Chinese companies’ debt-servicing firepower has slumped to a three-year low even as authorities move to support their financing, showcasing the difficulty of getting stimulus through to the real economy, Bloomberg News reported. Listed nonfinancial companies had cash and equivalents to cover only 81 percent of debt due in the coming year, the worst since 2015 -- when China was battling hard-landing fears -- data compiled by Bloomberg show. Materials, utilities and energy sectors are particularly vulnerable as their cash levels were at about half of short-term obligations.

Chinese aviation-to-finance conglomerate HNA defaulted on a Rmb300m ($44m) loan raised through a trust company, the lender said on Thursday as it sought to freeze HNA assets, the Financial Times reported. The announcement by Hunan Trust is a sign that HNA’s liquidity woes are beginning to have a broader impact outside China’s formal banking sector. The company is already under strict supervision by a group of bank creditors, led by China Development Bank, following a liquidity crunch in the final quarter of last year.

China agreed to extend a $5 billion credit line to cash-strapped Venezuela, said the Venezuelan finance minister, as President Nicolas Maduro headed to Beijing. Minister Simon Zerpa told Bloomberg News that Venezuela would pay back the loan with either cash or oil, Bloomberg News reported. The countries were expected to sign what Zerpa described as a strategic alliance on gold mining. “Venezuela has a great alliance with China,” Zerpa said on Thursday.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.