Chinese developer Guangzhou R&F Properties Co. succeeded in delaying payment on a dollar bond due Thursday despite buying back only 16% of the note, underscoring the company’s liquidity shortage, Bloomberg News reported. The firm will repurchase $116.4 million of a $725 million note under a tender offer, according to a company filing to the Hong Kong exchange Tuesday. The company last month said it had planned to set aside about $300 million for the buyback. As part of the offer, bondholders agreed to extend repayment on the remaining principal by six months.

Cities across China are imposing tougher restrictions to try to control new outbreaks of COVID-19, with Tianjin battling the highly contagious Omicron variant which has been detected to have been transmitted locally in two other provinces, Reuters reported. A Tianjin official told a Tuesday press briefing that 49 domestically transmitted cases with confirmed symptoms have been detected during the latest outbreak. The city of 14 million people, around 100km (62 miles) from Beijing, is now implementing tough controls to stop the coronavirus from spreading, especially to neighbouring Beijing.

Taiwan will set up a $1 billion credit program aimed at funding projects by Lithuanian and Taiwanese companies amid economic pressure from China over an office that the island opened in the European Union country, Lithuanian officials said Tuesday, the Associated Press reported. It follows Taiwan’s announcement last week about creating a $200 million investment fund to help Lithuania amid a diplomatic row with Beijing. American and Lithuanian officials say China has blocked imports from the Baltic nation, a close U.S. ally.

Embattled Chinese developer Shimao Group Holdings Ltd.’s shares jumped the most on record after REDD reported that it’s in talks with a bigger rival on asset disposals, Bloomberg News reported. The company’s stock closed 19% higher in Hong Kong on Monday, while subsidiary Shanghai Shimao Co. surged by the 10% daily limit in Shanghai. Shimao’s dollar bonds also climbed. The moves followed REDD’s report that China Vanke Co. is in talks to acquire assets from Shimao, citing an unidentified source close to the latter.

Heavily indebted property firm China Evergrande Group said on Monday that it has moved out of its headquarters in Shenzhen to another property in the city to cut costs and was still registered in the southern Chinese city, Reuters reported. The company issued its statement after Chinese media outlet The Paper reported that Evergrande had moved its headquarters from Shenzhen to nearby Guangzhou. Evergrande said it has moved out of Shenzhen's Excellence Centre, which is owned by another company, to a building that Evergrande owns in the city but gave no further details on the new set-up.

Shimao Group Holdings Ltd., a bellwether for financial contagion in China’s embattled property industry, suffered its biggest-ever bond rout on Thursday after a creditor said one of the developer’s units defaulted on a local loan, Bloomberg News reported. The Shimao unit failed to pay 645 million yuan ($101 million) of a total 792 million yuan due by Dec. 25, according to a notice sent to investors by China Credit Trust Co. The trust firm had demanded early repayment by Dec. 25 after the developer failed to meet installment requirements, according to the notice.

China called on banks to boost real estate lending in the first quarter and eased a key debt restriction for developers, a sign that authorities are becoming increasingly concerned about the industry’s liquidity crisis, Bloomberg News reported. In previously unreported window guidance issued last month, regulators told banks to step up lending to developers after at least two quarters of consecutive declines, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be identified discussing private information.

The crisis engulfing China Evergrande Group deepened, as the embattled property developer said it had been ordered to tear down dozens of buildings on an extravagant man-made island in southern China, the Wall Street Journal reported. At the same time, Evergrande released data showing its much-publicized financial stress had largely halted sales of new homes, depriving it of an important source of cash. Contracted sales dwindled to about 720 million yuan, the equivalent of just $113 million, between mid-October and year-end, the company’s figures showed.

A wall of maturing debt and a surge in seasonal demand for cash will test China’s financial markets this month, putting pressure on the central bank to ensure sufficient liquidity, Bloomberg News reported. Demand for liquidity may total about 4.5 trillion yuan ($708 billion) in January, 18% more than the amount seen last year, according to calculations by Bloomberg based on official data and analysts’ estimates. An increase in the amount of policy loans coming due and demand for cash to be spent during the Lunar New Year, which takes place earlier in 2022, are drivers.

A demolition order from authorities on the southern Chinese island of Hainan has plunged embattled property giant Evergrande into a fresh publicity crisis amid an investigation into the legality of a major project’s planning permits, the Washington Post reported. Trading of China Evergrande Group shares was suspended Monday following reports from local media that the Danzhou government had ordered the removal within 10 days of 39 apartment blocks on an artificial island in the seaside city after ruling that previous approvals were not valid.