Chinese property developers are starting 2025 facing liquidation petitions and mountains of debt as the nation’s real estate crisis enters its fifth year with little sign of improvement, Bloomberg News reported. Just this week, defaulted Chinese builder Sunac China Holdings Ltd received another winding-up petition. While the company successfully restructured its offshore debt in 2023, concerns about its ability to meet payment obligations have pushed its stock and bond prices to the lowest level in months.

In a striking sign of the Chinese economy’s stagnation, the central bank said on Friday that it had temporarily stopped buying government bonds, the New York Times reported. The central bank’s unexpected action is aimed at braking a recent shift by investors toward purchasing bonds while shunning riskier assets like stocks and real estate. That shift has driven China’s long-term interest rates to a record low. The decision to stop buying government bonds is especially unusual because interest rates have been rising lately in most of the world, in response to inflation fears.

Asia accounts for 60% of global crypto users and contributes the largest share of worldwide liquidity, according to Foresight Ventures, a crypto-focused venture capital firm, TheStreet.com reported. On Jan. 9, Foresight Ventures released its latest “GTM in Asia” report, co-published with Primitive Ventures, noting Asia’s influence in the global cryptocurrency landscape. Five Asian nations feature in the 2024 Global Crypto Adoption Index, with India securing the top position, Indonesia ranking third, Vietnam placing fifth, the Philippines coming in eighth, and Pakistan taking the ninth spot.

Country Garden has proposed a deal to its offshore creditors that will cut its debt by $11.6 billion, paving the way for the property developer to seek more time from the high court in Hong Kong to implement a restructuring plan, Reuters reported. The indebted developer has reached an understanding with a lender group made up of seven banks ahead of the company's liquidation hearing on Jan. 20 in Hong Kong, bringing it closer towards a restructuring of its offshore debt.

The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) on Wednesday, reserved its order on the appeals by Glas Trust and Aditya Birla Finance to be added to the committee of creditors (CoC), as well as the Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) application to withdraw its insolvency petition against the cash-strapped edtech firm Byju's, the Economic Times of India reported.

Australian building approvals were weaker than expected in November, denting hopes of a big recovery in housing supply to meet surging immigration, the Wall Street Journal reported. The total number of dwellings approved fell 3.6% in November to 14,998, following a 5.2% rise in October, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said Tuesday. Economists had expected approvals to drop 0.9% over the month.

Nuvoco Vistas Corp, a key producer of cement in East India, has emerged as the successful applicant to buy Vadraj Cement under the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process, the Economic Times of India reported. Gujarat-based Vadraj Cement, formerly owned by ABG Shipyard, has a 6 million tonne grinding unit in Surat and will add to Nuvoco Vistas’ existing production capacity of 25 million tonne by more than 20%. Vadraj Cement also has a clinker capacity of 3.5 million tonne in Kutch in Gujarat along with limestone reserves and a captive jetty.

Country Garden Holdings Co.’s sales slump continued in December even as the Chinese property market showed signs of stabilization after the government’s stimulus packages, Bloomberg News reported. Contracted sales declined 51% from a year earlier to 3.42 billion yuan ($467 million), narrowing from a 52% year-on-year drop in November, Bloomberg calculations based on corporate filings show. The developer’s home sales have cratered from 22 billion yuan in December 2022. China’s residential property market has shown gradual signs of stabilization after a government stimulus blitz.