A late PS: Shares in jet engine maker Rolls-Royce have dropped by almost 6% in late trading, after airline Cathay Pacific detected problems with several engine components.

Cathay Pacific has been forced to cancel some flights as it conducts a “precautionary” inspection of its entire Airbus SE A350 fleet.

Bloomberg has the details:

The Hong Kong-based airline, among the biggest operators of the European planemaker’s marquee jet, said it identified an engine component failure on an A350 aircraft that was forced to return from its flight to Zurich on Monday. A subsequent check of the fleet uncovered “a number of the same engine components that need to be replaced,” Cathay said in a statement.

The company didn’t specify the issue it had found on the engine, which is made by Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc. Representatives for Rolls-Royce didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment, while Airbus referred to the engine maker and the airline for comment.

More here.

Time for a recap.

Over in Germany, carmarket Volkswagen is considering making unprecented factory closures in its home market, as it tries to cut costs.

The company says it can no longer rule out plant closures in Germany – something it hasn’t done before in its history.

According to Bloomberg, Volkswagen is also considering trying its pact with unions to avoid any job cuts until 2029.

VW chief executive officer Oliver Blume said in a statement that the market was getting “tougher”.

“The economic environment has become even tougher and new players are pushing into Europe.

“Germany as a business location is falling further behind in terms of competitiveness.”

Daniela Cavallo, chair of the council that represents VW’s workers, has told employees that VW is considering shutting factories in Germany and cutting jobs.

In a note circulated to employees, reported by the Financial Times, Cavallo explained that VW brand chief executive Thomas Schäfer had on Monday “admitted” that planned savings had fallen short.

Cavallo added:

“As a result, the executive board is now questioning German plants, the VW in-house collective wage agreements and the job security programme running until the end of 2029.”

Hewlett Packard is planning to pursue its $4bn damages claim against the estate of British tech tycoon Mike Lynch, who died when his superyacht sank last month.

HP said in a statement on Monday:

“It is HPE’s intention to follow the proceedings through to their conclusion,”

HP has claimed that it lost more than $4bn after it acquired software firm Autonomy, accusing co-founder Lynch of an elaborate fraud that inflated its value.

In 2022, HP won a civil fraud case against Lynch, with a high court judge ruling that he duped the US firm into paying £8.2bn for his software firm Autonomy.

But in June, Lynch was cleared of fraud following a lengthy trial in the US.

Microsoft reports that a problem affecting its Azure platform today – which may have had a knock-on impact on consumer services – has been “mitigated”.

Lloyds Bank has apologised to customers after online banking issues have left some unable to view their recent transactions.

According to the website DownDetector, more than 650 Lloyds outages were reported on Monday morning.

A spokeswoman for Lloyds said:

“We know some of our customers are having issues viewing their recent transactions and our app may be running slower than usual.

“We’re sorry about this and we’re working to have everything back to normal soon.”

There have also been reports of problems using Microsoft’s Azure portal in the UK. Downdetector says this could be the cause of “the multiple issues reported by UK consumers”.