Asia Pacific

Dubai, the recipient yesterday of a $10 billion bailout from Abu Dhabi, has yet to convince investors it will meet all of its obligations, Bloomberg reported. Debt from Dubai state-controlled entities DP World Ltd., Dubai Commercial Operations Group LLC and Nakheel PJSC remains as much as 28 percent lower than before the emirate said on Nov. 25 it was seeking a “standstill” from creditors. Standard & Poor’s said it won’t automatically reverse downgrades made to ratings on state entities since the announcement.

Brian Clegg, the director of failed finance company Clegg and Co Finance was sentenced in the Auckland District Court today for six offences against the Companies Act and the Securities Act, The New Zealand Herald reported. "A number of these charges relate to false and misleading statements made in the company's 2005 and 2006 prospectuses and to the company's Trustee," said the Registrar of Companies, Neville Harris. The National Enforcement Unit of the Companies Office began its investigation after the matter was referred to it by the Securities Commission.

Solar Systems, the company that was to develop the world's biggest solar power station in Victoria, has until mid-February to find a buyer or go into liquidation, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. A second meeting of creditors in Melbourne yesterday agreed to adjourn for up to 45 business days to give administrator PricewaterhouseCoopers more time to sell the business as a going concern. BusinessDay believes that the administrator could be close to securing a sale but that details need to be finalised.

General Motors on Monday sold to Beijing Automotive Industry Holding the rights to technology from its Saab unit that will help the Chinese company to lift its profile at home, The New York Times reported. BAIC, as the Chinese company is known, is acquiring “certain Saab 9-3, current 9-5 and powertrain technology and tooling,” the companies said in a statement. “This arrangement is excellent for both parties, now and for the future,” Jan Ake Jonsson, managing director of Saab Automobile, said in the statement.

The Blue Chip investors who sparked the downfall of Mark Bryers have taken a hit to their wallets as a Gulf Harbour investment hotel unit they owned was seized by liquidators, The National Business Review reported. New Zealand investors Donald and Annette Rowson sank funds in to Blue Chip’s Gulf Harbour Lodge and originally applied to have Mark Bryers’ company Swordfish Lodge Management wound up in March 2008, which started the collapse of his companies.

The Rudd government will provide $15 million in taxpayer funds for a loan to help fund a charitable takeover of the nation's biggest childcare chain, the collapsed ABC Learning group, The Australian reported. A dozen philanthropists -- including Robin Crawford, a founding director of Macquarie Bank, Seek founder and BRW Young Rich-lister Matthew Rockman, and former Microsoft boss Daniel Petre -- also lent cash to the GoodStart consortium.

Nakheel PJSC creditors may win the right to seize a strip of barren waterfront land the size of Manhattan if the company defaults on the $3.5 billion bond backing the development, Bloomberg reported. Investors will be able to seek foreclosure on the property’s mortgages should the Dubai World unit fail to repay the loan, according to the bond’s prospectus. The debt is due on Dec. 14, after which Nakheel has two weeks to remedy a default. The property forms part of the Dubai Waterfront project, where Nakheel plans to build a city twice the size of Hong Kong Island.

General Motors Co. will cede a majority stake in its China passenger-car venture to partner SAIC Motor Corp., while forming a new partnership with the Shanghai-based company to sell low-cost vehicles in India, Bloomberg reported. GM agreed to transfer 1 percent of Shanghai General Motors Co. to SAIC, China’s biggest carmaker, the companies said in a joint statement today. That will boost SAIC’s holding to 51 percent. They will also form an equally controlled venture in the first quarter of next year to make and sell small cars and mini-commercial vehicles in India.

Gold’s rally to a record may be related to investors seeking to protect themselves from a government defaulting on its debt rather than inflation, according to economists at Fathom Financial Consulting, Bloomberg reported. Gold’s advance of about 35 percent this year suggests the metal may be in a “micro-bubble” even though it’s hard to argue that there is a generalized asset bubble forming in the world economy, the London-based consultancy said.

The head of China's biggest property developer warned that real-estate bubbles in some of China's biggest cities could spread elsewhere in the country, with potentially damaging consequences for the market, The Wall Street Journal reported. In an interview, Wang Shi, chairman of China Vanke Co., said government stimulus measures enacted a year ago to keep China's economy from being sucked into the global recession have helped to cause a fundamental turnaround in a property market that was severely ailing before the global financial crisis hit.