Stelios creates an atmosphere over easyJet’s new planes

The airline’s combative founder has forced a meeting this week in which he will try to dismiss four directors

Video conferencing may have shown it can replace plenty of physical business gatherings over the past couple of months, but there are some occasions when it just doesn’t cut it.

Take this week’s easyJet general meeting, part of the latest in the series of sensational scraps between its founder, Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, and the budget airline’s board. It is hard to see how something will not be lost with everyone out of lapel-grabbing reach.

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EasyJet founder offers £5m reward as he seeks to derail Airbus order

Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou seeks ‘whistleblower’ to help scupper airline’s £4.5bn, 107-plane deal

EasyJet founder Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou is offering £5m to any “whistleblower” providing him with information that scuppers the budget airline’s 107-plane order from Airbus.

Haji-Ioannou, who has been attempting to force easyJet’s board to cancel the order for months, says the £4.5bn deal will leave the carrier without enough cash to survive the coronavirus crisis.

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EasyJet agrees delay with Airbus on delivery of 24 new aircraft

Stelios Haji-Ioannou, easyJet’s biggest shareholder, has repeatedly tried to get order cancelled

EasyJet has agreed with Airbus to delay the delivery of 24 new aircraft as the budget airline tries to stave off a shareholder rebellion led by its founder and former chief executive, Stelios Haji-Ioannou.

Haji-Ioannou, easyJet’s biggest shareholder, has repeatedly called for easyJet to cancel its orders for new planes, with coronavirus lockdowns likely wiping out months of revenues.

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Airbus to pay record £3bn in fines for ‘endemic’ corruption

UK court sanctions fines after firm admits using agents across world to bribe officials to land high-value contracts

Airbus, Europe’s largest aerospace multinational, is to pay a record £3bn in penalties after admitting it had paid huge bribes on an “endemic” basis to land contracts in 20 countries.

Anti-corruption investigators hailed the result as the largest ever corporate fine for bribery in the world after judges declared that the corruption was “grave, pervasive and pernicious”.

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Scotch whisky and French wine hit by $7.5bn US tariffs

The 25% levies also include British knitwear and EU cheese and aircraft as White House retaliates for subsidies given to Airbus

The US is set to impose $7.5bn (£6.1bn) of tariffs on exports from the EU including scotch whisky, French wine and cheese and aircraft in retaliation for subsidies given to the aerospace group Airbus after a World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling..

Related: Airbus on course to overtake Boeing as biggest planemaker

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