Sweden

The prospect of an EU intervention in the Greek economy drew a step closer when European finance ministers endorsed a 28-day deadline imposed on its government to show that its budget plan is yielding dividends, The Irish Times reported. With European Central Bank president Jean Claude-Trichet pushing hard for Athens to adopt new budget measures, finance ministers in the wider union backed demands from euro-area ministers for fresh cuts and taxes in four weeks if the current plan is shown to have misfired.

Allen & Overy (A&O) has taken a lead role as General Motors (GM) and Spyker reached an agreement for the purchase of Saab Automobile yesterday (26 January) after months of discussions, LegalWeek reported. The magic circle firm advised Spyker on the deal, which has been agreed at a cut-price value of $400 million (£247 million), but will see the small Dutch auto maker save the Saab brand from disappearing after GM announced plans to wind down operations late last year.

Icelandic pleas for further aid met with a cool response on Thursday as the IMF suggested its hands may be tied by an Anglo-Dutch debt impasse and Sweden signalled no immediate funds were on the way, Reuters reported. Dominique Strauss-Kahn, head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), said a solution for the so-called Icesave issue was not a condition for aid but the Fund still had to listen if members raised issues. "If a lot of members think we have to hold on, we have to hold on," Strauss-Kahn told journalists in Washington.

General Motors has extended a December 31 deadline for bids for its Swedish car brand Saab, which will restart some production lines in January after a shutdown, Saab said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. GM had given itself to the end of this month to consider bids for loss-making Saab while continuing a process to wind down the company, which has drawn interest from Dutch luxury carmaker Spyker Cars and others.

Spyker Cars, the tiny Dutch automaker whose last-ditch bid for Saab was rejected Friday by General Motors, came back Sunday with a renewed offer for the struggling Swedish icon, which G.M. has said it plans to shut down, The New York Times reported. A spokesman for G.M. reacted cautiously to Spyker’s new offer, which many industry insiders consider a long shot. However, he said other potential buyers had expressed interest in Saab since Friday’s announcement.

Officials with General Motors Co.'s Saab unit said the brand has received serious expressions of interest from potential buyers since Tuesday's collapse of a deal to sell the Swedish car maker to Koenigsegg Group AB. Saab Automobile AB officials are now racing to build a case for GM's board of directors and its chief executive to keep Saab alive, a spokesman said. "We've had intense dialogue with potential buyers," Eric Geers, a Saab spokesman, said Friday.

Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Co. was thwarted again this week in its effort to gain access to advanced foreign technology after a deal involving General Motors Co.'s Saab unit fell through, The Wall Street Journal reported. But analysts expect the Chinese auto maker to try again as it seeks a platform for extending its reach world-wide. Beijing Auto said Wednesday it regrets the collapse of the deal.

The future of General Motors’ European operations was thrown further into confusion Tuesday when the automaker said the sale of its Saab Automobile subsidiary in Sweden had fallen through, The New York Times reported. The expected buyer, Koenigsegg Automotive, backed out of the deal, G.M. said. The announcement caught the American automaker, which is also struggling to restructure its Adam Opel unit in Europe, by surprise. General Motors is “obviously very disappointed with the decision,” Fritz Henderson, the G.M. chief executive, said in a statement.

Swedish media warns that Saab Automobile is close to bankruptcy, a day after luxury carmaker Koenigsegg abandoned its bid to buy the group from its US parent General Motors, The Swedish Wire reported. "The Death Knell," financial daily Dagens Industri headlined on its front page, while the country's leading newspaper Dagens Nyheter blazed "It's Over Now." In an analysis piece, conservative daily Svenska Dagbladet said "everything was pointing to the closure of Saab," adding it was "unlikely" a new buyer would turn up.

Latvia's halting austerity program and its proposal to modify mortgages are causing "another wave of distrust" to roll over the Baltic nation, the central bank said Wednesday, issuing a warning for the country hit hardest by economic strains across Europe, The Wall Street Journal reported. The criticism came as a government bond auction failed to attract buyers, and worries about the Latvian economy weighed on the currencies of Sweden -- whose banks are Latvia's major lenders -- and other countries.