T5 Oil & Gas, an Africa-focused explorer founded by a group of Tullow Oil veterans, has warned there is a “material uncertainty” over its ability to stay in business for the next year if it fails to raise money to complete a key deal in Gabon after aborting a $45 million (€40.2 million) initial public offering (IPO) in 2018, The Irish Times reported. In spite of this, the UK-based company, led by Irishman Pat Plunkett, said in its 2018 report there was a “reasonable expectation” of carrying out an IPO or finding alternative funding in the first half of this year.

Investors hit by the collapse of Lendy have expressed concerns about the spiralling costs of the administration process after insolvency practitioners warned that they could run up a bill of £2.5 million, The Times reported. Lendy, the peer-to-peer lending service, failed last May owning nearly £152 million to 9,000 investors, some of who now fear that the costs of managing the insolvency will reduce any money they get back. RSM Restructuring recorded time costs worth £1.7 million for the first six months of Lendy’s administration.

British Steel plunged into insolvency 225 days ago. Since then, taxpayers have funded its operational losses of an estimated £1m a day, The Guardian reported. It doesn’t take a mathematician to see that this can only go on for so long; a deal securing the future of the company’s 4,500 staff needs to be agreed – and fast. Chinese steelmaker Jingye has been in pole position since November’s announcement that a deal had been agreed in principle.

UK manufacturing activity “took a turn for the worse” at the end of 2019, with the sharpest deterioration in output in more than seven years as political uncertainty continued to weigh on orders, according to a closely watched survey, the Financial Times reported.

Britain's cap on domestic energy prices saved customers around 1 billion pounds in 2019, but shopping around is still the best way to save money, the government said on Tuesday. The cap on default electricity and gas bills came into effect in January this year and was a flagship policy of former British Prime Minister Theresa May to end what she called "rip-off" prices, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story.

A business which installed hundreds of BT-branded WiFi kiosks across the UK has collapsed into administration after encountering delays in obtaining planning permission, The Telegraph reported. InLink entered administration in November after its attempt to build a network of thousands of smart kiosks on roads across the UK faced opposition from local councils as well as the Metropolitan Police. The business was a joint venture between Intersection, an American advertising business which has been backed by Google’s parent company, and outdoor media company Primesight.

Financial services have been too slow to cut investment in fossil fuels, a delay that could lead to a sharp increase in global temperatures, Bank of England governor Mark Carney has warned, the Irish Times reported. Mr Carney, due to become the United Nations’ special envoy for climate change next year when he steps down from the bank, told BBC radio that global warming could render the assets of many financial companies worthless.

Fears over the impact of a chaotic Brexit left banks in a bind as many small businesses held off on borrowing to invest and nervous households squirrelled away more money – at a time when the European Central Bank (ECB) is charging banks a negative rate of 0.5 per cent to leave excess funds with it, The Irish Times reported. The three bailed-out banks’ combined deposits were €12 billion higher than their loan books in June.

Bad weather and belt-tightening hit the traditional start of Christmas discount sales on Thursday, dealing another blow to a high street retail industry blighted by years of shop closures and insolvencies, the Financial Times reported. Boxing Day has long marked the opening of the busy festive sales season, but its importance has waned as shoppers have moved online and retailers offer other promotions — such as November’s Black Friday — in the run-up to Christmas.

When Mexican food chain Chilango offered customers the chance to invest in its “burrito bonds” last year, it promised annual returns of 8 per cent and free food for life. It was part of a new wave of early stage restaurant businesses that have found creative — and sometimes risky — ways to finance their expansion at a time when cost pressures and competition in the sector are at all time highs, the Financial Times reported.