Asia

Chinese conglomerate HNA Group Co. must pay its former business partner SL Green Realty Corp. about $185 million in a dispute over a bankrupt Manhattan skyscraper, an arbitrator said, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The arbitrator, former judge L. Priscilla Hall, found that real-estate investment trust SL Green was entitled to a $184.6 million payment over an investment that it made in HNA Group’s 245 Park Ave., according to documents made public in a New York state court on Friday. SL Green should also be reimbursed for $856,000 in fees, she said.

South Korea's central bank is likely to hike its benchmark rate at a second consecutive meeting on Thursday to combat inflation running at more than double its target, taking rates higher by year end than previously thought, a Reuters poll showed. Inflation in Asia's fourth-largest economy rose to more than a 13-year high of 4.8% in April, as repercussions from the Russia-Ukraine war and a weakening won , down 7% this year, ramped up prices. Inflation has stayed above the central bank's target of 2.0% for more than a year.

The Turkish lira plunged the most since a rout late last year, as a steep drawdown in the central bank’s reserves and its unorthodox monetary policy left the currency increasingly exposed amid a standoff with the country’s NATO allies, Bloomberg News reported. Already the worst performer in emerging markets this year, the lira on Tuesday is on track for the world’s biggest decline against the dollar, slipping as much as 1.5% to the weakest level in five months. Little relief is in sight, especially as energy costs spiral higher for Turkey.

Slowing economic growth in China and anaemic demand for loans have sparked heavy buying of low-risk short-term financial instruments by lenders, pushing yields near zero, as banks seek to meet internal lending targets, Reuters reported. Strong demand for banker's acceptance bills - debt instruments guaranteed by banks - has pushed yields on one-month bills to an average of less than 1% and as low as 0.04% since the beginning of Shanghai's COVID-19 lockdown in late March, according to data from the Shanghai Commercial Paper Exchange.

The Indian government is considering spending an additional 2 trillion rupees ($26 billion) in the 2022/23 fiscal year to cushion consumers from rising prices and fight multi-year high inflation, two government officials told Reuters. The new measures will be double the 1 trillion rupees hit government revenues could take from tax cuts on petrol and diesel the finance minister announced on Saturday, both the officials said.

Pakistan's central bank raised its benchmark interest rate on Monday by 150 basis points to 13.75%, the second hike in less than two months, as the South Asian nation grapples with a sinking economy, Reuters reported. The key interest rates have been hiked by 400 bps in less than two months, according to the central bank. "This action, together with much needed fiscal consolidation, should help moderate demand to a more sustainable pace while keeping inflation expectations anchored and containing risks to external stability," the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said in a statement.

Thai AirAsia X, the long-haul budget airline under the AirAsia group, said its application for bankruptcy protection was accepted by Thailand’s Central Bankruptcy Court, Forbes reported. "Thai AirAsia X has entered into rehabilitation at an appropriate time with tourism recovering and the nation reopening”, Patima Jeerapaet, chief executive of Thai AirAsia X said in a statement released on Thursday.

China cut its benchmark reference rate for mortgages by an unexpectedly wide margin on Friday, its second reduction this year as Beijing seeks to revive the ailing housing sector to prop up the economy, Reuters reported. Senior officials have pledged further measures to fight a slowdown in the world's second-biggest economy, hit by COVID-19 outbreaks that prompted stringent measures and mobility restrictions and causing huge disruptions to activity.

China is quietly ramping up purchases of oil from Russia at bargain prices, according to shipping data and oil traders who spoke to Reuters, filling the vacuum left by Western buyers backing away from business with Russia after its invasion of Ukraine in February. The move by the world's biggest oil importer comes a month after it initially cut back on Russian supplies, for fear of appearing to openly support Moscow and potentially expose its state oil giants to sanctions.

Turkey’s gross foreign-currency reserves fell the most this year, providing further evidence that an effort to support the lira is coming at an increasingly steep cost, Bloomberg News reported. The stockpile shrank by $4.8 billion in the seven days ended May 13, according to central bank figures published on Friday. That brought total holdings, which exclude gold reserves, to a 10-month low of $61.2 billion.