Monday newspaper round-up: Smith & Nephew, BP, Portugal...

The healthcare group Smith & Nephew has rejected an offer from its American rival Johnson & Johnson, it emerged last night.The offer is reported to have been pitched at exactly £1 more than the 650p S&N shares closed at on Friday and would have valued the group at almost £6.7bn. A company spokesman refused to comment on reports of the offer. "Smith & Nephew never comments on market speculation." Nevertheless, the group will come under pressure to make a formal statement. The indicative approach is thought to have been made before Christmas and to have been rejected by the board as substantially undervaluing the business, the Times reports.Oil markets were braced on Monday for the impact of the loss of up to 15% of US crude after a pipeline leak forced BP, the UK-based oil company, to shut down 95% of production from North America's biggest field. The development, at the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System that carries oil from the Prudhoe Bay field, comes as BP is still grappling with the fallout from the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. A prolonged shutdown would cut into BP's output and could undermine earnings, the FT reports.Brazil has warned that the world is on course for a full-blown "trade war" as it stepped up its rhetoric against exchange rate manipulation. Guido Mantega, finance minister, told the Financial Times that Brazil was preparing new measures to prevent further appreciation of its currency, the real, and would raise the issue of exchange-rate manipulation at the World Trade Organisation and other global bodies. He said the US and China were among the worst offenders.Senior British executives of Alstom were part of a "wide-scale" plot by the French engineering giant to bribe public officials around the world, according to prosecutors. Investigators from the Serious Fraud Office suspected that Alstom's UK division was one of several "cells" that the company used to distribute corrupt payments to secure contracts in overseas markets, according to court documents obtained by The Times.Portugal was under intensifying pressure last night to accept an economic bailout. According to reports emerging from Brussels, both Germany and France were increasingly of the belief that the struggling Iberian country should accept help from the EU and IMF to stop the eurozone's debt crisis from spreading. Although no formal talks on aid have started yet, a number of eurozone insiders said that pressure was rising within the bloc, the Times reports.Some of Europe's biggest banks could see as much as a quarter of profits wiped out by the combined impact of 10 new levies imposed on their balance sheets in different countries across the continent. According to a European Union report prepared for last month's European Council meeting, and seen by the Financial Times, France's Crédit Agricole will be the hardest hit by the new taxes, which could absorb as much as 24% of pre-tax profits.Companies are to be given greater freedom to sack under-performing workers as part of an overhaul of employment laws to boost the economic recovery. The new "employers' charter" will allow companies to sack workers during the first two years of their employment without the threat of being taken to a tribunal for unfair dismissal. Currently an employee can bring an unfair dismissal claim after only a year. To reduce the number of vexatious allegations, workers will face a fee when lodging an employment tribunal claim, the Telegraph reports.Britain's financial-services sector continued to recover during the final quarter of 2010, a report from the CBI reveals today, with businesses such as banking, insurance and investment reporting strong growth in activity. The CBI said that 50% of financial-services businesses had reported a growth in sales volumes during the three months to the end of December, while 23% reported a fall. The positive balance, of 27%, was almost identical to the corresponding figure of 28% for the third quarter of 2010, the Independent reports.Taxpayers have been the biggest victims of a surge in big frauds, losing nearly £600m last year, according to KPMG. The number of recorded fraud cases last year rose by 16% to 314, the accounting firm has revealed in new research. The level is the highest in more than 20 years and cost victims almost £1.4bn. The government is being targeted increasingly by fraudsters and accounts for two out of every five cases, according to KPMG. the Times reports.JD Wetherspoon chairman Tim Martin has turned his sights on one of London's most successful property entrepreneurs in his fight against what he describes as "greedy" property agents. The pub chain which Mr Martin set up filed a writ at the High Court against property entrepreneur, Anthony Lyons, over his alleged part in the "fraudulent and dishonest" sale of pubs to Wetherspoon by the company's then advisor Van de Berg, the Telegraph reports.Sales of Rolls-Royce cars reached record levels last year as demand in Asia soared and cash-rich buyers splashed out on bespoke models as the global economy recovered. China has now overtaken the UK to be Rolls' second- biggest market after the US, while Asia-Pacific is the biggest region thanks to strong growth in the UAE, India, Korea and Japan, the Telegraph reports.Britain's manufacturing industry is capable of leading the economy further out of recession during 2011, its trade body will say today, with strong demand for exports - from emerging markets particularly - set to provide a further filip to the sector.The manufacturers' organisation EEF says the sector, which accounts for around 13% of the UK economy, will continue to outperform, and growth this year will be more balanced, the Independent reports.Large US financial groups are bracing for a new battery of stress tests that will determine which institutions are now healthy enough to raise dividends and buy back shares. The Federal Reserve is expected this week to begin examining data provided by 19 groups, including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, to gauge how their balance sheets would withstand a variety of new economic and financial shocks, the FT reports.