China will improve policies to help medium-to small and micro companies deal with bankruptcy more smoothly, state broadcaster reported on Wednesday, citing the state council meeting, Reuters reported. China will also crack down on such firms dodging repayment obligations for defaulted bonds in order to protect the interests of workers, creditors and investors, the cabinet said. Read more.
Read more
Ant Group Co. has agreed a restructuring plan with Chinese regulators under which the fintech giant will become a financial holding company, potentially easing founder Jack Ma’s regulatory woes, Reuters reported. The plan calls for putting all of Ant’s businesses into the holding company, including its payment processing and technology offerings in areas like blockchain and food delivery, the person said, declining to be named due to confidentiality constraints.
Read more

China’s embattled HNA Group is looking for private investors to help it emerge from bankruptcy, a person with knowledge of the matter said, but bankers and analysts say restructuring may be challenging due to its debt pile and opaque corporate structure, Reuters reported. The creditors’ move to file for bankruptcy came after HNA was put under a restructuring exercise led by the Hainan government to resolve its liquidity risks stemming from years of aggressive acquisitions abroad.

Read more

Creditors of China’s HNA Group have applied to a Chinese court for the company to be placed in bankruptcy and restructured, potentially giving a fresh start for the remaining assets of the once-highly acquisitive conglomerate, Reuters reported. HNA Group said on Friday that it had been notified by a Hainan court that its creditors had acted because it was unable to pay its debts. It said it would cooperate with the court. HNA Group was once one of China’s most aggressive dealmaking firms.

Read more

Hong Kong’s stock rally is so dependent on mainland capital that the mere suggestion the record inflows will slow has the potential to stir panic in the city’s $7.1 trillion market, Bloomberg News reported. Such was the case on Tuesday, when the People’s Bank of China withdrew incremental liquidity and an adviser warned obliquely of asset bubbles. The result was the biggest drop in eight months for the Hang Seng Index.

Read more

China’s central bank won’t exit “prematurely” from its supportive monetary policies while at the same time keeping debt risks under control, Governor Yi Gang said, Bloomberg News reported. Monetary policy will continue to “prop up the economy,” Yi said on a panel hosted by the World Economic Forum on Tuesday. Officials will remain mindful of risks, such as a rising macro leverage ratio and higher non-performing loans, he said. “Looking forward, I think our monetary policy will continue,” he said.

Read more

Millions of barrels of Venezuelan heavy crude, embargoed by the U.S., have been surreptitiously going to China, Bloomberg News reported. The cat-and-mouse games that avoid detection and sanctions include ship-to-ship transfers, shell companies and silenced satellite signals. But there’s another aspect to the dodge. It involves “doping” the oil with chemical additives and changing its name in the paperwork so it can be sold as a wholly different crude without a trace of its Venezuelan roots.

Read more
Tsinghua Unigroup, a Chinese conglomerate that has long sought to become a semiconductor powerhouse, is now caught between a rock and a hard place as debt woes mount while key chip units are failing to thrive, Reuters reported. Best known for an unsuccessful $23 billion bid for U.S. chipmaker Micron Technology Inc in 2015, Unigroup in November shocked investors with a default on a 1.3 billion yuan ($200 million) bond. Including that bond, Unigroup has now either defaulted or had cross-defaults triggered on seven onshore and offshore bonds worth about $3.6 billion, according to Refinitiv data.
Read more

New York-listed Best Inc, a Chinese logistics firm backed by e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, is considering a sale as part of a strategic review, Reuters reported. With the endorsement of Alibaba, its biggest shareholder, Best has tapped financial advisers to explore options as its shares have been underperforming and are worth a fifth of its IPO price in 2018, two of the people involved in the discussions said.

Read more

China postponed Kenyan debt repayments due over the next six months, a week after the Paris Club of creditors offered the East African nation similar relief, Bloomberg News reported. Kenya had been scheduled to pay 27 billion shillings ($245 million) to China from January through June, Treasury Secretary Ukur Yatani said Wednesday on Spice FM radio in the capital, Nairobi. The delayed payments were agreed after talks with the Chinese government, he said.

Read more