Goldman Sachs is considering a takeover of the remains of insolvent German department store chain Karstadt if no other investor emerges, two sources familiar with the situation told Reuters. Goldman Sachs as well as Deutsche Bank are part of the Highstreet consortium, which owns about two-thirds of Karstadt's store space. "Is increasingly looking like Highstreet is keeping this option open as a last resort," one of the sources said on Wednesday. Goldman would look for a co-investor if it decided to bid for Karstadt, another source said.

Wilbur Ross, the billionaire US turnaround specialist, has bought a 21 per cent stake in Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Money for £100 million as the group prepares to make a major assault on the UK banking market, The Scotsman reported. Ross, nicknamed the "King of Bankruptcy", is also prepared to pump in "hundreds of millions" more to fund acquisitions, including Virgin's £2 billion bid for 318 Royal Bank of Scotland branches. Virgin will join Clydesdale Bank owner National Australia Bank and Santander in submitting a bid for the RBS assets ahead of tomorrow's deadline.

Haemacure Corp said it received permission from the Superior Court of the Province of Quebec to sell its assets to Angiotech Pharmaceuticals Inc, a secured creditor of Haemacure, Reuters reported. The Canada-based biotherapeutic company said the United States Bankruptcy Court had previously authorized the sale to Angiotech of the assets of Haemacure's U.S. subsidiary. Haemacure also said it obtained a second extension, until April 19, within which to make a proposal to its creditors.

Michel Barnier, the European commissioner in charge of financial market regulation, said he would propose controls to curb speculative trading in credit default swaps, (CDS) a form of debt insurance that has been blamed for worsening Greece's economic problems, Telegraph.co.uk reported. His measures will target so-called naked selling of CDS, where insurance contracts are sold to buyers who do not own the debt. The cost of CDS on Greece rocketed when fears grew that the country could default on its debt.

Europe moved ahead of the United States on Tuesday in advocating new measures to ban certain types of financial speculation after concerns surfaced that traders used complex financial instruments to push Greece deeper into a fiscal crisis and threaten the European economy, The Washington Post reported. The European Commission said it would back a proposal to restrict trading in a type of financial instrument, known as a credit default swap, that is linked to the prices of government and corporate debt.

A day before he meets with President Obama, Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou on Monday called for "decisive and collective action" between Europe and the United States to curb the financial speculation believed by many to have exacerbated the debt crisis now hitting Greece and other financially troubled nations in Europe, The Washington Post reported. "Together with my European partners, we have taken a common initiative to strengthen financial regulation, particularly vis-a-vis speculation," Papandreou said, according to a copy of his speech.

Nortel Networks Corp said it received U.S. and Canadian court approval for the sale of its carrier Voice over Internet Protocol and application solutions business to Genband Inc for about $182 million, Reuters reported. The company received orders from the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware and the Ontario Superior Court of Justice approving the asset sale agreement with Genband, Nortel said in a statement.

Courts in Canada and the United States have rebuffed a British pension regulator's attempt to drag Nortel Networks Corp. into a separate legal battle in the United Kingdom over a multibillion-dollar claim, a Nortel lawyer said, allowing the company to focus on the liquidation of its global assets, The Globe and Mail reported. The British Pensions Regulator had been trying to argue a $3.4-billion claim on behalf of Nortel's 40,000-plus pensioners in the U.K., where Nortel's collapse triggered a pension crisis.

For the second time in less than five weeks, China’s central bank has moved to limit lending to consumers and businesses by ordering big commercial banks to park a larger share of their deposits at the central bank, The New York Times reported. The step, announced late Friday, came earlier than most economists had expected and was aimed at forestalling a rekindling of inflation by controlling a rapid expansion in bank loans. Families, real estate developers and industrial companies have been borrowing heavily and have started paying more for everything from food to apartments.

Ericsson said it would cut 1,500 jobs as part of its broad restructuring plan. In addition, the vendor's profit plunged 92 percent in the fourth quarter, hit by higher restructuring costs and weaker sales, FierceWireless reported. The Swedish company reported net profit of $43.4 million in the quarter, down from $539.4 million in the year-ago quarter. Sales slumped 13 percent to $8.08 billion, down from $9.29 billion in the fourth quarter last year. Networks sales fell 16 percent in the quarter and professional services sales were flat year-over-year.