China

China’s new development bank will strive to be corruption free, maintain environmentally sound policies and work with a streamlined bureaucracy, the interim head of the institution, Jin Liqun, said on Saturday, the International New York Times reported. “We are committed to building a lean, clean and green bank,” Mr. Jin told the Singapore Forum, a gathering of Asian business and political leaders.

A onetime restaurant chain that became the first Chinese company to default on the principal on its local debt could be a test of Beijing’s willingness to give market forces a greater role in the economy, The Wall Street Journal reported. In a statement on the Shenzhen stock exchange website on Tuesday, Cloud Live Technology Group Co. said it was short 240.6 million yuan ($39.2 million) needed to pay back 400 million yuan in debt it sold three years ago.

The sudden rush to join China’s new Asian development bank by this week’s deadline, including last-minute applications by countries hardly considered Beijing’s best friends, astonished even the Chinese, the International New York Times reported. Few in Beijing had believed that Taiwan, still considered a breakaway territory by China, would want in. Same for Norway, whose relations with the Chinese have been chilly since its decision five years ago to award the Nobel Peace Prize to a dissident Chinese writer.

China will introduce on May 1 a program to insure bank deposits, the government said on Tuesday, ushering in an overhaul seen as vital for freeing up the highly protected banking sector, the International New York Times reported. Deposits of up to 500,000 renminbi, or about $81,000, will be insured under the program, which is expected to help reduce financial risks and protect the rights and interests of savers, the State Council, or cabinet, said on the government’s website.

China on Monday courted home buyers with a bigger tax break as it cut down-payment requirements for the second time in six months, stepping up a fight against sliding house prices that is imperiling the Chinese economy, the International New York Times reported. The People’s Bank of China, the central bank, said on its website that commercial banks could now lower their minimum down-payment requirement for buyers of second homes, and with outstanding mortgages, to 40 percent from 60 percent.

Zhou Xiaochuan, China’s central bank governor, warned on Sunday that the country needed to be vigilant about signs of deflation and said policy makers were closely watching the slowing of global economic growth and declines in commodity prices, the International New York Times reported. Mr. Zhou’s comments are likely to add to concerns that China is in danger of slipping into deflation and to underline increasing nervousness among policy makers as the economy continues to lose momentum despite a series of stimulus measures. “Inflation in China is also declining.

China’s central bank said on Wednesday that banks should step up financing support for farms in the latest bid to bolster that vulnerable sector and the overall economy, the International New York Times reported. The banking industry should “enhance the availability of financing for the agricultural sector at an affordable cost,” the central bank said in a news release. Policy makers face challenges in channeling bank loans into the cash-starved farming sector.

Sunac China Holdings Ltd. Chairman Sun Hongbin defended Kaisa Group Holdings Ltd.’s debt-restructuring proposal, saying it’s “reasonable” and that his company may seek other opportunities if its planned acquisition fails. Sunac won’t let the purchase of the troubled Shenzhen-based developer affect its own operations, Sun said at a briefing in Hong Kong on Tuesday. Kaisa’s situation is worse than expected and the company “definitely” won’t be able to make coupon payments next month, Sun said.

Bonds of 11 Chinese companies now yield more than 15 percent as investors brace for the nation’s second onshore default amid record maturities in the coming quarter, Bloomberg News reported. Companies in Asia’s largest economy need to repay 1.5 trillion yuan ($242 billion) of local-currency notes in the period to June 30, the most for a quarter in Bloomberg data going back to 1998.

The U.S. and Europe are to blame for China’s formation of its own development bank after the Asian power was neglected in the structures of existing international banks, a top European Union official said Saturday, The Wall Street Journal reported. “China is aggressively stepping into an area where if we paid more attention, we would have had more normal relationships,” Kristalina Georgieva, vice president of the European Commission, said at the Brussels Forum, a foreign-policy conference.