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Tullett Prebon fined £15.4M; Brexit 'pathway'; Euronext eyes revenue growth

* U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said a "pathway" to a potential Brexit deal was in sight, following "detailed and constructive discussions" between the two ahead of a crucial European Council summit next week.

* EU finance ministers have supported the creation of a new bloc-wide agency to acquire supervisory powers from national authorities to tackle money laundering activities and terrorism financing, insiders told Reuters. The ministers are also considering tightening regulations that could increase controls over sectors where money laundering risks are high.

* The European Investment Bank will discuss potentially ending its funding policy for fossil fuel projects at a board meeting next week, Reuters reported, citing the lender's meeting agenda.

* The EU removed the United Arab Emirates and the Marshall Islands from its blacklist of non-cooperative tax jurisdictions. The bloc also removed Albania, Costa Rica, Mauritius, Serbia and Switzerland from a grey list.

* Eurogroup President Mário Centeno said European lenders should consider consolidation when necessary in order to address profitability outlook issues, according to Reuters.

* Eurozone finance ministers agreed on key elements of a common budget in a renewed attempt after initial talks fell through in June, media outlets reported. The eurozone budget, which is expected to create about €17 billion to €20 billion in funds, would be used to boost investments, facilitate reforms, and spur growth in poorer economies.

UK AND IRELAND

* TP Icap PLC said its subsidiary Tullett Prebon (Europe) Ltd. agreed to a £15.4 million settlement with the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority regarding a probe into certain trades that took place between 2008 and 2011. The regulator found that some former managers did not act appropriately, and that there were inadequate controls in place to deal with the risk of improper broker conduct.

* U.K.-based Hargreaves Lansdown PLC's assets under administration for the three months to September-end amounted to £101.8 billion, up from £94.1 billion in the same period a year earlier. However, the asset manager still drew criticism from small investors due to its close links with embattled fund manager Neil Woodford, the Financial Times reported.

* Prosecutors for the U.K. Serious Fraud Office claimed Barclays PLC's former top executives must have been aware that the lender had to pay Qatari investors twice the fees of other financiers to secure their participation in an emergency capital raising during the financial crisis but could not openly disclose the extra commission, the Financial Times wrote.

* The International Underwriting Association of London said there are no indications that London-based international insurers are suffering a "Brexit slump" so far and that companies are seeing growth opportunities from new subsidiaries they have set up in the EU post-Brexit.

* U.K.-based IHS Markit Ltd. acquired Novation Analytics, which provides data analytics and advisory services to the automotive industry.

* The U.K. government has rejected a proposal by the Treasury committee to grant the Financial Conduct Authority greater formal powers to make it easier for the watchdog to intervene and protect investors and businesses from unregulated activities, The Times reported. The government said such decisions about the perimeter of the FCA should be maintained by ministers.

* Monese Ltd. CEO Norris Koppel told the Financial News that the London-based digital banking startup expects to increase its total headcount to about 500 employees by the end of the year and potentially to 1,000 in 2020. Koppel added that the firm requires at least one more round of investment to reach profitability.

GERMANY, SWITZERLAND AND AUSTRIA

* Deutsche Postbank AG and trade union ver.di have settled their wage dispute and agreed on a salary rise by 3% from November 2019 and a further 1.75% or at least €110 per employee from January 2021, while the exclusion of redundancies has been extended by two years and is now valid until June 30, 2023. The new agreement for the approximately 12,000 employees of the bank runs until the end of 2021.

* Jürg Zeltner, member of the supervisory board of Deutsche Bank AG representing the bank's top shareholder, the Qatar royal family, will step down after the ECB and Germany's financial market supervisory BaFin rejected him because of a conflict of interest owing to Zeltner's role as CEO of KBL European Private Bankers S.A. which is controlled by the same family, Handelsblatt wrote.

* Austria's creditor protection organization Kreditschutzverband von 1870 is acquiring 25.1% of Vienna-based startup FINcredible GmbH, which specializes in creditworthiness checks.

* Switzerland-based SIX Group AG and China-based Shenzhen Stock Exchange Ltd. have signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at connecting investor communities and companies in both countries in order to create a larger capital pool. In addition, both parties will examine the possibility of supporting cross-border financing alternatives and cooperation in research projects.

FRANCE AND BENELUX

* Dutch stock exchange operator Euronext NV is targeting revenue growth to 2% to 3% a year as part of its new financial targets for the next three years. The company also expects to reach an organic EBITDA margin above 60% in 2022 and anticipates one-off costs of €12 million related to internal projects to meet these objectives over the period.

* French bank Crédit Agricole SA and Spain's Bankia SA have launched a consumer financing joint venture, SoYou, Expansión reports. Crédit Agricole will hold 51%, and Bankia 49%.

* British bank HSBC Holdings PLC has opened new 200 positions in Paris, nearly all local hires, instead of the 1,000 it said in January 2017 it would move from London as a result of Brexit, Le Monde reported. Sources told the paper that staff were refusing to move because they feared pay cuts.

* Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations signed to take control of Société de Financement Local, the body created to take over failed bank Dexia SA's local government lending, by buying La Banque Postale SA's 5% stake in SFIL and the state's 75% stake, with the deal due to be completed in early 2020, Les Echos reported.

