China

In ways big and small, Beijing’s takeover of Hong Kong’s financial sector is looking irreversible. With stunning speed, the world’s pre-eminent East-meets-West investment hub has become more Chinese as international financial institutions, corporations, and expatriates retreat, the Wall Street Journal reported. Foreign banks played major roles in one-fifth of Hong Kong’s initial public offerings this year, compared with roughly half just two years ago. Chinese banks have taken the places of Western ones as top earners in the city’s debt-capital market.

China has made a $1.3 billion bet that a new port in Peru will boost access to South America’s agricultural bounty. Cashing in on the investment may be harder than expected, Bloomberg News reported. China’s President Xi Jinping and Peruvian President Dina Boluarte officially inaugurated Chancay port during a ceremony at Peru’s presidential palace in Lima on Thursday. The move epitomizes Beijing’s ambitions to strengthen commerce with South America as the world braces for more restrictive trade measures under US President-elect Donald Trump.

China is cutting taxes for homebuyers and developers, as the government tries to put a floor under falling prices and sustain an improvement in housing transactions, Bloomberg News reported. The nation lowered home purchase deed taxes to 1% for first- and second-house buyers of flats of 140 square meters and below, from a current level of as much as 3%, according to a joint statement on Wednesday by the Ministry of Finance, State Taxation Administration and Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development.

China’s consumer prices edged up in October, while factory-gate prices continued to decline, underscoring the challenges Beijing faces in battling deflationary pressures despite a recent stimulus push, the Wall Street Journal reported. China’s consumer-price index rose 0.3% from a year last month, compared with the 0.4% gain seen in September, according to data released Saturday by the National Bureau of Statistics. The producer-price index, meanwhile, fell 2.9% in October, for a 25th straight month of decline.

Investors who won a $16 billion judgment against Argentina over its nationalization of energy firm YPF SA more than a decade ago are open to receiving payment in bonds instead of cash, Bloomberg News reported. Burford Capital, a litigation funder that’s the biggest stakeholder in the case, would accept sovereign bonds or other marketable securities, considering the Argentine central bank’s depleted foreign reserves, the people noted, asking not to be identified because the discussions are private.

China unveiled a 10 trillion yuan ($1.40 trillion) debt package on Friday to ease local government financing strains and stabilise flagging economic growth, as it faces fresh pressure from the re-election of Donald Trump as U.S. president, Reuters reported. The measures confirm last week's Reuters report, and mark a departure from the all-out stimulus strategies to revive growth China has deployed in the past. They aim to repair municipal balance sheets as a longer-term objective, rather than directly inject money into the economy.

Chinese builder Hopson Development Holdings Ltd. is in talks for a new private loan to refinance an expired bridge facility that backed the purchase of some property in Hong Kong, Bloomberg News reported. Discussions for the new loan with Seatown Holdings Pte Ltd., a subsidiary of Singaporean sovereign fund Temasek Holdings Pte, are ongoing, the people said. Earlier this year, Hopson, whose projects include high-end residential and commercial properties in Beijing and Guangzhou, received a four month bridge loan of around $100 million to $115 million from Seatown.

Banks in China are foreclosing on a growing number of apartments after homeowners could not pay their mortgages, as the country’s housing crash threatens the financial system, the New York Times reported. The roster of homes seized and listed for auction leaped 43 percent last year, according to official data. Numerous Chinese banks have disclosed increases in mortgage defaults during the first half of this year. The downward spiral in apartment prices has since accelerated. The legal system is struggling to keep up with evictions.