Eric Daniels, the boss of Lloyds Banking Group, which is 41 percent owned by British taxpayers, announced plans to retire in a year. Daniels is one of several bank bosses, including Barclays' John Varley and HSBC's Stephen Green, to step down in recent weeks.
Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy, with plans to reduce its debt load from nearly $1 billion to $100 million or less. The American film-rental chain said current holders of subordinated debt, preferred stock or common stock would get nothing back.
Profits at Spain's Inditex, the retailer behind Zara, a fashion chain, rose by 68 percent to $816 million in the first half of the 2010 fiscal year. The company, which has on average opened a store a day for the past few years, said that 72 percent of sales came from outside Spain.
Johnson & Johnson launched a $2.3 billion takeover offer for Crucell, a Dutch vaccine manufacturer. The bid by the American health-care group continues a recent trend of consolidation among vaccine producers, such as Pfizer's takeover of Wyeth and Novartis' acquisition of Chiron.
Total American consumer debt declined for the seventh straight quarter to $11.7 trillion, a reduction of 6.5 percent from its peak in the third quarter of 2008. Bank write-downs of mortgages and consumer debt accounted for most of that $812 billion reduction.
Defaults on corporate debt should fall below 3 percent by the end of the year, according to Moody's, a credit-rating agency. The default rate, which measures the percentage of companies with "junk" credit ratings that failed to meet debt obligations, reached its peak in November 2009. But small businesses, which depend mainly on bank lending, still are having a hard time getting capital.
Political economy
China's prime minister, Wen Jiabao, ruled out large-scale appreciation of the yuan because it would cause "major turbulence in the Chinese society." China, he added, had kept the yuan stable even as other currencies depreciated. China denied reports that it had banned exports of rare-earth elements to Japan after a dispute over the detention of a Chinese fishing trawler captain. Rare-earth minerals are crucial for products like hybrid cars, wind turbines and guided missiles.
Italy's finance police said they had seized $31 million held by the Vatican in an Italian bank and were investigating the Holy See's two leading bankers. Italian authorities claimed that the moves were part of a broad investigation into money-laundering.
Yale University and the National University of Singapore may set up a liberal-arts college in Singapore. The two universities signed a nonbinding agreement to establish the college, which would have around 1,000 students, by 2013. It would be the American university's first foreign campus, though costs would be borne by Singapore's government.
An international summit convened in Moscow to discuss competing territorial claims to the Arctic Ocean. Russia, Canada, Denmark, Norway and the United States all have claims in the resource-rich region, which some believe could have up to a quarter of the world's oil and gas reserves.
In Germany's biggest anti-nuclear demonstrations in decades, tens of thousands took to the streets of Berlin to protest the government's plans to extend the lifespan of Germany's nuclear reactors.