* Crédit Mutuel Arkéa SACC has lost a case before the European Court of Justice, where it sought to challenge the supervisory role with the European Central Bank, claimed by Confédération Nationale du Crédit Mutuel, but said it will continue to seek to break away from the rest of Crédit Mutuel Group, Les Echos reported.

* France's BNP Paribas SA is building its own cloud server network with IBM to enable it to avoid using Google Amazon, Facebook or Apple for security and cost reasons, and said it might be able to sell space on it to other banks after it becomes operational in 2020, Les Echos reported.

ITALY AND GREECE

* Italian bank UniCredit SpA is working on a plan to spin off its international assets ahead of the presentation of a new industrial plan on Dec. 3, said MF. Among options being studied post-spinoff is the listing of shares in a sub-holding that will contain UniCredit's international businesses, the newspaper added, noting that this would depend on favorable market conditions. Regulatory approval could take 12 to 18 months, Il Sole 24 Ore reported, noting that the international sub-holding would be headquartered in Germany.

* London Stock Exchange Group PLC is considering restructuring its MTS Italian business, including shutting down the bond trading platform BondVision and transferring the management functions of Italian securities' clearing operations to London from Milan, ahead of its proposed acquisition of U.S. data analytics provider Refinitiv, insiders told Reuters. However, an Italian central bank source told Reuters that LSE has assured the state that it plans to continue investing in local bond trading platforms and is not seeking to shift them out of the country. LSEG owns Italy's stock exchange, Borsa Italiana S.p.A.

* The European Commission approved Greek plans aimed at reducing the nonperforming loans of the country's banks, saying it did not violate state aid rules. The asset protection scheme seeks to bring down the stock of NPLs without distorting the market through government subsidies.

* Italian businessman Leonardo del Vecchio has hired proxy adviser Georgeson to present small shareholders with his strategy for Mediobanca - Banca di Credito Finanziario SpA and evaluate the level of support among them, said MF, noting that Del Vecchio recently announced the purchase of a 6.94% stake in Mediobanca and is said to now own nearly 10%.

NORDIC COUNTRIES

* Danske Bank A/S put on hold hiring new employees as then Danish lender grapples with higher compliance costs and a low interest rate environment in Europe. However, the bank will continue to hire for "business-critical" positions, such as regulatory functions.

* Danske Bank won the tender to supply the Finnish state with deposit services and cash management, Børsen reported. The agreement runs for six years, and it is set to expire in November 2026.

* Saxo Bank A/S won a case in Denmark's Supreme Court, over trading in Swiss francs, Finanswatch reported. In 2015, Switzerland ended its peg to the euro, and many Saxo Bank customers lost money when the bank was unable to live up to stop loss-agreements. Subsequently many have sued the bank.

EASTERN EUROPE

* Polish banks may have to return to clients over 1 billion Polish zlotys in fees linked to consumer loans that were repaid ahead of schedule, news agency PAP reported, citing the Polish Bank Association.

* The Polish Bank Association also said that Polish lenders will analyze their foreign currency mortgage portfolios over the next few months to assess the size of loan provisions they may need to set aside following the October ruling of the European Court of Justice on Swiss franc-indexed home loans. Banks will also consult potential provision hikes with auditors, the association's deputy head, Włodzimierz Kiciński, told PAP.

* The Russian central bank will discuss with local financial institutions the possibility of introducing negative interest rates on euro-denominated deposits from individuals, Vedomosti reported, citing the regulator's head Elvira Nabiullina.

* The Russian central bank expects that the country's systemically important banks will start using the internal ratings-based approach for credit risk assessment within five years, RBC wrote. At the moment, the IRB approach is only applied by PAO Sberbank of Russia and Raiffeisen Bank International AG unit AO Raiffeisenbank.

* Romanian Prime Minister Viorica Dancila and her government were ousted after losing a no-confidence motion in parliament, media reports said.

* The Kazakh central bank could launch a new assistance program for the country's banking sector after local lenders complete an ongoing asset quality review, Reuters wrote, citing central bank Governor Yerbolat Dosayev. The asset quality review is set to end in December and will cover the country's 14 largest banks.

IN OTHER PARTS OF THE WORLD

Asia-Pacific: JPMorgan sets up Singapore firm; China fines 4 banks; Vietcombank in Australia

Middle East & Africa: National Bank of Kuwait's Q3 results out; partial sale of UAE's Najm explored

Latin America: Panama extends intervention at AllBank; inflation in Brazil falls

NOW FEATURED ON S&P GLOBAL MARKET INTELLIGENCE

No sign yet of 'Brexit slump' for London insurers, says trade body: London-based international insurers are writing more European business thanks to the new subsidiaries they have set up to cope with the U.K.'s pending exit from the EU, according to the International Underwriting Association.

Job cuts announced by European banks in 2019 near 50,000: Chart Watch: The lion's share of the layoffs announced by European banks so far in 2019 are at German lenders, according to data compiled by S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Ben Meggeson, Arno Maierbrugger, Danielle Rossingh, Esben Svendsen, Beata Fojcik, Heather O'Brian, Brian McCulloch, Praxilla Trabattoni and Mariana Aldano contributed to this report.

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This S&P Global Market Intelligence news article may contain information about credit ratings issued by S&P Global Ratings. Descriptions in this news article were not prepared by S&P Global Ratings.