Asia Pacific

Dubai International Capital, an investment arm of conglomerate Dubai Holding, has asked lenders for a three-month extension on some of its debts, underscoring the financial challenges still facing the city-state, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. The news comes six months after Dubai's much larger conglomerate Dubai World shocked markets by announcing a standstill on its own debt pile. Last week, Dubai World said it has agreed in principle with its main creditors to restructure $23.5 billion of debt and said it would seek a final deal with all its creditors by the end of June.

Seven companies have joined the race to acquire Ssangyong Motor Co. by submitting separate letters of intent to deal adviser Macquarie Securities Korea, cash-strapped Ssangyong Motor said Friday, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Ssangyong Motor didn't name the seven companies, citing a confidentiality agreement. Local media earlier Friday reported that two Indian companies - Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. and Ruia Group - as well as three Korean companies: Renault Samsung Motors Corp., Young An Hat Co. and Seoul Invest are interested in bidding for Ssangyong Motor.

Australian shopping mall giant Westfield Group on Thursday ruled out a bid for General Growth Properties Inc., instead preferring to cherry pick individual assets its U.S. rival may put on the market, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. With the retail sector looking up in its main markets and a robust balance sheet boasting almost $6.59 billion liquidity, Westfield - the world's biggest owner of shopping centers by value - decided against entering a bidding war for General Growth, which is under U.S. bankruptcy protection.

Creditors who hold 92 percent of BTA Bank’s $16.7 billion of debt approved a restructuring plan, including bonds held by the parent company of Kazakhstan’s third-largest lender by assets, BusinessWeek reported on a Bloomberg story. BTA defaulted in April, 2009, two months after it was taken over by the state-owned National Wellbeing Fund Samruk-Kazyna. Besides BTA, which was the country’s biggest lender before its collapse, Alliance Bank, AO Astana Finance and Temirbank, then controlled by BTA, have also defaulted, leaving about $20 billion in debt.

Australian education and childcare services provider A.B.C. Learning Centres Ltd filed for bankruptcy in a Delaware court Wednesday, more than 18 months after the company went into administration in Australia, Reuters reported. The filing comes after an Arizona jury ruled against the company earlier this month in a lawsuit over certain development contracts and ordered it to pay more than $47 million in damages to RCS Capital Development LLC. The company filed under Chapter 15 of U.S. bankruptcy law, which deals with cases involving more than one country and allows U.S.

The Iraqi government has said it will close the state-owned Iraqi Airways after declaring it bankrupt, the BBC reported. Iraq's transportation ministry told reporters the airline would be closed following a damaging dispute with Kuwait over war reparations. Kuwait Airways says the Iraqi flag carrier owes it about $1.2bn for aircraft and plane parts taken during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990. All scheduled Iraqi Airways flights have been cancelled.

Japan Airlines Corp. said Tuesday it will postpone by two months the submission of a restructuring plan to the court as it seeks to flesh out details of the plan, Dow Jones reported. The airline, currently under court-led restructuring after filing for bankruptcy protection in January, initially intended to present the plan to the Tokyo district court by the end of June. The court has agreed to the new deadline, JAL said.

The former chief financial officer of an Australian disability employment group has told a court he and his wife spent tens of thousands of dollars on the group's credit cards because he thought there was no limit to a tax exemption it received as a benevolent organisation, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. Mustafa Koraiem, of Mosman, was overseeing the $25 million annual turnover of Cumberland Industries when he was approving his wife's and his own private expenses as salary sacrifices through the company's accounts, the Federal Court has heard.

The former head of New Zealand's biggest private dairy operation is expecting to be able to pull an offer together for receivers this week, but admits he's got no idea whether it will be enough to stave off receivership, The New Zealand Herald reported. Allan Crafar says he is considering "three very good options" from overseas interests, which he hopes to be able to present in the next few days.

Professionals and people on high incomes are declaring bankruptcy faster than ever before in Australia, according to a study that reveals levels have risen by more than a third in the past four years, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. Analysing the nation's cases over the past decade, the report shatters the myth that most people who file for bankruptcy are either the chronically poor who have no other options or the Alan Bond-style wealthy declaring complete financial free-fall.