China’s legions of regional banks are feeling the strain. The country’s two-year crackdown on risky financing and the trade war with the U.S. have slowed economic growth, triggering debt defaults that are exposing them as the weakest link in the credit chain, Bloomberg News reported. Several lenders have fallen into deep trouble this year, with others -- perhaps many -- expected to follow. What’s different is that China seems to have thrown out the old playbook of injecting state funds into struggling lenders to keep them alive.

India’s Supreme Court upheld the ability of homebuyers to drag property developers into bankruptcy proceedings as several real estate firms are going bust in Asia’s third-largest economy, Bloomberg News reported. Once a homebuyer establishes default before a bankruptcy court, the onus is on builders’ to prove that the consumer does not wish to take possession of their house to avoid proceedings, a three-judge bench headed by Justice Rohinton F Nariman said on Friday. The court ruled homebuyers’ rights will remain at par with lenders.

Dewan Housing Finance Corp Ltd (DHFL), one of India’s so-called shadow banks, on Thursday said it might not be able to fulfil its debt obligations due in the near future while banks review its restructuring plan, Reuters reported. DHFL, one of the largest housing finance companies in India, has roughly 1 trillion rupees of debt and is in the process of seeking lender approval on a restructuring plan designed to help it to ride out a liquidity crunch and restart its lending business.

New bank lending in China likely slowed in July, a Reuters poll showed, reinforcing expectations that policymakers will need to announce more support measures in coming months to stabilize the cooling economy as U.S. trade pressure builds, Reuters reported. The rapidly worsening trade dispute, rising borrowing costs, and this week’s sudden drop in the yuan have fanned worries that the world’s second-largest economy could face a sharper slowdown. But policymakers are also increasingly worried about rising debt and financial risks, particularly in the property market.

An investment group owned by Turkey’s military pension fund is in last-minute talks about a takeover of British Steel, offering hopes of a deal that could save thousands of jobs, the Financial Times reported. Ataer Holding, a wholly owned vehicle of state military retirement scheme Oyak that is also the largest shareholder in Turkish steel group Erdemir, is negotiating with the UK government about acquiring the collapsed steelmaker, according to two people familiar with the matter.

India’s central bank took steps to alleviate a credit crunch at shadow banks and relaxed rules for lending to consumers as part of measures to boost the slowing economy, Bloomberg News reported. The Reserve Bank of India, which also cut benchmark interest rates to the lowest since 2010 on Wednesday, increased the exposure limit for banks to a single non-banking finance company to 20% of Tier 1 capital from 15% before. It also reduced the risk weight on consumer credit excluding card receivables to 100% from about 125%.

Beijing’s decision to let the renminbi fall below the symbolic level of 7 to the dollar was a political choice — but it would not be in China’s economic interests to “weaponise” its currency, economists say, the Financial Times reported. Monday’s move to increase the renminbi’s trading band came as a retaliation against the latest US threat of fresh tariffs. And although China’s central bank took steps to stabilise the currency on Tuesday, investors worry that the authorities could seek to put pressure on Washington by allowing a bigger devaluation.

India’s debt-laden shadow bank Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd (DHFL) on Tuesday said its creditors would not have to take any haircuts on principal payments under its resolution plan, sending shares up as much as 10%, Reuters reported. As part of the resolution plan, DHFL will also put a moratorium on repayments and seek funding from banks to start retail lending, the company said here after a meeting of the special committee for resolution plan.

Banking in a country where almost nobody defaults sounds easy. For Japan’s lenders, it is anything but. After almost three decades of near-zero, zero, and now negative interest-rate policies, Tokyo has pushed its banking system to its limit, The Wall Street Journal reported. The country’s smaller lenders in particular are facing an existential threat to their business models. Located in aging and shrinking prefectures, they lack the ability to increase fee-related incomes that major banks can raise. Japan has too many banks, and consolidating them into larger players will buy time.

Skyrocketing micro-finance debt in Cambodia has left millions of people at risk of losing their homes, leading to fears of a potential political and economic crisis, Bloomberg News reported. With a median of $3,370 per loan, Cambodia now has the highest average for small loans in the world, according to a report from the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights and Samakum Teang Tnaut on Wednesday. Altogether, nearly 15% of the population held at least $8 billion in micro loan debt at the start of the year, the data show.