Brexit set for a reset but with thorny issues kicked into the long grass

Hello and welcome to the working week.

The theme tune for the next seven days is from Manchester’s finest, The Smiths: Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want.

British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer hosts the UK-EU summit in London to strike a deal on bilateral trade relations, attended by European Council President António Costa and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen. They’ll get something, but it is going to the wire and it will make people on either side unhappy, as my colleagues in Westminster and Brussels have uncovered. We can say with some confidence that there will be a new defence pact between the UK and EU. The sticking points are fishing rights and youth mobility.

The unfolding US tariff war with much of the rest of the world will (as it has been for what now seems like forever) be a driver of news this week. The timing of bilateral talks is uncertain, but I can tell you with some certainty that the topic will feature heavily in the three-day gathering of G7 finance ministers and central bankers in Banff, Canada, which begins on Tuesday.

Want to know what the US-China superpower trade showdown in particular means for the world? There’s an FT subscriber webinar for that, held on May 28 at midday London time, when you can put your questions to my colleagues Gideon Rachman and Eleanor Olcott, plus guests Oren Cass and Janka Oertel. Register now at ft.com/us-china.

Earnings season is less hectic than previous weeks, but there will still be notable reports — not least cyber attack victim Marks and Spencer, which presents full-year figures on Wednesday. There is also a steady flow of corporate news items in this newsletter’s calendar.

A major corporate legal case reaches London’s High Court on Monday. Collapsed hospital operator NMC Health is likely to get about £2.4bn in damages from accountancy firm EY for allegedly negligent audits between 2012 and 2018. The trial, expected to last 12 weeks, will examine how one of the UK’s biggest corporate meltdowns went undetected. NMC administrators Alvarez & Marsal will argue that EY fell below the required standard in its audit, including by failing to check a key financial register and allowing “a large proportion” of bank confirmation statements to be routed via NMC, leaving them open to manipulation.

Google holds its Input/Output annual developer conference in Mountain View, California, on Tuesday. The event typically involves a keynote speech by Google chief executive Sundar Pichai and will probably include announcements about new products.

On the other side of the Pacific, the Computex artificial intelligence conference will begin in Taipei with a keynote address from Foxconn chair Young Liu.

Talking of keynote addresses, central bankers will be hitting the speaker circuit this week with gusto. There is less oomph to the economic data run, but inflation will be a strong theme, watched closely for signs of the impact of Donald Trump’s tariffs, with consumer price index and producer price index updates from the EU, Germany, Japan, Britain and Canada. China and Australia will hold interest rate-setting meetings, and the US will update on state employment numbers. More details below.

One more thing . . . 

In honour of the Cannes Film Festival concluding with the Palme d’Or award on Saturday, I am looking forward to spending one night next weekend watching the latest creation by one of my favourite directors at present in employment, The Phoenician Scheme by Wes Anderson. It’s all about the little details, as this 2024 HTSI piece explains.

Should I be modelling my lifestyle better? What are you looking forward to next week that this newsletter needs to cover? Email me at jonathan.moules@ft.com or, if you are reading this from your inbox, hit reply.

Key economic and company reports

Here is a more complete list of what to expect in terms of company reports and economic data this week.

Monday

• Federal Reserve Bank of New York president John Williams speaks on the US economic outlook at the Mortgage Bankers Association Secondary and Capital Markets Conference in New York

• NMC Health’s lawsuit against auditor EY begins at London’s High Court

• Canada: Victoria Day (National Patriots’ Day in Quebec). Financial markets closed

• China: April retail sales and industrial output figures

• EU: April harmonised indices of consumer prices (HICP) inflation rate data

• Germany: March industrial orders data

• UK: Rightmove monthly House Price index

• Results: Big Yellow FY, Cerillion HY, Diageo Q3 trading update, Genuit trading statement ahead of annual general meeting, Kainos FY, Ryanair FY

Tuesday

• Huw Pill, Bank of England chief economist and executive director for monetary analysis, gives a speech at the Barclays briefing

• Nigel Lingwood becomes Forterra chair at the end of the company’s AGM, succeeding Justin Atkinson who is retiring

• Google Input/Output annual developer conference in Mountain View.

• Foxconn chair Young Liu gives a keynote speech at the Computex artificial intelligence conference in Taipei, Taiwan. The event runs until Friday

• Shell holds its AGM, an event that often attracts climate protesters.

