China’s deleveraging push has racked up the most defaults on corporate bonds ever for a first quarter, and the identity of the debtors is pretty revealing. Seven companies have defaulted on a total of nine bonds onshore so far in 2017, versus 29 for all of last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. In a sign of the struggles facing China’s old economic model, most of them depend on heavy industry and construction.

Last year Indonesia’s finance minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, invited chief executives, directors and shareholders from the country’s leading industries to banquets at her ministry, The Economist reported. As they munched, she would give presentations setting out who among them had—and, by omission, who had not—signed up to the government’s tax amnesty. “This may be the most expensive dinner in your lifetime,” the 54-year-old economist recalls telling them. Indonesia’s tax amnesty, which began in July 2016, ended on March 31st.

China's State Power Investment Corp said Westinghouse's bankruptcy filing would not have a "substantial impact" on the country's nuclear plans and the two sides would ensure a key AP1000 reactor project would be completed on schedule this year, Reuters reported. The project is the world's first Westinghouse-designed AP1000 reactor project, being built at Sanmen on China's eastern coast, and is one of four reactors planned with State Power.

The Centre is confident that the newly established institutional framework to implement the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) will help improve the country’s ranking in the World Bank’s ease of doing business index, The Hindu BusinessLine reported. “Yes, it is going to help us improve our ranking in ease of doing business,” Arjun Ram Meghwal, Minister of State for Finance, told BusinessLine here. As a regulator for overseeing insolvency proceedings and insolvency related entities, the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI) was established in October 2016.

China’s economy held steady in the first quarter, though the momentum, fueled by government-directed spending and low-cost funding, may be tough to sustain, according to a private quarterly survey, The Wall Street Journal reported. The stimulus-fueled engines that powered the Chinese economy in the second half of last year and early this year, including real estate and commodities, are increasingly wobbly and are adding to already high debt-levels, China Beige Book International said in its latest survey.

Shares in Toshiba Corp rose on Monday morning after a report that U.S. unit Westinghouse Electric Co could file for bankruptcy protection as early as Tuesday and is seeking support from South Korea's Korea Electric Power Corp, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. Toshiba's shares were last up 0.5 percent at 224 yen after earlier rising as high as 232 yen, against the backdrop of a broader market downturn. Read more.

Toshiba’s biggest creditors are split over its future strategy as pressure mounts for a swift Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection filing by Westinghouse, the troubled Japanese conglomerate’s US nuclear subsidiary, the Financial Times reported. People briefed on the situation said talks between Toshiba, its main lenders and other stakeholders are focused on whether it is possible or even desirable for Westinghouse to be placed under bankruptcy protection before the end of the Japanese group’s financial year on March 31.

CEO Jung said he expected Daewoo to receive considerable calls from shipowners for "builder's default", cancelling existing orders, if the company goes into court receivership - the regulator's alternate plan for the troubled firm in case the bailout does not go through, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story.

A new specter is haunting China’s financial system: the negotiable certificate of deposit. An explosion in banks’ use of the bondlike loans, whose durations range from a month to a year, is testing Beijing’s resolve to cure the economy of its addiction to debt-fueled growth and investment booms, The Wall Street Journal reported.

South Korean state banks are preparing a fresh $2.6 billion bailout for floundering Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co Ltd (042660.KS), which has built up huge losses from offshore projects and risks missing debt repayments, Reuters reported. Without the infusion of funds, Daewoo is not expected to be able to redeem 940 billion won ($840.49 million) in corporate bonds maturing this year - starting with 440 billion won due in April, the country's financial regulator, the Financial Services Commission (FSC), said on Thursday.