Elsewhere this morning, a director at Britain’s grid operator Neso (National Energy Systems Operator) has said it will conduct an internal review over allegations of a cover-up.

Claire Coutinho, the shadow energy secretary, has alleged that bosses at Neso ordered control-room staff to hide information that showed the grid was not being run securely.

This allegedly involved ordering staff not to keep permanent records of operational decisions to ensure there was no paper trail.

Julian Leslie, director of strategic energy planning at Neso, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:

We take all allegations seriously and we will conduct our own internal review into those allegations to get to the root cause of those. But what I can assure everybody…is that the control room is staffed by experienced, expert engineers that take real pride in their job, that they are authorised to make the decisions they make and only authorised people can make those decisions.

In terms of recording information, obviously those engineers in the control room are dispatching the generation across the nation and that is done through computer systems where there is clear records and logs of decisions that have been made, both at our end of the computer system and at the receiving end. So our investigation will look into all of that. We will get clarity as to what actually happened very soon.

European stock markets have opened broadly higher this morning – the UK’s blue chip FTSE 100 index is up 0.3%, led by a 11.7% rise in Vodafone after the news that the French billionaire Xavier Niel has bought a £4.4bn stake in the business.

The French Cac 40 is broadly flat, while the German Dax has slipped 0.07%. But the Stoxx Europe 600, which tracks the biggest companies across the whole continent, is up very slightly by 0.08%.

Shares in easyJet have popped 13% this morning after surprise news of a new £5.7bn takeover deal with the US private equity firm Apollo.

Aarin Chiekrie, an equity analyst at the broker Hargreaves Lansdown, notes that Castlelake could still come back with a higher bid.

Apollo said that it believes easyJet has significant long-term growth potential and supports its existing strategy of strengthening its low-cost carrier model by upgrading its fleet to newer, more efficient planes. This is an expensive task for any airline, and easyJet’s ambitions could be sped up by access to new capital and the longer-term strategic planning that’s afforded to private companies.

Apollo’s offer is now the preferred option and the one that easyJet’s management would recommend to shareholders. But the deal’s not off the runway yet, with Apollo having until 7 August to decide whether to make a formal bid. In that time, rival bidder Castlelake could still come to the table with improved terms.”

French telecoms billionaire Xavier Niel has become Vodafone’s largest shareholder after buying a 16.21% stake for £4.4bn.

On Friday, Emirati telecoms group e&, which first took a stake in Vodafone in 2022, announced the sale of its entire shareholding for 112.5p a share.

Niel, who founded the telecoms company Iliad, has bought the stake through investment vehicle Vega at a 15% premium to Vodafone’s share price on Thursday.

Niel said that Vega, which has been set up solely to house his stake in Vodafone, intends to be a long-term minority shareholder in the telecoms company.

In recent years Vodafone has restructured its business - including selling its Italian and Spanish operations and its 50% stake in its Dutch joint venture - as well as merging with Three to create the UK’s largest mobile operator.

Niel said Vodafone is now a “compelling investment opportunity”. He said:

As a simpler, more focused business, Vodafone is ready for a new phase of growth and is well-placed to unlock substantial untapped value across its European and African operations.

We are confident Vodafone can deliver sustainable growth and strong cash flow generation over the long term and – as an anchor investor based in Europe – we are ready to contribute our deep sector expertise and operational know-how to its future success.”

The 59-year old, who has built telecoms businesses in France, Italy, Poland and Iceland, first took a 2.5% stake in Vodafone in 2022.

Niel, who is estimated to be worth $15.5bn by Forbes, has been the partner of Delphine Arnault, the daughter of France’s richest man, Bernard Arnault, for more than a decade.

His other business interests include French newspaper Le Monde, which he saved from bankruptcy, although two years ago he sold almost all of his shares for €1 to the Fund for Press Independence in a restructure to safeguard the independence of the publication.

Good morning and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy.

A surprise corporate twist this morning: the US private equity firm Apollo has agreed to buy the airline easyJet in a £5.7bn deal, beating a rival bid for the company by Castlelake.

EasyJet has reached an agreement in principle for an offer of £7.15 per share, and has said this morning that its board is inclined to recommend the deal to shareholders.

The airline had been set to be taken private in a £5.5bn deal with the US private credit group Castlelake, which had until 3 August to make its formal offer.

But easyJet said in a statement this morning:

The proposed cash offer delivers a superior outcome for easyJet shareholders by providing a higher cash value than Castlelake’s latest proposal of £6.90 per easyJet share, submitted on 4 July 2026.

Apollo’s offer represents a 22% premium against easyJet’s closing share price yesterday, and an 81% premium compared with its price the day before the offer period for the bid from Castlelake.

Apollo also added that it would agree to take “all necessary steps” to satisfy any EU local ownership rules. Current regulation requires European airlines to be majority owned by a European entity, Castlelake had planned around this by intending to bring two Irish airline executives on board.

Elsewhere today, Asian stock markets have been largely mixed – the Japanese Nikkei and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng are both up by about 1%. The South Korean Kospi is yet again the stand out, up by almost 3%. On mainland China however, shares are slipping – the SSE Composite is down by 0.3%.

The agenda

• 7am BST: EU consumer price index and harmonised consumer price index

• 11am BST: Delta Air Lines earnings