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Chinese pork producer WH Group Ltd is seeking to raise up to $3 billion as early as this month in a revived Hong Kong initial public offering (IPO) which saw the deal size cut by nearly two-thirds, Thomson Reuters publication IFR reported on Thursday. The offer would be the second attempt this year by the world's biggest pork company to go public, as it seeks funds to repay part of the debt it took to foot last year's $7.1 billion purchase of U.S. pork producer Smithfield International. In April, WH Group pulled an Hong Kong IPO it had hoped would raise up to $5.3 billion after investors baulked at the high valuation. The 29 banks - a record number - hired to manage the offer also sent confusing signals to institutional investors, while the negative publicity surrounding sky-high executive compensation raised corporate governance issues. The new IPO would only comprise primary shares, meaning existing shareholders including CDH Investments, New Horizon, Goldman Sachs and Te

Credit costs for securities financing and derivatives transactions were little changed in the three months to the end of May, a European Central Bank survey released on Thursday showed. _0"> The ECB's June survey of credit terms and conditions in euro-denominated securities financing and over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives markets showed that: * Price terms remained almost unchanged for most counter-party types except hedge funds. * Non-price credit terms eased for banks, dealers and hedge funds, but on balance remained basically unchanged for other counterparty types. * Credit terms for funding that is collateralised by euro-denominated securities eased further for many types of collateral, albeit to a lesser extent than during the previous reference period. "The survey suggests that, across the entire range of securities financing and over-the-counter derivatives transactions, offered price terms (such as financing rates/spreads) on balance remained almost unch

Britain's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said the level of suspicious share price moves ahead of the announcement of takeover bids or mergers rose slightly to 15.1 percent in the last financial year, up from 14.9 percent in the prior period. _0"> The FCA, launched in 2013 to take a harder line on financial crime, said on Thursday this was still well down on the nearly 30 percent level seen back in 2010. Unexplained moves are defined as anything outside a stock's normal movement, which usually refers to volume and frequency of trading. The FCA published its update on "market cleanliness" in its annual report. (Reporting by Huw Jones ; Editing by David Holmes )

Libya's oil industry hopes life will return to normal now that a wave of protests has ebbed, but it will take months to ramp up production and more unrest is in prospect as political chaos spreads in the North African country. A group of eastern rebels agreed last week to clear two major ports they had seized almost a year ago in a drive for regional autonomy. Together with the freeing of the southern El Sharara oilfield, where a separate group has ended a blockade of its own, the ports' reopening could boost oil exports by 650,000 barrels a day in the next few weeks - helping to restore much of the 1.4 million bpd Libya used to pump before protests paralysed the sector. The rebels agreed to end their blockades after Libyans voted for a new parliamentary assembly last month in which candidates campaigning for a federal state that would share oil wealth between all regions scored well in the neglected east, according to preliminary results. But more protests can erupt at a

Oil that matches the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico has been found in the bodies of sickened fish, according to a team of Florida scientists who studied the oil's chemical composition. "We matched up the oil in the livers and flesh with Deepwater Horizon like a fingerprint," lead researcher Steven Murawski, a professor at the University of South Florida's College of Marine Science in Tampa, told Reuters. He said the findings debunk arguments that fish abnormalities could have been caused by other factors including oil in coastal runoff and oil from naturally occurring seeps in the Gulf. BP, whose oil rig caused the spill, rejected the research, stating in an emailed response that it was "not possible to accurately identify the source of oil based on chemical traces found in fish livers or tissue." BP's statement added, "vertebrates such as fish very quickly metabolize and eliminate oil compounds. Once metabolized, the sourc

An oil industry lobbying group on Wednesday unveiled voluntary standards aimed at tamping down concerns about the oil and gas production process known as horizontal drilling, or fracking, in communities around the United States. _0"> The American Petroleum Institute said it published standards for how to engage with communities that host shale drilling sites, based on the "best practices" of industry participants who have been involved in such projects for 65 years. "The energy revolution is now occurring in areas of the country where oil and natural gas exploration doesn't have the same history as Texas or Oklahoma," API director of standards David Miller said of the move. The "good neighbor" standards include a list of steps oil and gas companies should take to "help local leaders and residents prepare for energy exploration, minimize interruption to the community, and manage resources." The guidelines do not address common l

The Australian Senate rejected legislation to repeal the country's carbon tax on Thursday because it did not guarantee savings would be passed onto consumers, but amended legislation could still pass as early as next week. Mining magnate Clive Palmer's Palmer United Party (PUP), which holds the balance of power in the Senate, had said it would pass the legislation but withdrew support at the last minute. "We're very clear: we support the removal of the carbon tax, but we don't support the removal of the carbon tax if it means it won't flow on to normal people," Palmer told reporters. Australia has among the world's highest carbon emissions per capita due mainly to its reliance on coal-fired power stations. Conservative Prime Minister Tony Abbott, once a climate-change sceptic, made the abolition of the carbon tax a centrepiece of his 2013 election, arguing it financially burdened industry and consumers and did little to cut emissions. The last m