It’s been the worst month for China’s local corporate notes in two years. And it might just be the start, as the nation’s top bond fund manager says yield premiums could rise further in 2018, Bloomberg News reported. President Xi Jinping is stepping up efforts to trim the world’s largest corporate debt burden, after emerging even more powerful from the Communist Party’s twice-a-decade congress in October. Financial institutions are hoarding cash amid expectations the government will announce more measures to curb leverage, and that is pushing up borrowing costs in the money market.

Alibaba’s finance affiliate has banned consumer-loan products that charge annual interest rates above 24 per cent from its marketing platform. The step is the latest sign of how tighter regulation is reshaping China’s once-freewheeling internet lending industry, the Financial Times reported. Online consumer lending has boomed over the past year. Small-loan companies that lend online using their own capital have largely replaced peer-to-peer lenders as the main source of online consumer and small-business loans, following a regulatory crackdown on P2P.

Japan’s JFE Holdings Inc and India’s JSW Steel Ltd are lining up a joint bid with a private equity firm for the assets of India’s insolvent Bhushan Steel Ltd, two industry sources familiar with the matter said. Under the plans, JFE would set up a special purpose vehicle with the two partners to manage the assets, Reuters reported. JFE would hold a majority stake in the vehicle, while JSW Steel would operate Bhushan Steel’s plants, said the sources who did not want to be named as the details are not public. JFE already owns a 15 percent stake in JSW.

Singapore has made “a good start” in its bid to become a debt restructuring hub in the region, with six workout cases filed before its courts after it adopted U.S. Chapter 11-like incentives in local company laws this year, a senior government official said. Indonesian developer PT Bakrieland Development is set to complete its group restructuring after a plan by its unit BLD Investments Pte. was sanctioned by a local judge earlier this month in the first of such cases, Bloomberg News reported.

India’s highest-profile default this year and the government’s plan to inject capital into state-controlled lenders have thrust the nation’s bad debt into the spotlight, Bloomberg News reported. Some global debt funds increasingly like what they see. The nation’s so-called dirty dozen -- 12 large debtors that have been ordered to go through the bankruptcy courts -- are one focus for funds including Bain Capital Credit and alternative investment firm Varde Partners.

India has set up a panel to review provisions of the 11-month old bankruptcy law including whether to bar defaulting founders from repurchasing assets, Bloomberg News reported. The committee set up to improve The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code will have 14 members and includes officials from the finance ministry, Reserve Bank of India and representatives from industry and accountants group, Corporate Affairs Minister P.P. Chaudhary said in an interview on Monday. The code in force since December 2016 aims to accelerate winding up process of loss-making companies or recovering dues.

Chinese developers such as China Vanke and Country Garden are increasingly turning to the securitisation market as an alternative fund-raising channel as the onshore bond market remains mostly inaccessible, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. Property companies are in particular stepping up the securitisation of receivables from property sales, providing them with funds to develop other projects.

Chinese central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan said growth prospects have improved in the world's second-largest economy, but its monetary policy remains prudent and neutral, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. Earlier this week, China published upbeat data showing its economy got off to a strong start to 2017, supported by bank lending, a government infrastructure spree and a long-sought resurgence in private investment.

In attempting to head off a Bernie Madoff moment, China has set the stage for an even deeper bond market rout, Bloomberg News reported. Ten-year government note yields last week hit the psychologically important 4 percent level as investors braced for sweeping rules to curb risks in the country's $15 trillion asset-management industry.Caving into social pressure, banks in China have been bailing out wealth-management products that have gone bad. That's not going to be allowed come June 2019.

Toshiba Corp.’s plan to raise more money may bring in vocal investors more willing to take an active role in the electronics maker’s affairs, Bloomberg News reported. David Einhorn’s Greenlight Capital, Daniel Loeb’s Third Point and other investors have agreed to buy 600 billion yen ($5.4 billion) worth of newly issued shares, an extra cushion of cash on top of the already-agreed 2 trillion-yen sale of the Tokyo-based company’s chips business to a group led by Bain Capital.