UK

Conviviality, the UK alcohol wholesaler that owns Bargain Booze and Wine Rack, plans to call in administrators after a £125m emergency capital increase failed to attract enough demand to keep the company afloat.

US exchange operator CME’s revised bid for Nex Group, the electronic trading and post-trade platform company, has been recommended unanimously by the boards of both firms. The offer is higher than expected at 1,000p, half in cash and half in shares.

The UK’s Green Finance Taskforce has come up with strong recommendations for how the country should green its financial system, including issuing a big sovereign green bond, writes Jon Hay.

UK casual wear company JD Sports is set to break into the US market with an around $558m acquisition of Finish Line, which will be financed in the loan market.

Industrial conglomerate Melrose and its hostile acquisition target UK engineering firm GKN fired their final salvos in the run up to a crucial shareholder meeting on Thursday.

UK drug maker GlaxoSmithKline has agreed to buy Novartis’s 36.5% stake in the pair’s consumer healthcare joint venture, just days after backing out of an acquisition for a similar Pfizer unit.

This week, Elysium Healthcare successfully refinanced the loan that backed its leveraged buyout by BC Partners, getting a bigger size and better pricing three months after the original deal was met with a lukewarm reception from investors.

Agricultural commodities trader ED&F Man has signed three revolving credit facilities totaling $1.128bn, bringing the UK company’s committed funds to more than $2.4bn at a time when the company’s sugar and grains businesses have taken a hammering.

UK drug maker GlaxoSmithKline agreed to buy Novartis’ 36.5% stake in the pair's consumer healthcare joint venture just days after backing out of an acquisition for a similar Pfizer unit. But analysts disagree whether GSK’s ratings are being stretched to breaking point despite the new trade being far smaller.

Citi has appointed a new country officer for Ireland to lead the bank’s business in Dublin, its post-Brexit European headquarters.

The UK government has waded into Melrose’s hostile bid for engineering firm GKN, seeking assurances from the industrial conglomerate that it plans to protect UK jobs should the deal go ahead in the latest hurdle for a £7bn-plus debt financed acquisition.

The UK government has waded into Melrose’s hostile bid for engineering firm GKN, seeking assurances from the industrial conglomerate that it plans to protect UK jobs should the deal go ahead, in the latest hurdle for the £7bn-plus debt-financed acquisition.