Friday Papers: Eurozone dismisses Greek budget deal

Top stories

• Financial Times: Eurozone finance ministers dismissed as incomplete a reputed €3.3 billion package of Greek budget cuts presented to them in hopes of securing a new €130 billion bailout; lenders are demanding €325 million in further cuts to this year’s budget, parliamentary approval of a sweeping reform package and a pledge from the country’s political leaders to ensure that they will maintain their commitment after April elections.
• The Daily Telegraph: Bank of England policymakers have announced plans to pump £50 billion of additional stimulus into the economy in an attempt to avert a second recession.
• Financial Times: Citigroup was forced to write off $50 million after two traders accused of attempting to influence global lending rates left the bank.
• The Daily Telegraph: Key Indonesian investors in FTSE 250 miner Bumi say they are "confident" they can oust co-chairman Nat Rothschild, as they prepare to lobby shareholders to back their plans for a board shake-up.
• Financial Times: PepsiCo said on Thursday it would shed 8,700 jobs worldwide to cut costs.
• Daily Express: Rio Tinto boss Tom Albanese yesterday became the latest top company chief to waive his bonus after profits were walloped by a huge charge against its aluminium business, Alcan.
• Financial Times: LinkedIn, the professional social network, said fourth-quarter revenues doubled year-on-year.

Business and economics

• Financial Times: The Lehman Brothers estate has sued another of the defunct investment bank’s former counterparties, this time Citigroup, for $2.5 billion for cash taken in the period leading up to its bankruptcy that it wants returned.
• The Daily Telegraph: Gaming group Rank has credited the growing popularity of bingo among Britons under the age of 35 for an 8% increase in first-half pre-tax profit.
• Financial Times: The fledgling commodities operation of the Singapore Mercantile Exchange will launch the first global futures contract for black pepper on Friday.
• Financial Times: The Shanghai Futures Exchange is planning to launch a crude oil futures contract that will be denominated in multiple currencies and partially open to foreign investors.
• The Daily Telegraph: Sales at Shire shot up by almost a quarter last year, fuelled by strong demand for its hyperactivity medicine in the US.
• Financial Times: Activision Blizzard, the world’s largest video game publisher, reported fourth-quarter sales and profits ahead of Wall Street expectations.
• The Daily Telegraph: Five of the largest US banks are set to pay $26 billion to settle charges brought by the US authorities over claims they used abusive methods to foreclose on homeowners hit by the bursting of the country's property bubble.
• Financial Times: BG Group became the latest energy company to scale back its US shale gas plans after booming production of the fuel depressed prices.
• The Daily Telegraph: The European Central Bank has held interest rates at 1% and doused hopes of further cuts despite a credit contraction over the winter and falls in the M3 money supply.
• The Daily Telegraph: High energy prices helped BG Group’s profits soar by 32% in 2011, despite underperformance in the oil and gas major’s UK production and a hit on earnings due to the North Sea tax increase.
• Financial Times: Canaccord is to establish a $1 billion fund with the state-owned Export-Import Bank of China to invest in Canadian natural resources.
• The Daily Telegraph: Motor insurance group Esure has unveiled a boardroom shake-up ahead of a planned stock market flotation.
• The Daily Telegraph: Thomson Reuters lurched to a loss in the fourth quarter, after booking a $3 billion charge related to its troubled financial services business.
• The Daily Telegraph: Credit Suisse cut its executive bonus pool by 57% last year, as the eurozone debt crisis impacted its profitability.
• Financial Times: Intel is close to winding up a series of antitrust actions against it around the world with an agreement with the New York attorney-general to terminate a lawsuit; the company to pay $6.5 million to meet part of New York’s costs for the suit.
• The Daily Telegraph: Growth in the value of British Land's commercial property portfolio has slowed sharply as the uncertain economy affects shopping centres.
• The Daily Telegraph: Listed financial advisor Hargreaves Lansdown defied the market turmoil to see revenue rise 16% to £112.9 million over the first six months of the year.
• The Daily Telegraph: Fashion house Hugo Boss benefited from continued strength in the luxury products market, turning in record figures in 2011.
• The Daily Telegraph: Deteriorating economic conditions in the eurozone have taken a bite out of Vodafone's revenues; in the three months ending 31 December, Turkey grew by 23.3% as it added 163,000 net new customers; however, turnover fell by 5.4% to £1.3 billion in Italy, and 9.3% to £1.06 billion in Spain, contributing to a 1.9% fall across Europe to £8.1 billion; group revenues fell 2.3% to £11.62 billion.
• The Guardian: Diageo said UK sales of Christmas favourites such as Bell's whisky and Bailey's liqueur declined over the holidays after it stopped heavy discounting in supermarkets.
• The Daily Telegraph: Tate & Lyle could suffer a hit of as much as a $40 million to its annual profits from the removal of US tax breaks given to ethanol manufacturers.
• The Daily Telegraph: Groupon more than doubled its revenues from $172.2 million to $506.5 million in the final three months of 2011; however, it confounded expectations that it would move into profit by chalking up a loss of $42.7 million.
• The Guardian: Kodak, the company that pioneered home photography, is to give up making cameras after more than 110 years.
• Financial Times: Digital revenues from Publicis Groupe’s US business are set to overtake those from traditional advertising this year.
• Financial Times: The French government is to invest directly in the municipal finance unit of Dexia, the stricken Belgian bank, in order to salvage a deal to regularise lending to cash-strapped French local authorities.
• Financial Times: KKR will pay a record cash dividend to its shareholders for the fourth quarter, as greater transaction activity boosted profits at the listed private equity company.
• Financial Times: Bunge, one of the world’s leading suppliers of agricultural commodities, reported sharply lower results in international trading and foresaw tough market conditions in the year ahead.
• Financial Times: Alcatel-Lucent is planning to cut up to 1,800 jobs in Europe, French union leaders have claimed.

