The UK’s financial-markets watchdog put accountants on notice that they must improve auditing of financial companies’ client assets, the Financial Times reported. Charles Randell, the chairman of the Financial Conduct Authority, said on Thursday that the regulator had spotted instances where an audit of client assets was “just not good enough”, adding to the disquiet among regulators about the quality of financial firms’ audits. “We continue to see Client Assets reports that are just not good enough,” Mr Randell said in a speech, according to prepared remarks.

UK restaurant chain Gaucho is to be bought out of administration by two banks Investec and SC Lowry, as part of a rescue deal that will keep open all 16 Gaucho restaurants and save about 750 jobs, the Financial Times reported. The deal is subject to Gaucho’s creditors accepting a “ company voluntary arrangement”, an agreement that allows ailing businesses to restructure their debt.

British convenience retailer McColl’s Retail Group Plc posted on Tuesday lower like-for-like sales in the third quarter and said the collapse of cigarette wholesaler Palmer & Harvey (P&H) last year continued to disrupt its supply chain, Reuters reported. Like-for-like sales fell 0.9 percent for the 13 weeks ended Aug. 26 at McColl’s, which trades from about 1,600 convenience stores and newsagents in Britain. Total revenue rose 0.6 percent in the quarter.

Emso Asset Management, the $5.5bn emerging markets hedge fund, is to enter India’s growing corporate restructuring market with a local partner, the latest global investor to target a wave of $140bn in bad debt in the country, the Financial Times reported. A new bankruptcy law is forcing some of India’s biggest conglomerates into restructuring as local banks struggle with mounting bad debts following a boom in industrial lending.

Homebase creditors have approved a proposal to close 42 stores, putting 1,500 jobs at risk but giving the British home improvement retailer a lifeline from the brink of collapse, the company said on Friday. The proposed closures are further evidence of the deteriorating outlook for British retail sector, Reuters reported. They are part of a so-called Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA) restructuring, allowing the business to avoid insolvency or administration. Homebase said the restructuring plan, proposed this month, was approved by 95.92 percent of the company’s creditors.

Wonga co-founder Errol Damelin used to tell critics that “we are the good guys”, who would reach a $1bn Nasdaq listing by disrupting traditional banks that treated customers unfairly, the Financial Times reported. But when the company fell into administration on Thursday — having never made it to IPO — many observers were celebrating its demise. The company is the most prominent among hundreds of payday lenders that have gone out of business in the UK since the Financial Conduct Authority enforced a cap on charges in 2015.

Activity in UK factories expanded at the slowest rate in more than two years during August as weaker global growth led to the first fall in export orders since 2016, a survey of executives said on Monday. The monthly IHS Markit purchasing manufacturers index fell to 52.8 in August compared with 53.8 in July, anything above 50 is said to indicate an expansion while anything below means a contraction, the Financial Times reported. This was the survey’s lowest reading for 25 months. Analysts had expected the pace of growth in the sector to remain the same as the previous month.

Britain’s biggest payday lender Wonga Group collapsed on Thursday, putting its operations in the country into administration, Reuters reported. Privately owned Wonga, which initially enjoyed rapid growth via its short-term, high interest lending often to troubled borrowers, fell into difficulty in recent years after scrutiny of its practices led to a cap on interest on payday loans. “A decision has been taken to place Wonga Group Limited, WDFC UK Limited, Wonga Worldwide Limited and WDFC Services Limited into administration,” Wonga said in an email.

Deep cost cutting at the troubled newspaper publisher Johnston Press helped it maintain profits despite a dip in digital revenues as Google and Facebook tightened their grip on the online advertising market, The Telegraph reported. The publisher of the i, the Scotsman and scores of local titles is in a race against time to agree debt restructuring with its lenders before a repayment deadline next summer that threatens to tip it into administration. First half turnover was down 10pc on last year to £93m, as among the main lines of business only the i registered growth.

When a company goes under, or is teetering on the brink, news of its plight is usually greeted with genuine sympathy for its employees, along with nostalgic recollections of how the business used to be in its heyday. But not if that company is Wonga. Reports of the impending collapse of the notorious payday lender, which fleeced and frightened its vulnerable and desperate customers throughout the financial crisis, have been greeted with undisguised glee on social media, The Irish Times reported.