Japan’s government cut its monthly economic assessment in January for the first time in 11 months, as trade weakened due to a global economic slowdown, Bloomberg News reported. The Cabinet Office said in its latest report Wednesday that parts of the economy are showing weakness, while overall it’s picking up moderately. It downgraded its view of exports, imports and bankruptcies. Japan is bracing for the impact of a global economic slowdown from aggressive monetary policy tightening, and the fallout from China’s abrupt end to its zero-Covid policy.

Turkey’s central bank is considering a measure to deter lenders from selling currency derivatives to their customers, the latest effort to curb growing corporate demand for dollars, Bloomberg News reported. The monetary authority is designing a new regulation to require banks to hold collateral for forward contracts, with the goal of ultimately cooling off demand for hard currency in the spot market, according to people familiar with the discussions.

The government has proposed the decriminalisation of several violations under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) to further improve the ease of doing business and speed up corporate failure resolution, the Economic Times of India reported. The move is in line with the government's initiative to clean up the statute book to decriminalise minor offences and switch to monetary penalties. A similar process has been carried out in the laws for companies and limited liability partnerships.

Japan raised its estimates for long-term interest rates over the coming few years in government's twice-yearly fiscal projections issued on Tuesday, following the central bank's decision last month to allow 10-year bond yields to move more widely, Reuters reported. Higher rates will test the government's ability to service the industrial world's heaviest debt burden at more than double the size of Japan's annual economic output.

The Export-Import Bank of China has offered Sri Lanka a two-year moratorium on its debt and said it will support the country's efforts to secure a $2.9 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund, according to a letter reviewed by Reuters. Regional rivals China and India are the biggest bilateral lenders to Sri Lanka, a country of 22 million people that is facing its worst economic crisis in seven decades.

India’s bid to streamline bankruptcy proceedings includes provisions that could change the proportion of money creditors get from a firm’s liquidation, according to a Bloomberg News analysis. To speed up proceedings and counter a mounting caseload, the Ministry of Corporate Affairs last week published published dozens of proposed amendments to the insolvency code, giving the public until Feb. 7 to provide input. Any changes to the law would have to be voted on by parliament.

Japan's finances are becoming increasingly precarious, Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki warned on Monday, just as markets test whether the central bank can keep interest rates ultra-low, allowing the government to service its debt, Reuters reported. The government has been helped by near-zero bond yields, but bond investors have recently sought to break the Bank of Japan's (BOJ) 0.5% cap on the 10-year bond yield, as inflation runs at 41-year highs, double the central bank's 2% target.

Millions of people across Pakistan’s major cities were plunged into a blackout prompted by a power grid failure, dealing another blow to the nation already reeling from surging energy costs, Bloomberg News reported. Outages were reported in locations including Karachi, Lahore and capital Islamabad, according to local media reports, and it could take as long as 12 hours to fully restore electricity, Geo TV said, citing Power Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan. Many major businesses were relying on backup power systems, and Pakistan’s stock exchange was trading as normal.

A bankruptcy court on Thursday admitted military-focussed software developer Rolta India for the corporate insolvency resolution process (CIRP), allowing a petition filed by state-owned Union Bank of India, the Economic Times of India reported. The Mumbai Bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) appointed Mamta Binani as the interim resolution professional for the listed firm. Union Bank had approached the bankruptcy court in February 2020 after the Mumbai-based company defaulted on dues of over ₹1,413 crore to the lender.

The government proposal to amend the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), such that it permits mandatory admission of insolvency applications filed by financial creditors, is seen as a course correction after the Supreme Court's judgement on Vidarbha Industries Power, an Anil Ambani group company, the Economic Times of India reported.