China’s central bank again vowed to help the economy grow this year, firming expectations of more monetary easing as it walks a fine line between conflicting policy targets complicated by a possible trade war with the U.S., the Wall Street Journal reported. Officials at the People’s Bank of China said at a Tuesday briefing that they will ramp up support for the economy with measures like lower interest rates and reducing the amount of cash lenders must hold as reserves to free up liquidity.

China announced on Monday that its trade surplus reached almost $1 trillion last year as its exports swamped the globe, while the country’s own businesses and households spent cautiously on imports, the New York Times reported. When adjusted for inflation, China’s trade surplus last year far exceeded any in the world in the past century, even those of export powerhouses like Germany, Japan or the United States. Chinese factories are dominating global manufacturing on a scale not experienced by any country since the United States after World War II.

Defaulted property developer Sunac China Holdings said that it can’t rule out a second offshore debt restructuring as a prolonged property crisis dims its outlook and it faces another court petition to wind up operations, Bloomberg News reported. The company “doesn’t exclude seeking a more comprehensive holistic offshore debt solution”, given that current market conditions are “significantly below” expectations when it completed its first overhaul in 2023.

China Evergrande said on Monday that a court in Hong Kong had ordered one of its key offshore units to be wound up, the latest in a slew of legal victories for the embattled developer's liquidators, Reuters reported. The liquidators had filed a winding-up petition against company subsidiary CEG Holdings BVI in September, in a bid to recover funds from the debt-laden property company that defaulted in 2021 and triggered China's real estate market crisis.

China’s top securities regulator said it will work on building a mechanism to stabilize the market, vowing to anchor market expectations in 2025 after a disappointing start to the new year, Bloomberg News reported. The China Securities Regulatory Commission said stability is top of its agenda in 2025 as it pledged to make every effort to induce and maintain the market’s stabilizing and positive momentum, according to a statement following its work meeting on its priorities for the year.

In a striking sign of the Chinese economy’s stagnation, the central bank said on Friday that it had temporarily stopped buying government bonds, the New York Times reported. The central bank’s unexpected action is aimed at braking a recent shift by investors toward purchasing bonds while shunning riskier assets like stocks and real estate. That shift has driven China’s long-term interest rates to a record low. The decision to stop buying government bonds is especially unusual because interest rates have been rising lately in most of the world, in response to inflation fears.

Chinese companies were among the main buyers at the bankruptcy auction for BelGaN's high-tech machinery, Belgium’s last industrial chip manufacturer. In total, it raised over €23 million on Friday, according to its creditors, the Brussels Times reported. The company, based in Oudenaarde, East Flanders, went out of business three months ago, leaving over 400 employees jobless. The company specialised in the production of innovative gallium nitride semiconductors. https://www.brusselstimes.com/1388179/china-buys-assets-of-belgiums-bankrupt-semiconductor-maker

A key bondholder group of Country Garden Holdings Co., one of China’s most closely watched developers ensnared in the broader property crisis, isn’t on board with restructuring terms unveiled on Thursday, Bloomberg News reported. The new proposals by Country Garden aren’t supported by the so-called ad hoc group, which holds more than 30% of the developer’s outstanding $10.4 billion of notes.

Chinese property developers are starting 2025 facing liquidation petitions and mountains of debt as the nation’s real estate crisis enters its fifth year with little sign of improvement, Bloomberg News reported. Just this week, defaulted Chinese builder Sunac China Holdings Ltd received another winding-up petition. While the company successfully restructured its offshore debt in 2023, concerns about its ability to meet payment obligations have pushed its stock and bond prices to the lowest level in months.

In a striking sign of the Chinese economy’s stagnation, the central bank said on Friday that it had temporarily stopped buying government bonds, the New York Times reported. The central bank’s unexpected action is aimed at braking a recent shift by investors toward purchasing bonds while shunning riskier assets like stocks and real estate. That shift has driven China’s long-term interest rates to a record low. The decision to stop buying government bonds is especially unusual because interest rates have been rising lately in most of the world, in response to inflation fears.