Headlines

Scandinavian airline SAS said on Friday that it had agreed with another two of its aircraft lessors to amend the terms of existing lease contracts as part of its cost cutting efforts, Reuters reported. Crisis-hit SAS, which has been under chapter 11 protection in the U.S. since last year, said in a statement it had now amended contracts with in total 15 lessors representing 59 aircraft. "With these agreements, SAS concludes its lessor negotiations as part of the chapter 11 process," it said.

The UK and European Union are nearing an agreement on customs aimed at reducing trade friction between Great Britain and Northern Ireland as they prepare to intensify wider post-Brexit negotiations, Bloomberg News reported. Officials hope to announce significant progress toward a solution for customs arrangements if discussions go well over the coming days, according to people familiar with the matter. Talks are ongoing and a successful outcome is not guaranteed, the people said.

A judge in Connecticut has placed tighter restrictions on Chinese businessman and media entrepreneur Guo Wengui and his followers to end what she described as an alleged campaign of online and in-person harassment directed at a court-appointed trustee and others involved in his chapter 11 case, Reuters reported.

Japan’s financial watchdog expects the local unit of Sam Bankman-Fried’s failed crypto empire FTX will repay funds to customers starting next month, according to a senior official, Bloomberg News reported. “We have been in close communication with FTX Japan,” said Mamoru Yanase, deputy director-general of the Financial Services Agency’s Strategy Development and Management Bureau. A mid-February timeline for withdrawals announced last month by the firm is likely a product of such communication so “we are expecting that they will properly take steps based on that,” he said.

A group representing minority shareholders on Friday filed a complaint with Brazil's securities regulator against Americanas SA after the retailer uncovered "accounting inconsistencies" totaling 20 billion reais ($3.89 billion), Reuters reported. The Abradin association said it was denouncing Americanas for what it called a "multi-billion fraud," while also asking regulator CVM to investigate the retailer's auditor, PwC.

Canada’s banking industry regulator will consider limiting how much firms are able to lend to riskier homebuyers as part of a review intended to safeguard the financial system from a housing slump, Bloomberg News reported. The regulator is proposing restrictions on the volume of mortgages made available to those who are seeking to borrow amounts that are far in excess on their incomes. It’s part of a regular consultation on residential mortgage underwriting standards, which started Thursday.

Egypt plans to cut spending after the International Monetary Fund extended hundreds of millions of dollars in an economic bailout package, as the country struggles to pay off debts accumulated from a decadeslong building boom, the Wall Street Journal reported. Authorities said earlier this week they would delay state projects that required significant U.S. dollars to fund and cut back on travel, training and conferences for officials, according to Egypt’s cabinet.

Zambia's official sector creditors met on Thursday to discuss the type of debt relief to offer the country, Finance Minister Situmbeko Musoktwane told Reuters. Zambia became the first African sovereign default in the COVID-19 era in late 2020 and has been struggling to restructure debt that reached 133% of GDP at the end of 2021, which analysts have blamed partly on the high number and diversity of creditors.

The German government's net borrowing amounted to 115.4 billion euros ($124.48 billion) in 2022, finance ministry sources said on Thursday, as the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine led to a rise in debt, Reuters reported. Last year, government borrowing was at its third-highest level in the history of Germany, following a record figure of 215.4 billion euros in 2021 and 130.5 billion in 2020, according to the sources. The German government had envisaged net borrowing of 138.9 billion euros in 2022.

More than half Germany's companies are struggling to fill vacancies due to a lack of skilled workers, the German Chambers of Commerce and Industry (DIHK) said on Thursday, in the latest sign of growth headwinds belabouring Europe's largest economy, Reuters reported. The proportion of companies facing difficulties hiring was at its highest ever level, the DIHK found in its survey of 22,000 companies, with 53% reporting shortages.