritz Henderson will not deter the interim Opel CEO from his timetable to deliver a plan that would help the European carmaker achieve sustained profitability, Reuters reported. "I still intend to present a plan for Opel/Vauxhall's future by the middle of December," Nick Reilly wrote in a blog published on Wednesday, following the Henderson's removal by his board of directors. Reilly said the upheaval in Detroit's headquarters would not affect the ongoing restructuring of Opel.

Hundreds of Illawarra jobs are under serious threat after the Unanderra-based Wideform Group of Companies was placed in voluntary administration, The Illawarra Mercury reported. The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) said it had been told by the administrator that the company had millions of dollars owing to creditors, workers and the taxation department. Wideform was approached by creditor the ANZ Bank six months ago suggesting directors place the company into voluntary administration and a new buyer be sought due to the cashflow concerns.

Ciena Corp was cleared to acquire a unit of bankrupt Nortel Networks Inc. for $769 million after fighting off a legal challenge by Nokia Siemens Networks, Reuters reported. Network equipment maker Ciena trumped an offer by Nokia Siemens and its financial partner, One Equity Partners, with an auction-winning bid of $530 million in cash and $239 million in convertible securities for Nortel's optical networking and carrier Ethernet business.

General Motors Co. Chief Executive Officer Fritz Henderson resigned after eight months on the job as directors concluded he hadn’t done enough to fix GM’s finances and culture, people familiar with the matter said. The board gave Henderson, 51, a 100-day review yesterday on his performance since GM’s July 10 bankruptcy exit, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the discussions were private. Several directors also expressed the view that an outsider was needed to run the automaker, one person said.

The restructuring plan for Adam Opel GmbH provided by parent company General Motors Co. leaves key issues open, and isn't a request for state aid either, German Economics Minister Rainer Bruederle said Wednesday, Dow Jones reported. GM's restructuring plan is based on €3.3 billion in financial need for Opel, of which the U.S. carmaker will provide €600 million, while the rest would come from European taxpayers' money, he said. Bruederle said GM's restructuring plan for Opel and its U.K.

Indebted Russian aluminum giant UC Rusal has received agreement from the last remaining lender, London-based fund Blue Crest, on the restructuring of its $7.4 billion debt to more than 70 international banks, people familiar with the matter said Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reported. The debt agreement, which bankers said is probably the largest and most complex of the restructurings undertaken by debt-swamped Russian companies, was reached with the coordinating committee July, but it has taken the last several months for all participating banks to sign off.

The Swedish minister for enterprise and energy, Maud Olofsson, Wednesday said the government will only guarantee a loan from the European Investment Bank, or EIB, to a potential new buyer of Saab Automobile AB if production is kept in the Nordic country, Dow Jones reported. "If we're to go in with the taxpayer's money, then the production must be kept in Sweden, and also create jobs in Sweden," Olofsson said in an interview with public service radio, Sveriges Radio P1.

The battle over Nortel Network's optical network division may not be over, The Ottawa Citizen reported. Nokia Siemens Networks said in a U.S. bankruptcy court filing Tuesday that it, not Ciena Corp., was the top bidder in the auction that ended a week ago. It is also ready to increase its offer to $810 million U.S. in cash, or $41 million more than the Ciena cash-and-debt offer that won the fight. The question now is how U.S. and Canadian courts handle the latest twist in the complicated business of selling off Nortel assets.

The Governor of the Irish Central Bank, Patrick Honohan, has said he is determined "that there will be a renewed emphasis on enforcement, even at the risk of the regulator incurring legal costs in unsuccessful actions," Finfacts reported. He said “ignorance and inattention” were at the heart of regulatory failure. The governor said that Irish bank regulation fell into this trap. The business of "our banks was not particularly complex and could have been adequately supervised in the former style.