The Japanese government told the operator of the ravaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant yesterday to consider accepting temporary state control in return for a much-needed injection of public funds, in effect proposing an interim nationalization of the struggling utility, the New York Times reported yesterday. The order came after Tokyo Electric Power requested ¥689.4 billion ($8.8 billion) in government aid to help pay for its response to the nuclear accident at its Fukushima site.

Japan's Financial Services Agency (FSA) said that it will hire 32 officials to help tighten oversight of illegal trading at securities firms and other regulations as it boosts its headcount and budget for next year, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The regulator plans to increase its net headcount to 1,548 people in 2012, the most in at least in five years, as its budget grows by 4.1 percent to 23.1 billion yen ($296 million), the agency said. The FSA penalized at least 35 financial institutions this year, including Citigroup Inc. and UBS AG, for breaching Japanese securities rules.

Bharati Shipyard Ltd. said its board has approved restructuring INR28.54 billion ($538.2 million) of its INR32.50 billion debt, a move that will help it cut interest costs, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. The company has been struggling with mounting debt on its books after acquiring a majority stake in Great Offshore Ltd. two years ago, as a slowdown in Europe and lower demand in India also impacted its business.

A wide-ranging currency agreement between China and Japan is expected to give the Chinese yuan a more powerful role in international trade, the Wall Street Journal reported today. China, among other nations, has objected to the primacy of the dollar in international trade, and has suggested other ways to run the international monetary system, including giving a bigger role to the International Monetary Fund and a wider role for the yuan.

Turkey's central bank kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged for a fifth month and said it will keep bank borrowing costs high to restrain inflation and slow credit growth, Blomberg News reported today. The central bank held the one-week repo rate at 5.75 percent today, according to a statement on the website of the Ankara-based institution. The lira weakened 0.1 percent against the dollar after the bank sold $50 million for liras, less than the $150 million maximum it had set. Yields on two-year lira bonds rose 4 basis points, or 0.04 percentage point, to 10.43 percent.

International regulators' efforts to strengthen the financial system by tightening bank rules may inadvertently serve to boost opportunities for unregulated or "shadow" financial players, Reuters reported. That is because it is the shadow players, primarily hedge funds and private equity firms, who are expected to buy the billions of euros worth of assets that banks will be selling in the coming months as they slim down their balance sheets to comply with the new rules. "The growth of the shadow banking system is a logical consequence," said Merck Finck analyst Konrad Becker.

China's Pang Da Automobile Trade said on Wednesday it would halt its attempt to acquire Swedish carmaker Saab in light of Saab's bankruptcy, Reuters reported. Saab was declared bankrupt by a court on Monday, ending a nine-month survival battle by its Dutch owner. "In view of Saab being declared bankrupt, Pang Da Automobile Trade has decided to stop the acquisition transaction of Saab," Pang Da said in a statement to the Shanghai stock exchange.

Indian companies have a record $11.4 billion of dollar-denominated bonds to repay in 2012 just as the rupee falls to an all-time low and borrowing costs in the U.S. currency exceed all but one of Asia’s markets. Companies have more than double the debt coming due next year compared with a five-year average of $5.6 billion, while ICICI Bank Ltd. and Bank of Baroda have the most maturing debt, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Sino-Forest Corp., already reeling from fraud allegations, has been slapped with default notices from debt holders, a setback that could mark the beginning of the end for what was once Canada’s largest publicly traded forestry company, The Globe and Mail reported. Sino-Forest management, including its Canadian chief executive officer Judson Martin, are now pleading with debt holders not to tip the company into insolvency. The TSX-listed Chinese timber firm had less than $600-million (U.S.) in cash in early November and more than $1.8-billion in debt. Mr.

Sino-Forest Corp.'s second-largest shareholder has joined calls for the Canadian-Chinese timber company to make interest payments on outstanding debt, signalling a battle could be brewing between equity and bondholders over the firm's assets, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Davis Advisors, which owns about 17% of Sino-Forest, urged the company to reconsider its decision against making an almost $10 million interest payment that was due Thursday on some of its convertible bonds, given Sino-Forest maintains it's a going concern with real assets.