Asia Pacific

Fisker Automotive, the bankrupt maker of a plug-in hybrid sports car, asked a federal judge to approve its proposed sale to a Hong Kong tycoon rather than a Chinese suitor that Fisker alleged was to blame for its failure. A courtroom showdown is set for January 10 that will determine the future of the defunct car maker, which was launched with a controversial U.S. government loan. U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Kevin Gross must decide if Fisker's business will be put to open auction or sold to an affiliate of Richard Li as the company has proposed.

The Bombay high court on Thursday continued an order of interim protection granted earlier to a company against the State Bank of India. The HC restrained the Bank from publishing, photographs, names and addresses of the Petitioners as wilful defaulters in any newspaper or other media, The Times of India reported. The Bank had issued notice on December 21, 2013 to Icaro Machines India Private Limited and others. The company challenged the notice in the HC. On January 2, the matter was heard by vacation judge Justice Gautam Patel.

Ssangyong Engineering & Construction (E&C) has filed for court protection as its creditors refused to finance the cash-strapped builder, the Seoul-based company said Monday, The Korea Times reported. Ssangyong E&C said it held a board meeting Monday afternoon to ask the Seoul Central District Court to lead a debt-rescheduling program after one of its major creditors, the Military Mutual Aid Association, raised an objection to additional financial support to it.

Sri Lanka’s central bank cut one key interest rate while holding another after inflation eased to the lowest level in about two years, ignoring advice from the International Monetary Fund to hold off on further easing, Bloomberg News reported. The Central Bank of Sri Lanka reduced the benchmark reverse repurchase rate, which it renamed the standing lending facility rate, by 50 basis points to 8 percent, Governor Ajith Nivard Cabraal said in an interview in Colombo on Dec. 31.

China's largest auto parts company made a surprise bid for Fisker Automotive just days before the bankrupt maker of the Karma plug-in hybrid sports car was to be sold to a Hong Kong tycoon, according to court documents, Reuters reported. Fisker creditors asked the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware, to scrap Fisker's agreed sale to a company affiliated with Richard Li and instead hold an open auction at which auto parts supplier Wanxiang America Corp plans to bid.

Chennai-based Consolidated Construction Consortium Ltd (CCCL) has applied for the Corporate Debt Restructuring Scheme. "The necessary application for the same is being filed with CDR cell for its approval," the company said in a filing to the exchanges, the Business Standard reported. R Sarabeswar, chairman and chief executive officer of CCCL, did not offer a comment when contacted. Several infrastructure projects, including Chennai Metro, have been delayed due to various reasons affecting the company's balance sheet, according to industry sources.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, named on Monday to head the committee overseeing China's economic overhaul, must quickly figure out how to keep China's burgeoning local government debt from tanking the world's second-largest economy, The Wall Street Journal reported. Shortly before the announcement of Mr. Xi's new job, China's National Audit Office said debt and guarantees issued by local governments rocketed 67% to 17.9 trillion yuan ($2.95 trillion) midyear 2013 since the last tally at the end of 2010, when it was 10.7 trillion yuan.

China’s financial system is in danger of becoming too big to bail out, The International New York Times reported. Official bank lending has more than doubled since the global financial crisis, growing nearly twice as fast as the overall economy.

India's Lanco Infratech Ltd. is reportedly in the process of signing one of the country's largest corporate debt restructuring deals. The said deal will allow the debt-stricken infrastructure developer to reschedule repayment of as much as INR7,500 crore and give it access to new credit of INR3,500 crore. Economic Times, quoting Lanco Infratech's Amardeep Jaiswal, said the company and a consortium of over 25 lenders led by Mumbai-based IDBI Bank Ltd. on Friday met in Gurgaon to work out the details of the deal. Jaiswal is Lanco Infratech's legal affairs head.

Japan's financial regulator came down on Mizuho Bank harder than expected yesterday for not addressing loans to members of alleged criminal groups, and for the way it handled disclosures about the problem, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The Financial Services Agency ordered Mizuho Bank to suspend for a month its loan transactions with consumer-credit affiliates, which handled the questionable loans. It also ordered Mizuho Bank and its parent, Mizuho Financial Group Inc., to submit a business-improvement plan by Jan. 17.