The Serious Fraud Office has told Tesco former group commercial director Kevin Grace that he will not face charges in its probe over a £326m hole in the UK retailer’s accounts, according to two people familiar with the situation, The Financial Times writes. The paper says the decision could mean SFO is closer to announcing whether to charge the retailer. The Telegraph points out that for the company to be prosecuted under English law, the SFO must be able to show someone senior enough - the so-called “directing mind” - was involved in the alleged behaviour. Former CEO Philip Clarke was also told last month he would escape charges. But three former executives - Christopher Bush, Carl Rogberg and John Scouler - have been charged with fraud and false accounting by the SFO and will stand trial in September 2017.

Heineken saw off competition from one of the founders of Punch Taverns to agree a £400m deal for the pub operator. The Dutch brewer and investment firm Patron Capital will take over 3,000 pubs across the UK after combining to form Vine Acquisitions, The Guardian reports. David Forde, the UK boss of Heineken, described the deal as a “huge vote of confidence in the ‘Great British pub’”. However, as The Telegraph points out, shares in Punch surged 7.9% to 191p yesterday - higher than the 180p price offered, suggesting traders expect a counterbid to emerge. The bid is currently backed by the Punch board and the thre major shareholders, Glenview Capital, Avenue Capital and Warwick Capital Partners, which accounts for 52% of the shares (The Times).

Nestlé has lost its EU trademark protection for its four-fingered KitKat as the Intellectual Property Office revokes registration in case brought by Mondelez. The General Court in Luxembourg, the second-highest court in the EU, ruled that for the confectionery bar to be protected, consumers needed to recognise — across all EU states — that it had a distinctive character, according to The Financial Times.

The FT also picks up the administration of a maker of pink wafers. The paper writes that Rivington Biscuits’ finances crumbled as the pound fell. The Wigan-based business was forced into administration after running up monthly losses of more than £200,000 since July. Click here to read the full story on thegrocer.co.uk/finance.

News that takeaway delivery business Just Eat has swallowed its rivals for £300m bill makes plenty of headlines. The Times writes that in the UK it is buying Hungryhouse from the Berlin-based Delivery Hero for an initial sum of £200m, with a deal in Canada, where it is already the number one in the delivery market, for SkipTheDishes, a business with 2,900 restaurants and 350,000 active users. The Telegraph says that Just Eat boss David Buttress said the offer to pay ten times the annual sales of Hungry House, which is yet to turn a profit, is “not steep at all”. The Hungry House deal will have to be cleared by the Competition and Markets Authority (The Guardian). The Lex column in The Financial Times adds that the the UK’s competition authority will look at the deal but that the consumer still has “the whip hand”. “At a push they can even wield the skillet themselves. Consolidation will continue.”

The Queen’s grocer Fortnum & Mason is trying to persuade more of its staff to accept a big cut in basic pay in return for a share of tips in a move that will help reduce its tax bill, according to The Guardian.

Retail sales continued to show robust growth in the run-up to Christmas despite the largest drop in petrol sales in two years, The Times writes. The Office for National Statistics said sales increased by 0.5% excluding fuel in November from October and by 5.9% on the same month last year as bumper sales on Black Friday and Cyber Monday helped the retail sector (The Guardian). However, economists warned that consumer spending is likely to come under increasing pressure next year as higher import prices resulting from the depreciation of sterling start to feed through into consumer prices (The Financial Times).

Britain’s sugar tax could reduce the number of obese children by up to 7% and lead to fewer people developing type-2 diabetes and tooth decay, according to an article in The Lancet Public Health journal (The Financial Times).

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