An interest rate hike by Turkey’s central bank on Thursday might just be the lesser of two evils for the country’s beleaguered companies, Bloomberg News reported. On the one hand, a steep rate increase could stem the slide in the lira that has boosted dollar-debt costs by more than 40 percent this year. On the other, pausing would spare the already bruised balance sheets of companies, which have had to contend with a near doubling in local borrowing costs.

The Indian infrastructure finance firm behind a rare default last month that is reverberating through the nation’s credit markets is delinquent on more borrowings, people familiar with the matter said. Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services Ltd., which helped fund India’s longest tunnel, is in default on 3 billion rupees ($41 million) of short-term borrowings taken through so-called inter-corporate deposits from Small Industries Development Bank of India, the people said.

Rating agency S&P has downgraded seven Chinese local-government financing vehicles (LGFVs), on the view that local governments are less likely to provide bailouts if these companies verge towards default, highlighting the punishing impact of Beijing’s austerity campaign, the Financial Times reported. For the last decade, Chinese local governments have used such off-budget vehicles to finance infrastructure projects that skirt restrictions on direct borrowing, prompting warnings from global watchdogs and China’s finance ministry. In 2014, China’s parliament legalised dire

Developers in Hong Kong are offering perks such as free rail tickets and early move-in dates in a further sign one of the world’s hottest property markets may finally be cooling, Bloomberg News reported. In a bid to shift apartments, CK Asset Holdings Ltd. is giving away high-speed rail holiday and travel packages, including accommodation, worth HK$280,000 ($35,700) for people who agree to purchase one of its four-bedroom units at a development in Hong Kong’s west.

Hong Kong-based private-equity firm Baring Private Equity Asia has agreed to invest roughly half a billion dollars in Pioneer Corp., likely becoming the controlling shareholder, in another example of overseas investors taking a role in restructuring venerable Japanese brands, The Wall Street Journal reported. Pioneer, a struggling maker of car audio and navigation equipment, is trying to compete in the quickly changing market for internet-connected vehicles with autonomous-driving functions. In June, a group led by U.S.

Australia’s Wiggins Island Coal Export Terminal obtained court approval on Tuesday for a $3.2 billion debt refinancing plan, offering respite to its owners who would have had to start repayments this month, Reuters reported. The Queensland-based terminal, known as WICET, is 40 percent owned by miner and commodities trader Glencore and was built to service a consortium of eight coal companies during a period of high commodity prices. It will now have the maturity of $2.6 billion in senior debt extended from this month until September 2026, court documents showed.

It is said that generals often plan to fight the last war. Ten years on from the collapse of Lehman Brothers, many experts fear a new financial crisis, the Financial Times reported. In fact, the global financial system is much more robust than before 2008, but the global economy is still threatened by excessive debt. The financial crisis began because of dangerous features within the financial system itself. Massively leveraged investment banks engaged in socially useless trading of huge volumes of complex credit securities and derivatives.

ArcelorMittal shares fell more than 2 percent on Tuesday after the world’s largest steelmaker said it had raised its offer for India’s Essar Steel , prompting concerns that it was overpaying, Reuters reported. ArcelorMittal is forming a joint venture with Japan’s Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp to bid for Essar in competition with bids from Russian lender VTB and Vedanta Resources. It said on Monday that it had submitted a revised proposal representing a “material increase” on its two previous offers.

China’s policy makers are stuck with the most bearish equity market in years as their attempts to lift sentiment fail to gain traction, Reuters reported. The Shanghai Composite Index slid Wednesday to within 10 points of its lowest intraday level since 2014, ignoring an article in the Securities Daily expressing support for the market and suggesting value investors should start buying. The benchmark made a brief upward foray mid-morning and then retreated. It was down 0.3 percent as of 11:05 a.m.

As a growing number of emerging markets teeter on the brink of crisis, we’re hearing more and more about “original sin.” No, this isn’t about Adam and Eve’s transgressions. The concept, coined by economists Barry Eichengreen and Ricardo Hausmann, refers to the inability of most nations — and their corporations — to borrow abroad in their own currency, a Bloomberg View reported. Instead, they necessarily borrow in other currencies. Turkey, for example, has accumulated significant debts denominated in dollars.