Shares in French investment bank Natixis rise on Wednesday after its parent BPCE guarantees billions of euros of toxic assets. Keeping with the topic of rescuing banks: U.S. regulators might have opened the way for private equity bidders to enter auctions of troubled banks. Meanwhile, wrangling about Opel — the European unit of General Motors — continues. For top Reuters stories on deals, click here.

And here are stories that we found of interest in the newspapers. Some of the links may require a subscription.

* Lloyds Banking Group may have to write off as much as 500 million pounds on loans it made to pubs group Admiral Taverns, the Financial Times reports.

* Eyeing a controlling stake in EverPower Wind Holdings Inc, Terra Firma Chairman Guy Hands is in advanced stages of talks to invest up to $350 million in the wind-farm developer, the Wall Street Journal says.

* Dutch banking and insurance company ING Groep NV has picked at least six financial institutions to enter the second round of bidding for its Swiss and Asian private banking assets, according to the Wall Street Journal.

* China Sinopec Group’s $7.24 billion acquisition of Swiss oil firm Addax Petroleum Corp was approved by the Iraqi government, a local paper quotes a senior Sinopec official as saying.

*  The London Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange/Euronext may pick up a 5 percent stake each in MCX Stock Exchange, India’s newest bourse, the Mint newspaper says, citing two people close to the development.

Manitowoc Co is set to be the third U.S. manufacturer dropped from the Standard & Poor’s 500 index this year — but the brains behind the benchmark said the shift does not reflect a desire to soft-pedal the sector. 

“Our general concern about sectors is the proportions of sectors in the market and the index should be close to one another, and close is around a percentage point or so,” said David Blitzer, an S&P managing director who chairs the index committee. “Given that the 500 is 75 to 80 percent of the total market cap of the U.S. market, we’re never going to be too far off.”

S&P said late on Monday that it would remove Manitowoc, a maker of cranes and ships, from the benchmark S&P 500 after the close of trading on Aug. 31, noting that its market capitalization ranked it last in the group.

Manitowoc will be replaced by Cardinal Health Inc spin-off, CareFusion Corp, a medical products company.

In March, Tyco International Ltd was dropped from the index, followed by Ingersoll-Rand Co in June. They were replaced by New England’s largest utility Northeast Utilities and utilities contractor Quanta Services Inc.

But Tyco and Ingersoll had something in common besides their sector — they both reincorporated from Bermuda to Europe, making them ineligible for inclusion on this list.

“Two of the three industrials that left did it themselves,” Blitzer said.

Leaving the index — whose members are widely held in a variety of mutual and index funds — can take a toll on a stock’s performance. Manitowoc shares were down 7 percent at $6.35 on Tuesday, on a day that U.S. stocks were mostly higher.

But that penalty has not deterred some companies’ interest in making a move, in the face of concerns that the Obama adminsitration may crack down on incorporations in countries including Bermuda seen as an effort to avoid taxes.

Cooper Industries Ltd in June said it planned to reincorporate to Ireland, joining Ingersoll, saying that lower taxes and regulatory costs would help its bottom line.

But Blitzer laughed at the idea that S&P could even try to muscle any single sector out of its benchmark index.

“I don’t think that we could do it, not that we’ve ever tried,” be said. “It just wouldn’t work.”

The Obama administration pledges to stay out of General Motors’ choice of a buyer for its European Opel unit, while union leaders in Germany put more pressure on the U.S. automaker to make a decision. Meanwhile, Lowe’s Companies Inc (LOW.N), the No. 2 U.S. home improvement chain, is making its first foray outside North America through a joint venture with Woolworths Ltd (WOW.AX), Australia’s largest retailer.

For more on these stories, and all the other latest deals news from Reuters, click here.

And here’s what’s in the papers (some external links may require subscriptions):

* The sale of Royal Bank of Scotland’s (RBS.L) retail and commercial assets in China has hit a stumbling block that could derail the talks with the preferred bidder, Standard Chartered (STAN.L), the Financial Times reported.

* Britain’s largest free-to-air broadcaster ITV (ITV.L) is weeks away from signing a deal with Hulu, the U.S. video-on-demand venture, to syndicate its content in exchange for equity in the company, the Daily Telegraph said.

* China’s state-owned Shandong Iron and Steel Group, the world’s eighth-largest steel maker, will take a 67 percent stake in Rizhao Iron and Steel, one of the sector’s largest non-state firms, the 21st Century Business Herald reported on Tuesday.

* Chinese supermarket chain Times Ltd’s (1832.HK) majority shareholder has invited bidders to make offers for the retailer, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the situation.

* Toyota Motor Corp (7203.T) plans to raise its daily production level in Japan in November compared with a year earlier for the first time in 16 months, thanks to a recovery in demand, the Asahi newspaper reported on Tuesday. Reuters story here.

* Austrian bank BAWAG P.S.K., owned by U.S. financier Cerberus Capital, will get a planned 550 million euros ($786.8 million) of state aid in October or November but will have to accept strict conditions, state broadcaster ORF reported. Reuters story here.