LONDON (ShareCast) - Apollo, the American private equity group, is understood to have approached Barratt Developments to offer to buy a stake in the troubled UK housebuilder, The Times has learnt.

The US firm, which specialises in making investments in distressed companies and has a large European real estate fund, is believed to have offered to inject between £300m and £400m into Barratt at a small premium to the current share price. Barratt, which is understood to have rejected the offer, has a current market value of about £933m.

BAE Systems, the defence contractor at the centre of one of the UK's biggest arms sales sagas, should undergo an independent annual audit to make sure it meets the highest ethical standards, the long-awaited report by Lord Woolf will recommend today. The report by the former lord chief justice was commissioned by BAE in June to draw a line under the years of criticism that have dogged it since it signed the £43bn Al-Yamamah deal in 1989, reports the FT.

BlackRock, the US asset manager, will pay UBS $15bn (£7.6bn) for a portfolio of subprime mortgage debt in a deal that the Swiss bank plans to announce with its first-quarter results. BlackRock’s move represents one of the more significant examples of a growing number of contrarian bets by leading financial firms, indicating that the worst is over in the credit markets says the FT.

Microsoft is understood to be in preliminary talks with Time Warner about buying AOL, the media group’s internet unit, The Times has learnt. The software giant is understood to be keen to find alternative acquisitions to increase its internet presence after being forced to abandon plans to buy Yahoo! for $47.5bn at the weekend. It is not known whether the talks between the two parties began because Microsoft was trying to stymie discussions between Time Warner and Yahoo!, its initial bid target.

Brit Insurance, the reinsurance broker is investigating whether jurisdictions such as Dublin or Geneva are more tax-efficient than the UK, which is increasingly seen as operating a business-unfriendly regime. Several other companies, including Sir Martin Sorrell’s WPP Group, have said they are considering such a move, in reaction to plans to increase the amount of tax firms pay on overseas earnings, writes the Times.

Gordon Brown is in “very dangerous territory” on corporate taxation, with Britain facing an exodus of companies moving to lower tax regimes, a leading business organisation has warned. Changes under Mr Brown’s premiership have made tax “problem number one” for British business, the EEF manufacturers’ body Martin Temple said in an interview with the FT.

The post-credit crisis economic recovery could be "snuffed out" by high oil prices, experts have warned, as the price of crude broke through the $120 mark for the first time. The influential Ernst & Young Item Club warned that rising oil prices may force it to slash its growth forecast for next year dramatically, and could cause inflation to as much as double. It came as crude prices passed through the $120 mark yesterday for the first time on record, amid fears about disruptions to the supply in Nigeria and Iraq, writes the Telegraph.

Thousands of small businesses face an increase in their banking charges of several hundred pounds a year following a decision by one of the UK's biggest banks to axe free business banking for a group of its customers. Business account holders at the Royal Bank of Scotland who have hitherto not paid for their accounts face paying the fees from June 2. The bank says it is merely bringing the businesses into line with their 1m other business customers and arrangements at other banks, reports the Telegraph.

Thousands of manufacturing jobs are facing the axe as the industrial sector becomes the latest victim of the credit crisis, according to research by business lobby group the CBI. Despite the fall in the pound and a recent rise in export expectations, Britain's manufacturers are planning major cutbacks. The CBI regional trends survey, out today, shows an estimated 18,000 manufacturing jobs will be axed in the second quarter, mainly in the South East and London, South West and East of England, says the Telegraph.

The number of properties being repossessed has soared as the effects of the credit crunch push court orders from banks and building societies to record highs, figures will show this week. The tally of 95,374 repossession orders during 2007 was the highest since the housing crash of the early 1990s – when they peaked at 142,905 in 1991. In the last three months of 2007, the number of home repossession orders climbed by 6.3%to 25,008, writes the Independent.

• News Channel