Asia Pacific

Koenigsegg Group, the luxury Swedish carmaker, said Wednesday that it would sell a stake to the state-owned Beijing Automotive Industry Holding as part of the Swedish company’s purchase of General Motor’s Saab unit, in the latest push by a Chinese automaker expand outside its domestic base, The New York Times reported. The agreement came just hours after another Chinese carmaker, Geely Automotive, said its parent company planned to bid for Volvo Cars, the Swedish brand that is being sold by Ford Motor.

Japanese corporate bankruptcies fell for the first time in three months in August as companies found it easier to borrow and government spending fueled demand, Bloomberg reported. Business failures declined 1 percent from a year earlier to 1,241 cases, Tokyo Shoko Research Ltd. said in Tokyo today. Efforts by the Bank of Japan and the government to encourage lending helped businesses stay afloat in the wake of the country’s deepest postwar recession. Companies have also benefited from more than $2 trillion in worldwide government stimulus that encouraged consumers to buy cars and electronics.

Three companies connected with Christchurch developer David Henderson have been put into liquidation at the High Court in Christchurch, The National Business Review reported. Associate Judge Rob Osbourne has granted applications to liquidate Montecristo Construction Ltd, Te Anau Ventures Ltd and Tomanovich Holdings over debts amounting to about $900,000 (excluding costs) owed to March Construction Ltd.

Luxury sportscar maker Koenigsegg has presented the Swedish government with a new plan for financing its purchase of Saab Automobile, a government official said on Monday. State Secretary Joran Hagglund told Reuters the plan no longer involved any extra loan from the Swedish state on top of guarantees for funding from the European Investment Bank (EIB). He declined to comment on the details of the plan.

The Chinese Ministry of Finance said Tuesday that it would issue 6 billion yuan worth of government bonds in Hong Kong, a major step to internationalize its currency at a time of concern about the dollar, The New York Times reported. The yuan bond issue, worth about $879 million, will “promote the yuan in neighboring countries,” the Finance Ministry said on its Web site, and "improve the yuan’s international status.” “The first step toward internationalization is regionalization,” Shi Lei, a foreign currency analyst at Bank of China in Beijing, said in an interview.

The World Trade Organisation is expected to rule on Friday that billions of dollars in European government subsidies for Airbus aircraft are illegal, the Financial Times reported. That would hand victory to the US and Boeing, in the first round of a WTO dogfight between the world’s biggest aircraft manufacturers. The preliminary ruling, is likely to spur Washington to launch a WTO challenge to further government loans for Airbus to develop its new €11 billion ($16 billion, £10 billion) A350 extra wide-bodied airliner which will compete with Boeing’s long-delayed 787 Dreamliner.

Creditors have come to an agreement about how to wind up FerroChina Ltd. and are awaiting approval by a mainland China court, said people familiar with the agreement, in a decision that many foreign investors view as a significant test of China's 2007 bankruptcy law, The Wall Street Journal reported. Under the restructuring agreement, the people say, China Minmetals Corp. will acquire five operating subsidiaries of the galvanized-steel maker for 3.2 billion yuan ($468.5 million). Some foreign creditors will recoup as much as 60 cents on the dollar.

Investors in a finance company chaired by former New Zealand Finance Minister Ruth Richardson are being told not to expect all their money back. The IMP Diversified Income Fund entered into a moratorium agreement with investors in June last year promising to make a full repayment to debenture holders. The company owed $16.5 million to debenture and capital noteholders at the time, and has since paid back 40c in the dollar.

A senate Inquiry has been told that hundreds of overseas students from the failed Sterling College in Sydney have still not been transferred to new courses, a month after the college collapsed, ABC News reported. The Federation of Indian Students of Australia says only 34 students have been found new places. About 500 mainly Indian students were affected when the college, which offers courses in information technology and community welfare, went into voluntary administration at the end of July. Read more.

Nursery furniture retailer BabyCo has gone into voluntary administration and only four of the company's 22 shops in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland and South Australia will remain open, Big Pond News reported. Deloitte partners Tim Norman, Sal Algeri and Simon Cathro have been appointed as voluntary administrators of the company on Friday. Mr Norman says slow sales and the competitive nature of the retail industry prompted the company to appoint administrators.