• Australia: interest rate decision

• Canada: April consumer price index (CPI) inflation rate data

• China: interest rate announcement

• Germany: April producer price index (PPI) inflation rate data

• UK: monthly insolvency figures

• Results: Cranswick FY, Forterra AGM and trading update, Greggs trading update, Home Depot Q1, Keysight Technologies Q2, Palo Alto Networks Q3, Smiths Q3 trading update, Sompo FY, SSP HY, Topps Tiles HY, Vodafone FY

Wednesday

• US Treasury Department’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the US expected to make its recommendation on Nippon Steel’s acquisition of US Steel

• FT Live Climate & Impact Summit Europe begins in London. Register here for the two-day event

• IEA Global Critical Minerals Outlook report

• France: Q1 new home sales figures

• UK: April CPI inflation rate data

• US: April state employment and unemployment

• Results: Avon Technologies HY, Close Brothers Q3 trading update, Coats AGM and trading update, Currys pre-close FY trading update, Great Portland Estates FY, Helical FY, HICL Infrastructure FY, Intermediate Capital Group FY, JD Sports Fashion FY and Q1 trading update, Lowe’s Q1, Marks and Spencer FY, Medtronic Q4, Severn Trent FY, SSE FY, Target Q1, TJX Q1, Urban Outfitters Q1, Zoom Q1

Thursday

• Bank of England chief economist Huw Pill gives keynote speech at the Oesterreichische Nationalbank and SUERF Annual Economics Conference 2025, titled ‘Monetary policy and structural tectonic shifts’, in Vienna.

• Eurozone, France, Germany, India, Japan, UK, US: S&P Global/HCOB manufacturing and services purchasing managers’ index (PMI) data

• EU: minutes from last European Central Bank rate-setting meeting published.

• UK: April public sector finances

• Results: Analog Devices Q2, Autodesk Q1, British Land FY, BT FY, easyJet HY, Hill & Smith trading update, Intuit Q3, Investec FY, Johnson Matthey FY, Julius Baer interim management statement, Mitchells & Butlers HY, Ralph Lauren Q4, Qinetiq FY, Tate & Lyle FY, Toronto-Dominion Bank Q2

Friday

• Takeover Panel’s extended deadline for Greencore to announce either a firm intention to make an offer for Bakkavor or that it does not intend to make an offer

• France: May consumer confidence survey

• Germany: Q1 GDP estimate

• Japan: April CPI inflation rate data

• UK: April Great Britain retail sales figures. Also, GfK UK Consumer Confidence Survey

• US: April new residential home sales

• Results: AJ Bell HY

World events

Finally, here is a rundown of other events and milestones this week.

Monday

• Switzerland: 78th World Health Assembly begins in Geneva, running until May 27

• UK: British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer hosts the UK-EU summit in central London

Tuesday

• Belgium: EU foreign and defence ministers attend a meeting in Brussels, chaired by Kaja Kallas, the EU high representative for foreign affairs and security policy

• Canada: G7 finance ministers and central bank governors gather in Banff, Alberta, for discussions on global economic stability, the Ukraine conflict, financial crime, the impact of artificial intelligence and trade tariffs.

• UK: Chelsea Flower Show begins

Wednesday

Thursday

• Belgium: Brussels Economic Forum. Speakers include Valdis Dombrovskis, the EU commissioner for economy and productivity and for implementation and simplification; Renault chief Luca de Meo; and Electrolux chief Yannick Fierling.

• New Zealand: Budget announcement by finance minister Nicola Willis

• Spain: Parliamentary Intelligence-Security Forum opens in Madrid. The two-day event will be hosted by Spanish Senate president Pedro Rollán Ojeda

• UK: Hay Festival, an annual gathering to celebrate literature and the arts, begins in the Welsh town of Hay-on-Wye, running until June 1

• US: President Donald Trump due to hold a gala dinner for the top 220 holders of the Trump memecoin at the Trump National Golf Club in Washington

Saturday

Sunday

• France: French Open tennis begins at the Roland-Garros courts in Paris

• Israel: Jerusalem Day national holiday begins, marking the date in the Hebrew calendar when the city was unified under Israeli rule at the end of the 1967 war

• Venezuela: parliamentary and regional elections