British baby products retailer Mothercare said on Tuesday it plans to sell its educational toy brand ELC to Teal Brands for £13.5 million (€15.75 million) as it looks to cut debt, sending its shares up 6 per cent, The Irish Times reported. The company’s sales and profit have been hammered by intense competition from supermarket groups and online retailers in its main British market as well as by rising costs. In addition to the sale of Early Learning Centre Ltd (ELC), it will also sell some related assets, Mothercare said. It will, however, retain some ELC inventory to sell later.

Beleaguered rich-lister Eric Watson will likely remain embroiled in courts for years — and faces the possibility of a tax bill of $200m when penalties are added — after a landmark court decision yesterday saw his businesses ruled to have engaged in $51.5m in tax avoidance, The New Zealand Herald reported. Justice Matthew Palmer said a complex 2002 transaction — involving Cayman Island companies while Watson himself was relocating from New Zealand to the UK for tax purposes — was an avoidance arrangement. The case is one of the largest tax judgments in New Zealand history.

The UK Pensions Regulator has dropped its probe into whether Johnston Press used an insolvency process to dump £300m of pension liabilities into the industry-backed Pension Protection Fund, the Financial Times reported. The regulator opened an investigation in November after Johnston, the publisher of the Scotsman and Yorkshire Post, used a “pre-pack” insolvency to keep the business afloat. Pre-packs are legitimate procedures that allow a business to go into administration, with the assets then sold on to a new buyer, minus liabilities such as pension debt.

Outsourcing specialist Kier Group has revised its debt up by £50m after an accounting error, alarming investors and raising further concerns over the financial health of the industry, the Financial Times reported. Shares in the contractor, which employs 20,000 people on work ranging from rubbish collection for local authorities to building houses and schools, fell 13 per cent after it said it had revised its net debt as at December 31 up to £180.5m.

As the battle between Mike Ashley and Debenhams Plc becomes ever more acrimonious, the department store chain is stepping up its efforts to see off the retail billionaire, a Bloomberg View reported. On Monday, it said it was close to securing about 150 million pounds ($194.9 million) of extra financing. This announcement follows last week’s severe profit warning. When you are fending off an activist investor or a potential predator – and Ashley is both, given that his Sports Direct International Plc has a 30 percent stake – it’s important to have some good news.

LK Bennett, the luxury fashion chain whose fans include the Duchess of Cambridge and Theresa May, has filed for administration in the latest example of a premium-priced retailer struggling on UK high streets, the Financial Times reported. The company, which was founded by fashion entrepreneur Linda Bennett in 1990 and sold to private equity backers Phoenix Equity Partners and former Jimmy Choo chief executive Robert Bensoussan at a £100m valuation in 2008, has appointed Ernst & Young to handle its insolvency process. The accounting firm will now try to sell the business.

Billionaire Mike Ashley’s push to oust the board of Debenhams Plc came after creditors of the troubled U.K. retailer repeatedly rebuffed his bid to take over immediately as chief executive officer, according to people familiar with the situation. Ashley, whose Sports Direct International Plc is the biggest investor in the department-store chain, has stepped up his campaign by appealing directly to shareholders, Bloomberg News reported. The tycoon late Thursday called for a special vote to unseat all but one of the company’s directors and install himself in a management role.

The UK’s financial regulator has placed a British peer-to-peer lender under special supervision after becoming concerned about its ability to meet the standards required of regulated firms, the Financial Times reported. Lendy, which allows retail investors to fund property development loans, was put on an FCA watchlist in January, according to documents seen by the Financial Times and three people familiar with the situation. The company, its creditors and the regulator are working to shore up the business and collect on its overdue loans.

The Bank of England has told some UK lenders to triple their holdings of easy-to-sell assets in the run-up to Brexit to cope with the market meltdown forecast if the UK crashes out of the EU without a deal later this month, the Financial Times reported. Some lenders must now hold enough liquid assets to withstand a severe stress — when banks stop lending to each other — of 100 days rather than the normal 30, under rules brought in late last year by the BoE’s Prudential Regulation Authority, according to people familiar with the situation.

Banks for Interserve have lined up a so-called pre-pack administration that will wipe out existing shareholders but enable the troubled outsourcer to keep operating, a person familiar with the situation said on Saturday, Reuters reported. Seeking to avoid a collapse like rival Carillion, the plan would come into force if investors reject Interserve’s debt-for-equity swap at a vote on Friday.