Sunday newspaper round-up: Petrol, Rio Tinto, Morrisons

Government sources told The Times that soldiers would be put on notice to drive petrol tankers, amid panic buying by motorists that had seen most forecourts run dry. Military personnel were expected to have to help within days. The Petrol Retailers Association, which represents most petrol stations in the country, estimated that between and half to 90% of forecourts had run out of supplies. - Sunday Times

The Financial Conduct Authority is investigating claims that Rio Tinto misled the market regarding its £5bn copper mine in Mongolia. Sources told the newspaper that Britain's financial markets watchdog was already querying people previously linked to the project before possibly launching a formal probe. America's Securities and Exchange Commission was said to also be looking into the allegations that Rio had known that the mine's development had gone off the tracks months before disclosing it to investors. - The Financial Mail on Sunday

MPs howled when they found out that Clayton, Dubilier and Rice, will run Morrisons through a cash shell based in the Cayman islands. The US private equity outfit was the front-runner in the timed auction to take over the grocer, with a £7bn bid, which was set to end during the following month. - Financial Mail on Sunday

Over half a million of Avro Energy's clients have been moved to rival Octopus Energy following the former's collapse, boosting the latter's customer count to 3.1m. Ofgem announced that Avro customers would be shifted to new contracts with Octopus effective from Sunday. Octopus was also said to be interested in picking up another rival, Bulb Energy, and its 1.7m customers. - Financial Mail on Sunday

Senior industry sources say Ministers are set to forbid any further role for China in the Sizewell C nuclear reactor due to security concerns. The Treasury was understood to be planning for pension funds to plug the multi-billion funding gap that was expected to result. - Financial Mail on Sunday

Imagination is plotting a return to the London stock market with Lazard acting as its advisor. During the prior year, the microchip manufacturer inked a deal to supply Apple that was reportedly worth as much as $50m. It had also received approaches from private equity outfits, including US-based Francisco Partners, who had taken note of the company's turnaround, the newspaper revealed. Nevertheless, more than two dozen staff had left the company, including five of its top engineers, who had moved to rivals AMD and Intel. Furthermore, the fact that its majority owner is backed by the Chinese state and a spate of licencing deals in the Asian giant have been criticised by some observers. - The Sunday Telegraph

The proportion of technology companies in the FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 is back at seven per cent, a level last seen in 2000. That follows recent flotations by the likes of Darktrace, Trustpilot and Moonpig, and of listing reforms that could allow companies with dual class shares to list on the premium segment. The hope is that the presence of a greater number of technology firms on London's blue-chip market indices will encourage more tech outfits to list in London and curtail outflows from UK funds as investors seek out high-growth investment opportunities. - Sunday Telegraph