A top Chinese technology company that’s struggled for months to assure creditors of its financial stability has seen its efforts to secure a fresh loan disrupted by the coronavirus crisis, Bloomberg News reported. With payments on a dollar loan coming due next month, Tsinghua Unigroup Co. has been engaged with lenders on a $900 million financing deal. That loan has been delayed partly due to the coronavirus outbreak and the Lunar New Year holiday, a company spokesman said Tuesday. Even so, the financing market has been open for others.

Chinese airlines are rushing to refinance their fleets as they struggle with the impact of the coronavirus outbreak, according to the head of Avolon, one of the world’s largest aviation leasing companies, the Financial Times reported. “When the airline industry is impacted, it tends to move quickly to preserve cash. That is what we are seeing here. The phones have started ringing. We’ve seen a dramatic step up of airlines reaching out to do sale and lease back transactions,” said Domhnal Slattery, chief executive of the Dublin-based company.

The coronavirus outbreak may have a bigger and longer-term impact on China’s economy than thought, as fewer migrant workers have returned for work than in previous years and business activities have been slow to pick up, according to Nomura Holdings Inc, Bloomberg News reported. To contain the spread of the novel coronavirus pneumonia (NCP), Chinese authorities have ordered city lockdowns and extended holidays at the expense of near-term economic growth.

Chinese car and car-parts factories may stay closed longer than expected because of the coronavirus, increasing the chances that assembly lines in Asia, Europe and the United States could grind to a halt because of shortages of components, the International New York Times reported. The hit to the auto industry, which employs eight million people worldwide, comes as output from the world’s factories is already sagging. It is likely to amplify the already alarming human and economic cost of the outbreak.

A formula is emerging for Chinese state-run firms to resolve offshore debt failures after a major commodities trader and a prominent aluminum producer imposed nearly identical losses on holders of their defaulted bonds, Bloomberg News reported. The decisions by Tewoo Group Co. and Qinghai Provincial Investment Group Co., which have since December committed the two biggest dollar-bond defaults from China’s state sector in 20 years, could offer a roadmap to investors as Beijing allows more ailing state firms to go bust.

China’s massive pile of soured debt is set to get even bigger, giving foreign investors more opportunities to try to profit from the cleanup, Bloomberg News reported. Nonperforming loans and stressed assets are likely to keep growing after reaching $1.5 trillion in 2019, according to a new study from PricewaterhouseCoopers. The mountain of soured borrowings is rising as the world’s second-largest economy opens further to foreign capital. As part of a recent trade deal, China is now allowing U.S. firms to apply for licenses to buy non-performing loans directly from banks.

China’s biggest health crisis since at least 2003 has worsened the outlook for defaults in the world’s second-biggest bond market, likely tipping a raft of distressed borrowers over the edge this year, Bloomberg News reported. With scores of millions of citizens barred from travel, and companies, factories and retail outlets shuttered for a period of weeks, strains on cash flow add an unexpected layer of stress on Chinese borrowers. Market participants had already anticipated that defaults in 2020 would be on par with 2019, which saw a second straight annual record high.

China’s banking system is facing greater risks than it seems as some bigger regional lenders are under pressure just like their smaller counterparts. “Some of the relatively larger stress-tested banks could require sizable recapitalization,” said S&P Global Ratings credit analyst Ming Tan, citing tests conducted by the People’s Bank of China, Bloomberg News reported. China’s vast network of regional banks is under pressure amid the slowest economic growth in three decades and rising loan defaults. The partially resolved trade dispute with the U.S.

Stocks in China plunged in early Monday trading as investors returned from a long holiday to the prospect of the world’s No. 2 economy virtually shut down by the coronavirus epidemic, the International New York Times reported. Stocks in Shanghai opened 8.7 percent lower, while shares in the southern Chinese boomtown of Shenzhen fell 9 percent. The markets had been closed since Jan. 23 for the Lunar New Year holiday, and government officials extended that closure until Monday while the authorities dealt with the outbreak.

Bank of China agreed to pay €3.9 million to settle a French probe into allegations it turned a blind eye as customers moved millions to their Asian accounts without paying European taxes, The Irish Times reported. The lender will pay a €3 million fine and €900,000 in damages to French tax authorities to put the criminal allegations behind it, Paris prosecutor Remi Heitz said. The case will continue against 28 business owners and intermediaries involved in transferring the funds to China, Mr Heitz said Tuesday in a statement.