Sunday newspaper round-up: Esure, Ryanair, bank complaints, Libor, Evening Standard

Insurance tycoon Sir Peter Wood is attempting to orchestrate a sale of his £1bn stock market-listed empire Esure, according to senior City sources. Wood, 71, who is worth £693m according to The Sunday Times Rich List, has held informal discussions with potential buyers over a deal to offload his controlling 30.7% stake in the London-listed company - a move that would trigger a bid for the whole business. - The Sunday Times

The world’s top financial watchdog has uncovered $14 trillion of global dollar debt hidden in derivatives and swap contracts, a startling sum that doubles the underlying levels of offshore dollar credit in the international system. The scale of this lending greatly increases the risk of a future funding crisis if inflation ever forces the US Federal Reserve to tighten hard, draining worldwide liquidity and potentially triggering a dollar surge. - Sunday Telegraph

Ryanair has tried to appease angry customers by publishing lists of all flights to be cancelled until Wednesday, after 82 failed to take off on Sunday. However, this will do little to calm nerves as travellers are demanding to know which flights will be cancelled over the next six weeks when Ryanair has said there would be up to 2,000 cancellations. Up to 400,000 passengers could be affected. - Observer

Small firms are unable to obtain justice in their complaints against banks and the system needs an urgent overhaul, the City’s top regulator has told the Mail on Sunday. Andrew Bailey, head of the Financial Conduct Authority, is calling on politicians to set up a new, independent process to deal with disputes between firms and lenders amid a growing row over how banks treat small and medium-sized business customers. This could be an independent ombudsman or a tribunal.

Libor is “more open to manipulation” than ever before despite wholesale reform of how the benchmark rate is calculated, a whistleblower claims. Behzad Goharian, who was responsible for Libor submissions at UBS until a few months ago, alleges there are still “catastrophic” failings in the way the interest rate is set and monitored. - The Sunday Times

The owner of the Evening Standard has made an approach to buy the Metro newspaper from the publisher of the Daily Mail, as media barons jockey for position in an industry merger melee. Evgeny Lebedev, the 37-year-old owner of the London freesheet edited by former chancellor George Osborne, is understood to be keen to add the Metro to his stable to drive cost savings and expansion outside the capital. - Sunday Telegraph

EU leaders have agreed to make “swift” progress on raising the tax bills for digital giants such as Google and Facebook, despite warnings from smaller states that unilateral action could drive business away from Europe. France is pushing for a new way of taxing them on the basis of their turnover – rather than profits – to increase the amount collected from companies accused of paying too little in Europe. - Observer

Leading architect Lord Foster has joined the Brexit debate by calling for the country to ‘look outwards, not inwards’, adding that London is ‘under threat’ due to the vote to leave the EU. Foster, who founded his London-based Foster + Partners practice 50 years ago, said in his chairman’s statement to the latest set of company accounts that there were ‘serious concerns that will affect our future and that of others’. - Mail on Sunday

A Chinese nuclear power giant is exploring a bid for Toshiba’s troubled £15bn reactor project on the Cumbrian coast. China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) is keen on taking control of NuGen, which plans a 3.8 gigawatt plant capable of powering up to 6m homes. - The Sunday Times

While the costs of recent hurricane catastrophes are still being assessed, insurers are expecting losses of more than $70bn (£52bn) – down from the initial $150bn feared from Irma but still enough to make 2017 one of the worst years on record. Reinsurance groups are expected to be the hardest hit, with the world’s largest, Munich Re, already warning that the events will threaten its ability to meet full-year earnings. - Sunday Telegraph

The controversial property mogul Christian Candy, whose luxury developments attracted some of the highest prices ever paid for London real estate, has sold and mortgaged assets worth an estimated £340m in less than a year. The sum is a significant part of the £600m joint fortune Christian and his elder brother and business partner, Nick, disclosed to a British court last year. - Observer

There are more than 355,000 electric cars on Britain’s roads. Whether pure electric, plug-in hybrid or a hybrid where electric takes just some of the load, they account for about 5 per cent of new vehicle sales. But these numbers are set to spiral as manufacturers power ahead with new models against the background of a Government commitment to end the production of new petrol and diesel cars by 2040. - Mail on Sunday