THE airports group BAA faces a crunch week for its £7.1 billion refinancing. Bondholders in the company vote on Tuesday whether to accept the terms of a plan to shift their loans into a new credit structure.

Most bondholders have indicated their acceptance, but one group, advised by investment bank UBS, has not indicated how it will vote. Talks between BAA and UBS continued this weekend.

City sources expect a deal to be concluded but said it was unclear what terms the UBS group would demand.

Hedge fund's bumper payout

THE FOLLOWING STORY IS SUBJECT TO A LEGAL COMPLAINT

A HEDGE-FUND manager who is a close friend of Tory party leader David Cameron paid himself a hefty salary for 2007. A probe by US financial regulators has since forced the managers into prematurely winding down the funds. Of the funds managed by Pentagon, around 90% of the funds from its largest strategy have already been distributed to investors. Lewis Chester, founder of Pentagon Capital Management, rewarded his team in 2007 with a combined wage of £5.2m, according to accounts filed at Companies House. This was an increase of £1.6m on 2006 - this partly reflected an increase in the firm's number of employees. The fund’s overall performance was described as “reasonable although unspectacular” in the directors’ own report. Pentagon’s pre-tax profits for the year were down from £25.3m to £7.3m.

SEC probe at Citi

THE Securities and Exchange Commission, Wall Street’s regulator, is investigating the sale of “auction-rate securities” by Citigroup, America’s biggest bank.

Citi revealed the probe on Friday, and is also responding to subpoenas from Massachusetts and Texas over the securities, a form of bonds that have their interest rate set at periodic auctions.

In addition, authorities are probing a number of other firms over the sale of the securities.

Suitors for Paragon

THE private-equity house Bridgepoint has emerged as a suitor for the buy-to-let mortgage company Paragon. The lender recently revealed it had received approaches from a number of parties.

Blackstone, the American private-equity giant, is understood to be one and Bridgepoint, which recently bought the Pret A Manger sandwich chain, the other.

Paragon, which has stopped taking new customers, has a market value of £290m.

New bid for Wilmington

WILMINGTON, owner of the journalists’ trade title Press Gazette, has received a second approach that could lead to a takeover. BPP, the graduate training firm, has asked to see the same limited information granted last week to private-equity firm HG Capital. Wilmington is worth £164m. One of its main divisions trains lawyers while BPP trains accountants. Both companies declined to comment.

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