Friday Papers: Osborne scrambles to weaken bonus cap

Top stories

• Financial Times: Chancellor George Osborne was scrambling to launch a rearguard action against an EU bonus cap, as senior bankers warned that any proposed legislation threatened London’s competitiveness as a financial centre.
• Financial Times: Stephen Hester has sent the strongest signal yet that Royal Bank of Scotland could be ready for reprivatisation next year as the state-owned bank announced that a series of scandals had helped push it into losses of more than £5 billion for 2012.
• Financial Times: On a day when more than a third of Spain’s Ibex 35 index reported full-year results Bankia, the nationalised lender, reported a net loss of €19.2 billion, the largest in Spanish corporate history.
• The Independent: The City of London could be hit by an exodus of workers to New York, Hong Kong and Singapore, experts have warned, after politicians agreed to cap bankers' bonuses across Europe.
• Financial Times: Andrew Mason was dismissed as Groupon chief executive on Thursday after the young daily deals company was plagued by accounting missteps, disappointing earnings results and a plunging stock price.
• The Daily Telegraph: British Airways’ parent company, International Airlines Group, has warned of further job cuts at its flagging Spanish carrier, Iberia, after the aviation giant crashed almost €1 billion into the red.
• The Guardian: The future of high street fashion retailer Republic has been secured and 2,100 jobs saved after Sports Direct bought the chain from administrators.
• Financial Times: Huawei has denied that the telecoms group has taken subsidies from the Chinese state as Guo Ping, chief executive and longstanding confidant of founder Ren Zhengfei, stressed the company’s independence in his first interview with foreign media.
• Financial Times: Carl Icahn, the veteran corporate raider, has struck a deal with Herbalife to nominate two directors to the board of the nutritional supplement direct seller which is under attack from his bitter rival, short-seller Bill Ackman.
• Financial Times: A tough court hearing in New York has rekindled market fears that Argentina could be edging towards its second default in just over a decade.
• The Daily Telegraph: BP's investigation of its disastrous 2010 Gulf of Mexico blowout did not address the impact of cost overruns on the well, a BP executive said on Thursday, in the final day of testimony this week in the massive civil trial over the spill.
• Financial Times: A Singaporean claim for wrongful dismissal against UBS in the wake of the Libor-rigging scandal threatens to prolong the affair for the Swiss bank and has hinted at potential vulnerabilities for HSBC.
• The Daily Telegraph: British American Tobacco cheered the market by announcing a £1.5billion share buyback programme, as price rises and smokers trading up to premium brands helped the cigarette maker overcome falling sales.
• Daily Mail: Publishing and events group Reed Elsevier has promised to hand back another £300 million to shareholders this year after profits jumped 25%.

