Tuesday newspaper round-up: eurozone, Sony, IMF

24th May 2011 06:04

Fears that the debt crisis is spreading across the eurozone hammered financial markets around the world yesterday. A wipeout for Spain's Socialists in regional elections over the weekend, coupled with fears of a political logjam in Italy, undermined investor confidence in governments' efforts to steer a path through the sovereign debt maelstrom, reports the Times.The electronics giant Sony is set to slump to full-year losses of ¥269bn (£2bn), its second worst performance ever, after a tax charge forced the group to slash its forecasts. The losses will heap further pressure on its embattled chief executive Sir Howard Stringer in a year when the group has suffered from the devastating earthquake in Japan and a cyber attack on its network, says the Independent.Mexico has proposed its central bank chief as the next head of the International Monetary Fund, as the nominating period for a job popularly known as "the world's banker" officially started. Agustin Carstens, who has run Mexico's central bank since the start of last year and was the country's finance minister before that, is the first candidate to be officially nominated, reports the Telegraph.Sergei Shmatko, Russia's Energy Minister, does not expect BP and Rosneft to revive their strategic alliance after it was blocked by BP's existing Russian partners. However, he said the two companies were continuing discussions. "In its current form, the deal has become a burden," Mr Shmatko said. "I don't believe there's any chance of reincarnation of the deal in its current form," he said, according to the Telegraph.TalkTalk has been "dishonest, misleading or deceptive" in hoodwinking customers into signing up to new telephone packages, Ofcom ruled yesterday. The regulator said that the company, which has been under fire in the past for poor customer services, had contravened strict mis-selling rules designed to protect consumers by "providing misleading information that is likely to affect a customer's purchasing decision," the Times reports.A Russian search engine is set to embark on what could be the biggest float by an online firm since Google raised $1.67bn (£1bn) back in 2004. Yandex, which was used by 38m unique users in March, plans to sell its shares at between $24 and $25 apiece when it makes its debut in New York today, according to the Independent.Irene Rosenfeld, chief executive of Kraft Foods, has defended her company's handling of the £11.7bn acquisition of British chocolate brand Cadbury last year amid fresh criticism of the deal from UK politicians. A British parliamentary committee issued a report on Monday highlighting "significant concerns" about the Cadbury takeover and sharply criticised the refusal of Ms Rosenfeld to appear before its recent hearings into the deal, the Financial Times reports.Supermarket giant Tesco is ordering councils across Britain to remove recycling bins from its car parks so it can install its own money-making collection services - potentially netting £25m. Furious council chiefs have accused the retailer of being 'greedy' after it brought in a private contractor to replace council collection bins at 500 stores, the Daily Mail reports.Britain's major banks yesterday sparked anger from business groups as well as anti-poverty campaigners after they failed to meet lending targets set by the government in return for ministers shelving extra taxes on executive bonuses. According to industry figures, bank lending to small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) fell more than £2bn short of targets set by the Treasury as part of the Project Merlin deal signed in February, the Guardian reports.---RG