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Czech Airlines has sealed a deal which means a large part of its future fleet will be leased and not owned. The financial burden of honouring an eight-year-old agreement to buy aircraft was untenable for the recovering, but still fragile, carrier.

More and more Czechs are investing in prefabricated flats in Prague as second apartments to let, financial daily Hospodářské noviny reports. According to the daily, the price of pre-fab apartments, once the apple of the eye of the former communist regime, is roughly half that of apartments in brick-and-mortar buildings, while rent in the cheaper apartments are around 75 percent of the monthly average.

The once legendary Favorit bicycle brand, which used to be exported from Czechoslovakia all over the world, is launching a new racing model, the daily Hospodářské noviny reported on Friday. The highest quality models will be priced of 250,000 crowns.

Czech pork and milk producers are finding it increasingly hard to compete with cheap imports from other EU states. Individual producers are seeking ways to sell their products directly to end-consumers and the Czech Agriculture Ministry is considering giving them additional support from the state budget.

Czech labour offices will start providing financial contributions towards travel expenses in order to encourage labour mobility, Czech Television reported on Tuesday. Individual contributions will be between 1,000 to 3,500 crowns.

A bill which would restrict shopping hours on public holidays is back on Parliament’s agenda and is once again meeting with fierce opposition from entrepreneurs. With a vote expected in the coming days the Association of Trade and Tourism and the Czech Business Chamber are scrambling to dissuade MPs from supporting the proposed restrictions.

The biggest Czech publisher of children’s books has just agreed to acquire its nearest rival with an eye on the rights to international hits that should result from the deal.

Two Czech energy companies Energetický a Průmyslový Holding (EPH) and Czech Coal have announced they submitted binding bids for Vattenfall's German assets. But the Czech Republic's biggest electricity producer, ČEZ, said it will not make a binding bid.

The Czech Republic’s biggest carmaker Škoda Auto announced a record profit of around 19 billion crowns in 2015, a 6.5 increase from 2014. Overall sales over the same period increased by 6.2 percent from the previous year, to a total of 338 billion crowns, also a company record.

The Czech Republic’s biggest energy company ČEZ wound up what’s been a difficult 2015 with the announcement of its full year results on Tuesday. The good news is that the final net profit figure came in 700 million crowns ahead of its latest expectations at 27.7 billion crowns. The bad news is that the golden goose company now looks like its producing pretty ordinary eggs with its profits still undermined by falling electricity prices.