Business and economics

• The Guardian: Britain is to challenge an EU agreement to slash bankers' bonuses at a meeting of European finance ministers next week after Boris Johnson condemned the proposal as a "deluded measure".
• The Daily Telegraph: Britain is better off inside the European Union, Olli Rehn, Europe's commissioner for economic and monetary affairs, has said, as he urged the UK to support the rebuilding of the 27-nation bloc rather than seek to "undo our Community" by heading for the exit.
• Financial Times: The US is braced for across-the-board public spending cuts to hit on Friday as new growth data showed the economy is highly vulnerable to lower outlays.
• The Daily Telegraph: The US Department of Commerce has revised up its growth estimate in the final quarter of 2012 to 0.1% after intially estimating a contraction, but it fell far short of market expectations.
• Financial Times: The amount of money being allocated by US money markets funds to eurozone banks hit the highest level for more than a year, in a sign of how much investor sentiment towards Europe has thawed in the wake of central bank action.
• Financial Times: Mark Wetjen, seen as the swing vote on the five-person Commodity Futures Trading Commission, is poised to water down rules for derivatives trading that critics argue will allow global banks to preserve their dominance of the market.
• The Guardian: Cyprus will run out of money in May, its outgoing finance minister has warned, as EU officials prepare to address the issue of a €17.5billion bailout for the island.
• Financial Times: Haruhiko Kuroda, president of the Asian Development Bank, has been confirmed as the government’s choice to become the next governor of the Bank of Japan, as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seeks a more aggressive regime to overturn more than a decade of growth-sapping deflation.
• The Daily Telegraph: The head of Lloyds Banking Group has promised to lend at least £5 billion to its one million small business customers this year as part of a pledge to give them "all the support they need".
• The Independent: The changing of the guard continued in the FTSE 100 mining industry as Rio Tinto appointed Chris Lynch, a former finance head at BHP Billiton, as its chief financial officer.
• Financial Times: The profitability and dominance enjoyed by US-backed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will limit policy makers’ motivation for winding them down, Fitch Ratings has said; the warning comes as appetite to transform the state-backed companies into private sector entities wanes in Washington.
• The Daily Telegraph: National Express is under pressure from shareholders to exit Britain’s troubled rail industry in the wake of the West Coast Main Line scandal, it emerged on Thursday.
• The Independent: Genel Energy, the Kurdistan-focused oil producer backed by the financier Nat Rothschild, has announced plans to step up exports next year.
• Financial Times: Tony Hayward, the former chief executive of BP who now leads London-listed Genel Energy, has predicted a formal agreement between Turkey and Kurdistan within months that will lead to full-scale exports from the oil-rich region of Iraq from next year.
• The Daily Telegraph: Ryanair announced it will cut capacity at Stansted by 9% on the day the airport came under new ownership.
• The Independent: Severfield-Rowen, the UK's biggest structural steelwork company, has unveiled a rights issue to raise nearly £50 million to help give it more breathing space from its lenders, following a "very difficult" 2012.
• The Daily Telegraph: Domino's Pizza directors have cashed in on the delivery company's success by selling £39 million of shares.
• The Independent: A series of public-service contract wins helped the outsourcing giant Capita increase its pre-tax profits by 10% to £425.6 million.
• Financial Times: Dubai expects a €28 billion boost to its economy if it is successful in its bid to stage the World Expo 2020, the emirate announced on Thursday.
• Financial Times: Debt-laden Indian wind turbine manufacturer Suzlon Energy saw its stock plunge by 34% on Thursday following news that management had sold more than 6% of its equity, raising $44 million.
• Financial Times: India’s so-called “super-rich” may be privately unhappy, but few are complaining publicly about the Congress-led government’s imposition of a new 10% tax surcharge on their earnings.
• Financial Times: The High Court has ordered Britain’s six biggest internet service providers to block access to three websites – Kickass Torrents, H33T and Fenopy – that provide links to pirated music, films and television shows.
• The Guardian: Historic Devon business Axminster Carpets is on the brink of failure with 400 jobs at risk.
• The Daily Telegraph: A Chinese wealth survey has found that Asia has more billionaires than any other continent, apparently surpassing North America for the first time.

Share tips, comment and bids

• Financial Times: Facebook has finalised a deal with Microsoft to buy Atlas Solutions, an ad-serving platform that will help the social network measure the effectiveness of ads placed on its site and others; terms of the deal were not disclosed.
• Financial Times: John Paulson, the billionaire whose hedge fund is the largest shareholder in MetroPCS, has said he will vote against plans to merge the wireless operator with T-Mobile USA, owned by Deutsche Telekom.
• Financial Times: Alisher Usmanov, the Russian tycoon, has sold part of his stake in Russian internet company Mail.ru for about $530 million.
• Financial Times: Standard Life Wealth has agreed to buy the private-client division of Newton Management in a £83.5million deal.
• The Guardian (Editorial): The British prime minister is still confusing the interests of the City with those of the nation.
• The Daily Telegraph (Comment): We can’t afford to make profit a dirty word.
• The Daily Telegraph (Comment): If the British coalition wants to save the high street it must rethink business rates.
• Daily Mail (Comment – Alex Brummer): The obstacles were considerable when Royal Bank of Scotland was hit by problems including an IT meltdown, the Libor scandal and interest rate swaps.
• Financial Times (Lex): Royal Bank of Scotland: RBS chief is confident the bank will be a ‘normal’ company by next year, but the government should sell its stake sooner rather than later.
• Financial Times (Lex): IAG: the British Airways-Iberia airline group has reported a dismal loss for 2012, but it says 2013 will be much better. Should the company be believed?
• Financial Times (Lex): Repsol: The Spanish oil and gas group has rebounded well from Argentina’s expropriation of its YPF assets as it concentrates on its upstream strengths.
• Financial Times (Lex): American Tower: should interest rates start to climb, any company that, like American, is leveraged and has a debt-funded acquisition strategy is going to get stung.