US tech giant Apple launched the biggest corporate bond offering ever last night, raising $17bn to help fund its proposed $100bn giveaway to shareholders by 2015, reports The Times. Wall Street sources says that the company could have raised as much as $50bn due to a flood of demand.

Chinese manufacturing growth slowed down this month, according to an official purchasing managers’ index (PMI), “providing further evidence of weakness in the world’s second-largest economy”, writes the Financial Times. The paper reports that the manufacturing PMI fell from 50.9 to 50.6 in April.

“Vince Cable has put pressure on Scottish prosecutors to speed up action that could see Fred Goodwin and other former Royal Bank of Scotland directors disqualified for their roles in the bank’s collapse,” writes The Telegraph.

According to the Financial Times, the UK Listings Authority has launched an investigation into ENRC possible breaches of its takeover rues that could result in a fine or public censure. “The irony of the move is that the UK Listings Authority has been criticised for permitting ENRC to list in the UK in the first place,” the paper says.

Chancellor George Osborne has told Bank of England governor Sir Mervyn King that the Bank risks derailing the UK economy if it uses tough financial watchdog powers to “clamp down too hard on the City”, The Guardian says.

The Guardian says that the Office of Fair Trading has referred Cineworld‘s takeover of cinema chain Picturehouse to the Competition Commission on concerns that it could be bad for film-goers.

Sir Martin Sorrell, the head of adverting and media group WPP, is to have his basic salary and potential reduced this year after the news that his package packed rose by nearly half to £17.6m in 2012, The Independent says.