Wednesday Papers: HP sues to block Hurd’s move to Oracle - other news

Financial Times

* Hewlett-Packard has sued to block Mark Hurd, its former chief executive, from taking up a senior role at Oracle; Hurd had signed agreements with HP preventing him disclosing trade secrets, the lawsuit says.

* John Varley will stay on at Barclays as a senior adviser on regulatory matters until next September, after relinquishing the chief executive role; meanwhile, the appointment of Bob Diamond, one of the world’s best-paid investment bankers, as chief executive of Barclays has been met with outrage in British government circles.

* India’s central bank governor urged the government to revise the pay of executives in state-controlled banks.

* Equity derivatives and increased leverage will be key to revenue growth for the global investment banks in the next couple of years, with the big US and Swiss groups best positioned to prosper, according to a JPMorgan report on the sector.

* SEC signals shake-up of equity market rules.

* Stephen Green, HSBC chairman, is set to become the UK trade minister; Green has been charged with boosting British exports and attracting inward investment, but his clout is likely to extend to banking reform and migration policy.

* German industrial orders have tumbled unexpectedly sharply; orders in July were 2.2% lower than the previous month, according to the country’s economic ministry.

* Wheat trading volumes jumped fourfold in July and August as traders scrambled to use the European benchmark to hedge price risk in the wake of Russian crisis.

* President Barack Obama is preparing to announce on Wednesday a plan allowing companies to write off all capital investments until the end of next year.

* Europe must accelerate the pace of structural reform over the next year to consolidate an uneven economic recovery, José Manuel Barroso told the European parliament in his first “state of the union” address.

* France’s trade unions threatened to step up their campaign against President Nicolas Sarkozy’s plan to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62.