Share tips, comment and bids

• The Daily Telegraph: A charm offensive to win support for the planned £54 billion Glencore-Xstrata mega-merger is falling short of the mark, investors warn.
• Financial Times: Goldman Sachs has purchased a 4.8% stake in Mongolia’s Trade and Development Bank.
• Financial Times: SVG Capital reported an increase in fourth-quarter earnings and struck an upbeat note for 2012.
• The Guardian: A majority stake in the Meadowhall shopping centre in Sheffield is for sale, at a price likely to value the whole mall at £1.4 billion or more.
• The Daily Telegraph: Last-minute lobbying by Barclays has secured it a role advising on the mega-merger of trading giant Glencore and miner Xstrata after originally being left off the advisory roster for the £54 billion deal.
• Financial Times: Enterprise Inns, the UK’s largest tenanted pub company, plans to sell some of its best pubs over the next two years in order to refinance £400 million in bank debt.
• Financial Times: Doughty Hanson has bought Spanish hospital chain USP Hospitales from RBS and Barclays in a €355 million deal.
• Financial Times: Center Parcs is looking to raise £1 billion through a bond backed by four of its holiday villages as the British holiday parks group seeks to refinance debt and expand its business.
• The Daily Telegraph (Comment): Bob Diamond should take his bonus but force Barclays' shareholders to vote on it.
• The Daily Telegraph (Comment): Greece may be clinging on, but the eurozone's real problems remain resolutely unaddressed.
• The Independent (share tips): Invest in Fuller Smith & Turner and Wetherspoon if the shares show weakness; buy Mitchells & Butlers; Marston's may be worth a small interest; avoid Greene King until the shares have lost a bit of froth; Punch Tavern might be a gamble; steer clear of Enterprise Inns.
• The Guardian (Comment): A Glencore-Xstrata merger threatens the world's poorest - the consolidation of a dominant producer and a dominant trader would be bad news for some of the least powerful populations.
• Financial Times (Lombard): Libor probe will supply new anti-banking munitions; the success of Rolls-Royce undermines the theory that Brits are necessarily bad at commercialising technology they have created.
• Financial Times (Lex): Thomson Reuters - the information conglomerate has not succeeded in taking the noise out of its financial reporting in an increasingly noisy world.
• Financial Times (Lex): Rio Tinto: the real story in the miner’s full-year results needs no spin whatsoever: the Pilbara iron ore business is a giant cash machine.
• Financial Times (Lex): BG Group - its big bet on gas is proving a mixed blessing: it is repositioning itself as a middleman between supply-heavy US markets and demand-heavy Asia.
• Financial Times (Lex): Diageo: as consumers abandon beer in favour of the strong stuff, some investors may wonder why the drinks group insists on holding on to it.