Sunday newspaper round-up: Budget tax plans, Morrisons, BHS

George Osborne is planning to raise personal tax allowances and introduce a "diverted profits tax" to stop multinational companies such as Amazon shifting profits overseas to avoid tax, the Sunday Times said. The Chancellor will introduce the measures in his Budget. He is in talks to raise the personal tax allowance in April by at least £200 more than planned. In a crackdown on corporate tax avoidance, companies will be charged a penal rate of 25% compared with the standard corporation tax rate of 20% if they fall foul of the measure. He will also make companies disclose revenue and profit for each country in which they operate.

Morrisons' new Chairman plans to cut the dividend and rein in the opening of convenience stores to fund a revival of the group's supermarkets, the Sunday Telegraph reported. When Morrisons reports annual results on March 12th, Andy Higginson is expected to say the dividend could fall by as much as 60% over the next year. Morrisons' profit will have halved from a year earlier because of pressure on the industry and the war on prices between grocers. Higginson will also pull back on the commitment to open 100 convenience stores this year.

Sir Philip Green is close to selling his BHS department store chain, the Sunday Times said. Green is in detailed talks and could announce a deal in the coming week. Apollo, the private equity group, is no longer the front runner. The deal would end Green's 15-year ownership of the chain, whose turnaround made him his first £1bn and provided a springboard to buy Arcadia, including what is now his main business, Topshop.

An ex-senior director at BHS has joined a bid to buy the store group from Sir Philip Green, the Sunday Telegraph said. Tony Brown is working with Alteri Investors, a turnaround retail vehicle backed by private equity firm Apollo. Brown was BHS's retail director for several years before leaving to run mini-department store group Beales in 2008. Green has been in talks with Alteri and Brown for a while but discussions are likely to take several more weeks and they could collapse over price.

Soco International could surprise investors with a dividend when it announces annual results on March 12th, the Sunday Times said. The oil company, portrayed in a bad light in Virunga, a film about oil drilling in Democratic Republic of the Congo, may pay out $60m to investors, Barclays analysts think. It would be half last year's $120m, but still welcome in an industry hit by falling oil prices.

Signs are emerging that indicate the mining and commodities sectors could be reaching the bottom of the cycle, the Sunday Telegraph said. One such sign will be the first big deal since the fallout. Glencore had a megamerger offer rejected by Rio Tinto late in 2014 but is ready to strike again. Mick Davis, the former boss of Xstrata, has raised $5.6bn that, with debt financing, could give his X2 vehicle more than $10bn to buy up assets. Cost cutting will eventually restore the balance between supply and demand to support commodity prices, Morgan Stanley analysts said.

Angel Trains, one of Britain's big rolling stock companies, has been put up for sale amid booming demand for rail assets, the Sunday Times said. The company has appointed Citigroup to advise on a potential sale. Royal Bank of Scotland sold it to a consortium in 2008 for £3.6bn. It would be the last of the UK's train owners to be sold within a year after Porterbrook and Eversholt changed hands. The companies were set up when British Rail was privatised in the 1990s.

European finance ministers are to reject reform proposals for Greece when they meet on March 9th, the Sunday Times reported. The plan includes hiring tourists as undercover tax inspectors in Greece as well as proposals for a fiscal council to oversee spending and update licensing of gaming and lotteries. Greece's government wants to unlock the final €7.2bn of cash under the terms of the country's bailout plan from three years ago. But European officials think Greece needs to do more "on the ground" to solve its problems.

John Lewis is ready to announce that its annual staff bonus has fallen for the second year running after profits at its Waitrose grocery chain were hit by difficult conditions for food retailing, the Sunday Telegraph reported. The payout for the employee-owned group's 90,000 staff will fall from 15% last year to between 10% and 14%. Though the company is increasing sales and its share of the market, the cost of new stores, loyalty cards and price cuts has had an impact on profits.

UK banks are retreating from Russia after conflict in Ukraine caused sanctions against Russia to harden, the Sunday Telegraph said. Standard Chartered has shut its Moscow office and Barclays has cut loans by £1.3bn, while HSBC and Royal Bank of Scotland put restrictions on lending to Russian companies and individuals. Standard Chartered's annual results showed that it had decided to close the Moscow office, which it inherited with the purchase of Amex Bank in 2008. The information on other banks was in their annual reports.