The New Zealand company that operates the coal mine where 29 miners died in a series of explosions last month said Monday it has been placed into receivership, Bloomberg reported on an Associated Press story. Pike River Coal Ltd chairman John Dow said that the largest shareholder, NZ Oil & Gas, appointed accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers as receivers. The coal miner is expected to announce mass redundancies on Tuesday among its 180-strong work force. The first major methane-fueled explosion ripped through the mine on Nov.

The Serious Fraud Office has arrested and laid six Crimes Act charges against one current and one former director of failed finance company Capital + Merchant in relation to $14.5 million worth of related party lending dating back to 2002, BusinessDay.co.nz reported. The two men charged at Neal Nicholls and Wayne Douglas, the founding directors and beneficial owners of the company which went into receivership in November 207 owing 7000 investors $167 million. Nicholls remained as a director until the company went under but Douglas had resigned a few months earlier in February of that year.

May Wang is set to appeal a bankruptcy ruling over a $22 million debt, while the company she is fronting considers whether it will proceed with its bid to purchase the Crafar farms, The New Zealand Herald reported. Ms Wang lost her year-long battle with Westpac at the High Court at Auckland yesterday, leaving the future of the deal between Hong Kong-listed company Natural Dairy and the New Zealand-based UBNZ group hanging in the balance. Ms Wang is the director and sole shareholder of UBNZ's trustee.

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) will make an arrest tomorrow in a case that involves tens of millions of dollars of investor losses, The National Business Review reported. News of the arrest came as SFO chief executive Adam Feeley appeared before Parliament's Law and Order select committee. Asked to explain how the SFO pursues its investigations and uses other organisations and contractors, he dramatically gave the arrest tomorrow as an example.

Bahrain's Awal Bank BSC is withdrawing its request to withhold financial details and now plans to comply with Chapter 11 disclosure requirements, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Awal's U.K.-based administrator had previously asked the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan for permission to follow the protocol of reorganizations in Bahrain, allowing the company to withhold information typically made public in U.S. cases, such as the exact amounts owed to the 20 largest creditors. Bahraini authorities placed Awal into administration in July 2009.

Fast food franchise Souvlaki Hut has been placed into voluntary administration, despite being named as one of the fastest growing franchises in Australia just 10 months ago, StartupSmart.com.au reported. Souvlaki Hut ranked third on the 2010 BRW Fast Franchise list, with revenue of $17.36 million and growth of 217.89%. But Laurie Fitzgerald from BDO Australia, who has been appointed as the company’s administrator, says poor retail sales, threats of litigation and disgruntled franchisees led to its demise.

A unit of HSBC Holdings PLC is protesting an attempt by Bahrain's Awal Bank BSC to pursue Chapter 11 protection in the U.S., saying Awal is seeking to cherry-pick the portions of the Bankruptcy Code it would like to use while ignoring other aspects of the law, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. HSBC Bank USA, which claims to be among Awal's largest creditors, said the Bahrain bank is trying to take advantage of U.S. laws in an attempt to claw back an errant $13 million wire transfer.

Lending by lightly regulated financial companies outside China's formal banking system has ballooned this year, causing increasing headaches for the government in its efforts to manage the economy and control inflation, observers say, The Wall Street Journal reported. China's government has traditionally used its control of the largely state-owned banking sector to regulate the country's pace of economic growth, directing it to pump out cheap credit in good times and restricting the volume of new loans to prevent overheating.

Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Inc.’s Australian unit exited bankruptcy protection after winning approval of its restructuring from creditors, the company said, Bloomberg reported. Management and control of the unit reverts to the directors, Krispy Kreme Australia said in an e-mailed statement today. Creditors can file claims against a A$2.3 million ($2.2 million) fund that was approved as part of the restructuring and will probably receive 45 cents for each dollar they’re owed, the company said.

Australia’s economy slowed to a crawl in the September quarter, The Australian reported. The economy was caught in the transition from the government's economic stimulus package to the revitalised commodity boom. The economy expanded by just 0.2 per cent, half as fast as expected, with the breaking of the drought and higher export prices saving the national accounts from plunging into the red.