Wednesday newspaper round-up: Philip Green, China, Tesla, Lloyds

Sir Philip Green has escaped a ban from serving as a company director by the Insolvency Service over the deal to sell BHS for £1 in 2015, a year before the retailer collapsed. However, Dominic Chappell, who led the consortium that bought BHS, faces a lengthy boardroom ban after a government inquiry into the collapse of the retailer in 2016, which led to the loss of 11,000 jobs. – Guardian

China has confirmed that the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, has visited Beijing, where he met the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, and pledged his commitment to denuclearising the Korean peninsula. Confirming several reports over the last two days, Xinhua state news agency said Kim had been in China on an “unofficial visit” from Sunday to Wednesday. – Guardian

Shares in Tesla plunged to their lowest level in almost a year on Tuesday, as it faced news of a probe into a car crash last week, a downgrade by credit agency Moody's and as doubts were aired over its production targets. Tesla's shares dropped around 8.1pc to $279.18, dragged lower after it emerged that the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is launching an investigation into a fatal crash of a Tesla Model X, which then caught fire, in California last week. – Telegraph

The energy regulator is under fire for overseeing a string of customer service blunders from energy supply minnows this week amid growing calls to tighten up standards for new market entrants. Ofgem resorted to banning Britain’s cheapest energy supplier from signing up more customers on Tuesday after repeated complaints against Iresa Energy over the past year. – Telegraph

Lloyds Banking Group will have to pay nearly £3 million to its former chief executive and another director after losing a legal battle to withhold payments relating to the purchase of HBOS. A judge ruled yesterday that Lloyds had wrongly refused to hand over share awards to Eric Daniels, chief executive from 2003 to 2011, and Truett Tate, a former head of wholesale banking. – The Times

The government turned back the clock and pushed an interventionist industrial strategy yesterday when Greg Clark, the business secretary, put himself front and centre of the £8.1 billion hostile takeover bid for GKN by Melrose. Not since Michael, now Lord, Heseltine pledged 25 years ago to intervene before breakfast, lunch and dinner on behalf of British industry has a business or trade and industry secretary moved to shape the future ownership of the UK manufacturing sector. – The Times