Wednesday newspaper round-up: Oil prices, Iceland, VW, Albert Edwards

The former head of the British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has apologised for her turbulent tenure during the financial crisis and the Libor-rigging scandal. Angela Knight, who led the BBA from early 2007 to July 2012, said she had “tried my best, I was out there, I did what I could in explanation” as the industry lurched through corporate collapses, taxpayer bailouts and mis-selling scandals. – Telegraph

Oil prices have crashed to below $30-a-barrel amid warnings the rout could reach as low as $10 and bring down petrol prices to levels last seen in 2009. Standard Chartered became the latest major bank to downgrade its oil outlook to $10, joining the likes of Goldman Sachs, RBS and Morgan Stanley in making ultra-bearish calls as prices have collapsed by 15pc this year. – Telegraph

The City of London’s most vocal “bear” has warned that the world is heading for a financial crisis as severe as the crash of 2008-09 that could prompt the collapse of the eurozone. Albert Edwards, strategist at the bank Société Générale, said the west was about to be hit by a wave of deflation from emerging market economies and that central banks were unaware of the disaster about to hit them. His comments came as analysts at Royal Bank of Scotland urged investors to “sell everything” ahead of an imminent stock market crash. – Guardian

Iceland says it has fully reimbursed Britain for the collapse of the Icesave bank in 2008 which left British and Dutch account-holders empty-handed. “Remember Icesave?”, Iceland’s foreign ministry wrote on Twitter, adding a link to an article about the reimbursement on the English-language website of the Icelandic daily Morgunbladid. – Guardian

Nigeria called for a crisis meeting of Opec yesterday amid warnings from Standard Chartered that the price of crude could fall as low as $10 a barrel. As the price of Brent crude in New York slid by 1.4 per cent to $31.12, its lowest since April 2004, Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, Nigeria’s oil minister, said that several members of the 13-nation cartel wanted an emergency meeting in March. – The Times

Compensation will be withheld from British owners of Volkswagen cars as the price for getting their vehicles fixed promptly, according to its UK boss. Paul Willis said that drivers would not get “goodwill payments” over the diesel emissions scandal because the money would be better spent speeding up the repairs process. – The Times

The crews of two US Navy vessels were picked up by the Iranian authorities in the Persian Gulf on Tuesday, setting up a new source of friction between Washington and Tehran just days before last year’s landmark nuclear agreement is due to be implemented. US officials said they expected the sailors to be released soon but were scrambling for more information about the incident which was revealed just hours before President Barack Obama’s last State of the Union address. – Financial Times

Companies around the world will be forced to add close to $3tn of leasing commitments to their balance sheets under new rules from US and international regulators — significantly increasing the net debt that must be reported by airlines and retailers. A new financial reporting standard — the culmination of decades of debate over “off-balance sheet” financing — will affect more than one in two public companies globally. – Financial Times