Banks are prepared to accept "appropriate" reforms to increase competition in the sector, the sector's peak body has declared. However Australian Bankers Association chief executive Steven Munchenberg also defended the decision of the Commonwealth bank to increase its key lending rates by almost double yesterday's official 25 basis point rise by the Reserve Bank Australia.

Amid the gloom hanging over the U.S. housing market, Australia continues to defy critics who say one of the world's few property hot spots is overdue for a correction, The Wall Street Journal reported. Another test will come at the landmark Sydney Opera House on Monday, when real-estate agency Ray White Ltd. holds an auction of 11 luxury dwellings, 10 in New South Wales, one in Queensland. The firm hopes the iconic venue will help persuade the invited bidders, mainly Asian, to snap up the properties, some for as much as 10 million Australian dollars (US$9.9 million).

The number of companies globally at risk of defaulting on debt jumped in October for the third consecutive month, indicating deteriorating credit quality worldwide, risk management firm Kamakura Corp said on Monday, Reuters reported. The proportion of them at risk of defaulting on their debt leaped by 1.17 percentage points in October to 11.10 percent of the more than 29,000 companies Kamakura rates. The index has deteriorated for the last three months after generally seeing improvement for more than a year.

A stagnant climate in the property market could last for months, after the usual spring lift in the market failed to show up in October, real estate industry website realestate.co.nz says, The National Business Review reported. Spring is a pivotal time in the property market, as better weather returns and more houses are usually listed. In October, 11,911 properties came onto the market, a 12.1 percent drop from the same month last year.

One of WA's major dairy companies has gone into voluntary administration, after weeks of speculation that it was on the verge of collapse, ABC News reported. South West-based Challenge Dairy announced today it has gone into voluntary administration, admitting it owed substantial amounts to farmers. About half of the state's dairy farmers supply milk to the company, and a number of them say they have not been paid for milk supplied last month.

The Tokyo District Court has decided to start bankruptcy protection procedures for consumer lender Takefuji Corp., its administrator said Sunday, The Japan Times reported on a Kyodo News story. Takefuji, snowed under by mounting refund claims for excessive interest charges, filed for bankruptcy protection on Sept. 28. The number of borrowers who haven't sought reimbursement yet is meanwhile estimated at anything from 1 million to around 2 million, with potential claims estimated at ¥1 trillion to ¥2 trillion.

The Australian division of Krispy Kreme doughnuts has gone into voluntary bankruptcy, the company said, UPI reported. With bankruptcy, which is referred to as voluntary administration in Australia, the company is seeking to find a way to save any parts of its business. Krispy Kreme spokesman Matthew Horan told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. Monday the company troubles were the result of several poorly performing stores.

The government debt burden shouldered by employees in the rich world will more than double between 2007 and 2015 as an ageing population puts rising strain on welfare and health systems in advanced economies. In new calculations for the Financial Times, Eswar Prasad, a former International Monetary Fund official now at the Brookings Institution and Cornell University, finds that the rich economies will owe a rapidly rising share of public debt worldwide, while contributing relatively less to global growth.

One-third of Hawke's Bay's apple business will soon be for sale, with Opey Holdings Ltd and Edenz Ltd joining Mr Apple, placed on the market by receivers, Hawke’s Bay Today reported. South Canterbury Finance receiver McGrathNicol has appointed investment bankers Goldman Sachs & Partners New Zealand Ltd as sale advisers for investment assets owned by the finance company, including Scales Corporation of which it owns 80 per cent. Deutsche Bank AG has been appointed as sale adviser for SCF's core finance business. South Canterbury Finance was put into receivership in August.

South Korea is expected to start selling a $6 billion majority stake in the country's largest financial company, Woori Finance Holdings, in a move that could create a Korean bank with the heft to compete on the global stage, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. A successful sale of Woori, which was cobbled together in 2001 in the wake of the Asian financial crisis as a holding company for several troubled financial firms, would be a significant step for the government of President Lee Myung-bak, which wants to privatize more of an economy that retains significant state ownership.