In 2008, as the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy triggered an epic credit crisis across the developed world, everyone braced for the inevitable crisis in the emerging markets that would follow. It didn’t happen. That year’s financial chaos created problems for these economies, whose stock and bond markets dipped far more than those of the U.S. or Europe; but they avoided wholesale defaults or devaluations, Bloomberg News reported. There was no repeat of the cycle of emerging market crises that had roiled the world in past decades.

India’s shadow banks are being forced to go overseas more for money as local lenders balk at extending funds, flagging strains in a key industry for an economy that’s already sputtering, Bloomberg News reported. The country’s non-banking financial companies have raised more than $2 billion of overseas bonds and loans in 2019, a record compared with the same period in previous years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The lifeline is welcome, even as it underscores a scramble after a string of defaults by peer IL&FS Group last year made investors wary.

Underwriters of a new Chinese credit hedging tool just narrowly avoided their first-ever payout in the nation’s $13 trillion bond market, Bloomberg News reported. An investor protection clause on two of Beijing Orient Landscape & Environment Co.’s bonds was triggered last month after the note repayment funds were used for other purposes. Bondholders recently gave waivers, not calling them defaults. The close shave is making underwriters more wary of selling credit risk mitigation warrants (CRMWs), according to Southwest Securities Co.

A consumer loan company priced Japan’s first publicly-offered junk bond on Friday with an interest rate of just 0.99 per cent, a coupon that highlights the country’s institutional desperation for yield and the increasingly eye-catching distortions caused by the Bank of Japan’s negative interest rate policy, the Financial Times reported.

Global mining conglomerate Vedanta Resources said on Friday it was seeking international arbitration over Zambia’s appointment of a provisional liquidator to run the company’s Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) business, Reuters reported. Vedanta said on Friday its executives were unable to visit its KCM operation and engage with local management, in a setback to efforts to ease tensions amid a legal battle with Africa’s second-biggest copper producer. The Zambian government has accused KCM of breaching its operating license. Legal proceedings have been adjourned until June 4.

Creditors of Jaypee Infratech Thursday decided to put on vote NBCC's bid to acquire the debt-laden realty firm even as the state-owned firm did not dilute certain conditions in its offer including relief from future tax liabilities, sources said, Yahoo! News reported. The voting under the insolvency process, run by Jaypee Infratech's Interim Resolution Professional (IRP) Anuj Jain, will start from Friday and continue till June 10, they added. As many as 13 banks and over 23,000 home buyers have voting rights in the committee of creditors (CoC). Buyers have nearly 60 per cent votes.

Azerbaijan’s SOCAR is interested in buying Russia’s Antipinsky oil refinery, although specifics from the Russian side are not known yet, SOCAR’s deputy vice president told Reuters. Sberbank, Russia’s largest lender, is in talks with potential investors to sell the Siberian refinery after gaining the rights for the majority of the indebted business, Reuters reported. “We are interested in this purchase indeed, but proposals are not defined yet,” Vitaly Baylarbayov told Reuters on Thursday at the annual Caspian Oil and Gas conference in the Azeri capital, Baku.

India probably lost its spot as the fastest growing major economy to China in the January-March quarter as a chill in domestic and global consumer demand hit manufacturers and service providers, Reuters reported. The slowing economy didn’t stop voters giving Prime Minister Narendra Modi a landslide victory in an election concluded earlier this month. But it puts an onus on him to deliver reforms that can truly unlock growth, which had waxed and waned during his first five years in office.

Japan’s negative interest rates have upended many conventions in the local credit market and another was broken on Friday when the nation’s first publicly offered junk bond priced -- at the super-low interest rate of 0.99%. Aiful Corp., a consumer lender that teetered on the edge of bankruptcy a decade ago, sold 15 billion yen ($137 million) of speculative-grade notes due in 1.5 years, Bloomberg News reported.

The governor of China’s central bank sought to ease concerns on Thursday over the growing level of risk at troubled small banks in the country, following the first state takeover of a lender in 18 years, the Financial Times reported. Yi Gang of the People’s Bank of China, speaking at an event in Beijing, said the central bank was “fully capable” of managing risks at small banks, and that it planned to increase the supply of credit to small companies, according to local media and Bloomberg.