Barclays chief executive Antony Jenkins says he was forced to increase bonus payments to senior executives after hundreds of key staff left the investment bank in America and he feared a “death spiral” could grip the organisation, The Guardian reported. Revealing the reasons behind the controversial decision to increase bonuses by £200m in 2013 despite profits falling at Barclays, Mr Jenkins said that he had to act or the investment division would suffer.

Some of Britain's banks are still offering their staff pay incentives that could trigger more mis-selling of financial products, the country's markets watchdog said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said significant progress had been made in stamping out poor selling practices, but found around one in 10 of the companies it examined still had risky sales practices. The issue of mis-selling remains sensitive in the wake of a series of scandals.

Part-nationalised Royal Bank of Scotland is working on a plan to salvage its troubled Irish business, Ulster Bank, by merging it with a number of rivals, the Sunday Times newspaper reported. Attempts to find a buyer for the business have failed and a team inside RBS is looking at tie-ups between Ulster and other lenders, such as Permanent TSB or the Irish units of Danske Bank or KBC, the newspaper reported. Bolting the institutions together could allow the new Ulster Bank to strip out costs and mount a credible challenge to Ireland's top players.

A landmark ruling will have a game-changing effect on the way landlords are paid in a corporate collapse, essentially giving them super creditor status. But what impact will this have on other creditors, and the insolvency profession? A consortium of landlords appealed and won a case that will see them repaid £3m in back rent due prior to the collapse of digital game retailer GAME from the new owners of the business, AccountancyAge reported.

The Co-operative Group has announced plans to sell its farms business and is considering a sale of its pharmacy chain as it faces a reported loss of more than £2bn, The Guardian reported. Britain's biggest mutually owned company, which is preparing for its worst ever loss according to a BBC report on Wednesday morning, considers the farming business – the biggest in the UK – to be peripheral to its main activities and in need of investment.

Royal Bank of Scotland has received approval from Treasury agency UK Financial Investments to pay about 550 million pounds ($920 million) in staff bonuses for 2013, Sky News reported late on Tuesday. The news service said the bank is expected to disclose the proposed bonuses when it announces its annual earnings, estimated at a loss of about 8 billion pounds.

UK regional carrier Flybe is tapping shareholders for £150m (€182m) to shore up its balance sheet as the embattled airline tries to reinvent itself, Independent.ie reported. The airline, which serves some routes between the UK and Ireland, will also use the funds with a view to "improving operational flexibility and providing additional cash reserves to enable the group to protect itself from unforeseen disruptions or occurrences". Chief executive Saad Hammad said that the fresh finance would enable Flybe to pursue its "profitable growth strategy".

National Australia Bank Ltd. (NAB) fell in Sydney trading after flagging a possible increase in provisions at its British operations, overshadowing a 7 percent increase in first-quarter profit, Bloomberg News reported. Shares of Australia’s biggest bank by assets slid as much as 2.8 percent, the biggest intraday decline in three months, and traded 1.9 percent lower at A$34.50 at 11:53 a.m. in Sydney. Provisions for some tailored business loans and compensation to U.K. customers for wrongly sold payment-protection insurance may rise, the Melbourne-based lender said in a statement today.

Stemcor Holdings Ltd. said its creditors voted to approve the U.K. steel trader’s plan to restructure its debt, Bloomberg News reported. Lenders voted “overwhelmingly” in favor of the plan, according to Charles Armitstead, a spokesman for Stemcor employed by Pendomer Communications LLP. The debt deal, which includes converting $1.1 billion of credit facilities into term loans and borrowing an additional $1.15 billion, will be taken to a U.K. court for approval this month, he said.

Insolvency practitioners are facing a crackdown after the Government proposed to cap the “excessive fees”  they charge creditors of failed companies, The Times reported. The Insolvency Service has started a consultation on whether to stop insolvency practitioners charging by the hour . They could instead be forced to fix their fees as a percentage of the property dealt with or the amounts realised from a liquidation. The regulator said that the changes could be the difference between creditors getting a fair deal or losing out through “excessive charges”.