The insolvency case of Guo Wengui, the exiled Chinese businessman, got off to raucous start Tuesday when a longstanding creditor called the move “astonishing” and signaled it would wage an aggressive fight in bankruptcy court, Bloomberg News reported. Guo, a former partner of Trump political strategist Steve Bannon, filed for bankruptcy last month after moving a yacht from New York waters, a shift that would keep it out of the reach of creditors, and then facing a $134 million penalty for taking that step.

A widely-anticipated push by China’s government to boost construction in order to stabilize growth in the world’s second-largest economy has yet to materialize, a blow to hopes that Chinese stimulus would lift global growth early on this year, Bloomberg News reported. The Communist Party has made its stimulus goals clear in recent months, pledging to “front-load” pro-growth policies in 2022, pushing early sales of bonds to fund investment and easing curbs on financing for the property sector.

China’s top disciplinary watchdog sharply criticized more than two dozen financial regulators, state banks, insurers and bad debt managers following months of investigations, Bloomberg News reported. The financial agencies had common problems in meeting the objectives of the Communist Party’s leadership, including gaps in their work to implement the Party’s major strategy, insufficient awareness and mechanisms to prevent financial risks, and slow progress in making financial reforms, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said in a statement Thursday.

Three months ago, Chinese authorities saved the country’s largest manager of distressed debt from a potentially disastrous collapse. Now, they’re turning China Huarong Asset Management Co. and its peers into a key line of defense for the $54 trillion financial system as defaults in the property sector soar, Bloomberg News reported.

Money raised by newly-launched private funds in China plunged 44% in January from a month earlier, latest official data showed, adding to evidence of rapidly-shrinking risk appetite amid a slowing economy and rising geopolitical tensions, Reuters reported. The disclosure by the Asset Management Association of China (AMAC) mirrors a slump in fundraising by Chinese mutual funds, and comes as a growing number of money managers announce fund launch failures, or extend subscription periods.

Two of China’s largest and most prosperous cities have cut interest rates for prospective home buyers, joining an effort to prop up a housing sector whose weakness could threaten the broader economy, the Wall Street Journal reported. Six of China’s largest state-owned banks, including Bank of China and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, cut mortgage rates for home buyers in the southern city of Guangzhou by 0.2 percentage point on Monday, according to state-run broadcaster China Central Television.

Zhenro Properties Group Ltd., a Chinese developer, said its existing internal resources may be insufficient to meet debt payment obligations next month, according to a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange, Bloomberg News reported. The Shanghai-based developer is soliciting the consent of creditors “to certain proposed waiver and amendments” to help improve its overall finances and give it stability, it said in the filing late Friday. Zhenro is China’s 30th largest builder by contracted sales in 2021, according to China Real Estate Information Corp.

A Chinese court has ordered the freezing of 640.4 million yuan ($101 million) in assets held by a subsidiary of China Evergrande Group, according to a filing by contractor Shanghai Construction Group, Reuters reported. State-owned Shanghai Construction, which sued the Evergrande unit in the southwestern city of Chengdu in December for overdue construction fees, cited the Guangzhou Intermediate People's Court ruling that the assets to be frozen will include bank deposits and real estate.

China’s factory-gate inflation eased and consumer price growth slowed, giving Beijing room to stimulate growth at a time when more major economies are looking to tighten policy to curb rising prices, the Wall Street Journal reported. The producer-price index, a gauge of wholesale prices charged by manufacturers, rose 9.1% in January from a year earlier, down from December’s 10.3%, National Bureau of Statistics data published on Wednesday show. Softening coal and steel prices helped lead the index lower, said Dong Lijuan, a senior statistician with the bureau.

China’s central bank stepped up support for its slowing economy by pumping in cash via policy loans for a second straight month. The benchmark stock index advanced, outperforming regional equities, Bloomberg News reported. The People’s Bank of China injected a net 100 billion yuan ($15.7 billion) into the banking system with its medium-term lending facility, while leaving the borrowing rate unchanged. The CSI 300 rose as much as 1.1%. Chinese banks in January extended a record amount of loans after the PBOC lowered borrowing costs for the first time since 2020 last month.