Lenders to Vijay Mallya-promoted Kingfisher Airlines may have no option other than restructuring the carrier's loans again. In case of a second restructuring, banks have to classify the asset as non-performing, which requires higher provisioning, the Business Standard reported. Bankers are working on a formula that would aim to keep the re-payment period and the net present value of the asset specified during the first restructuring intact, by increasing the interest rate. In this case, there would be no increase in the provisioning requirement.
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Politics Stymie China's EU Aid Offer

Diplomatic deadlock is curbing China's will to provide cash to help end the euro zone crisis after Europe spurned the simplest of Beijing's three key demands, two independent sources have told Reuters. China had offered help in return for European support to grant it either more influence at the International Monetary Fund, market economy status in the World Trade Organization, or the lifting of a European arms embargo, said the sources, both of whom have direct knowledge of the matter, including one who has ties to the leadership in Beijing.
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17 Banks To Restructure AI Debt

A consortium of 17 banks have agreed to a restructuring package for Air India where Rs 20,000 crore of short term working capital loans will be converted into longer duration term loans and part of this money will be converted to unsecured credit that the government will repay, the Financial Chronicle reported. The repayment period of the loan has been extended by 10 years with a corporate guarantee from the Government of India and hypothecation of aircraft with the instalment beginning within two years.
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Olympus Corp's losses on securities investments mounted to more than 100 billion yen ($1.3 billion) at one point, the Nikkei business daily said on Wednesday, citing sources close to the matter, Reuters reported. Olympus, engulfed by a scandal that has brought the 92-year-old company to its knees, admitted the previous day to using M&A transactions to conceal past losses.
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While many businesses in the United States struggle to stay afloat and workers collect unemployment checks, China has the opposite problem: an economy, pumped up by expansive lending by state-controlled banks, which is growing too fast to keep inflation and speculation in check, the International Herald Tribune reported. Beijing’s solution: Create an artificial shortage of credit.
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Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), operator of the Japanese nuclear plant destroyed by the tsunami in March, forecast a second year of heavy financial losses even as it secured Y890bn (US$11.4bn) in government aid to help compensate victims of the nuclear disaster, the Financial Times reported. The utility on Friday projected a Y600bn net loss for the year to March 2012, its first earnings guidance since the triple meltdown occurred at its Fukushima Daiichi facility. If the estimate is realised, it would bring its losses since the tsunami to Y1,847bn.
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The board of Proserpine Cooperative Sugar Milling Association Ltd. has refused to accept a A$120 million takeover offer by Chinese state-owned Cofco Group's local unit Tully Sugar Ltd., Tully said Sunday. The Proserpine board has chosen to enter administration despite Tully tabling a binding and unconditional asset sale and loan agreement, Tully said in a statement.
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It’s “too soon” for China to discuss further bond purchases from Europe’s revamped rescue fund, Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao told reporters in Cannes, France, on the eve of a summit of world leaders, Bloomberg reported. While there are proposals to bolster the European Financial Stability Facility, “there are no concrete plans yet so it’s too early to talk about further investments in these tools,” Zhu said today. Zhu said the rescue fund, already part of China’s portfolio, is an “important tool” to address the sovereign debt crisis.
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Struggling Indian airline Kingfisher on Wednesday said it was in talks with bankers to reduce high interest rates on its $1.2-billion debt, but denied it was pursuing a fresh loan restructuring, Agence France-Presse reported. Ravi Nedungadi, chief financial officer of the giant drinks group UB group which controls the airline, said in a statement the carrier was attempting to swap high-cost rupee borrowings for lower-cost foreign debt. "The banks are in active consideration of these requests," Nedungadi said.
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Efforts to curb inflation in China are having some painful side-effects. A squeeze on bank lending has prompted some businesses short of cash to stop paying wages to blue-collar workers, The Economist reported. Even the much-vaunted state sector is feeling the pinch. Work has all but ground to a halt on thousands of kilometres of railway track, and many of the network’s 6m construction workers have been complaining about not being paid for weeks or sometimes months.
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