China

China relaxed rules governing cross-border data flows, addressing a key concern of foreign businesses that had complained previous regulations were disrupting their operations, Bloomberg News reported. Data collected in international trade, cross-border travel, manufacturing, academic research, and marketing that don’t contain either personal information or “important” information will be exempt from security evaluations when transfered out of the country, China’s top internet regulator said in a statement on Friday.

China's tightening of rules for consumer finance companies is likely to force consolidation in the roughly $120 billion sector that provides high-interest loans for millions of people shut out of traditional banking, Reuters reported. The National Financial Regulatory Administration (NFRA) announced revamped and stricter rules for the sector on Monday, measures that are expected to drive China's consumer finance companies to seek deeper-pocketed investors or merge.

China Life Insurance Co. is in crunch talks with lenders to an office tower in Canary Wharf to help stave off the locality’s third potential major default, as the eastern financial district of London grapples with some of the city’s highest vacancy rates, Bloomberg News reported. The landlord is in discussions with Lloyds Banking Group Plc, which originally financed 10 Upper Bank Street before syndicating the vast majority of the debt to several Chinese banks, about a plan to avoid an event of default ahead of the loan’s maturity next month, people with knowledge of the negotiations said.

Troubled property developer China Evergrande Group says Beijing’s stock watchdog has fined it 4.2 billion yuan ($333.4 million) for allegedly falsifying its revenue, among other violations, as it conducts a deep clean of the troubled financial sector, the Associated Press reported. The company said in a release to mainland Chinese stock exchanges late Monday that its chairman, Hui Ka Yan, was fined 47 million yuan ($6.5 million) and banned from China’s markets for life.

China Evergrande Group founder Hui Ka Yan will be barred from the securities market for life and fined 47 million yuan ($6.53 million) after the regulator accused the group's flagship unit of inflating results, securities fraud and failing to make timely disclosures, Reuters reported. Hengda Real Estate said in an exchange filing that China's securities watchdog also penalised the company and several of its former senior executives after an investigation.

Chinese authorities said that they took “criminal mandatory measures” against some employees at the money management business of Zhongzhi Enterprise Group Co., weeks after a Beijing court accepted the shadow banking giant’s bankruptcy application, Bloomberg News reported. Police in Beijing said the recovery of “stolen goods” is underway as it took action against suspects which included executives, according to a statement on WeChat on Saturday.

China’s central bank kept its key policy rates unchanged on Friday while reporting a net withdrawal of liquidity from the financial market, the Wall Street Journal reported. The People’s Bank of China held its one-year medium-term lending facility steady at 2.5% while injecting 387 billion yuan ($53.80 billion) worth of liquidity through the monetary tool, according to a statement on its website. There was a total of CNY481 billion of MLF loans due Friday, indicating a net withdrawal of liquidity.

China’s bank loans expanded at the slowest pace on record in February, underscoring weakness in borrowing demand despite steps by the central bank to ease policy and help the economy, Bloomberg News reported. The stock of yuan loans grew 9.7% in February from a year ago, the lowest in data going back to 2003, according to figures released by the People’s Bank of China on Friday. It was also the first time the rate dropped below 10%. The stock of aggregate financing — a broad measure of credit — expanded just 9%, also near a record low.

Country Garden Holdings Co. missed a coupon payment on a yuan bond for the first time, adding to the woes of the Chinese developer that is facing a lawsuit seeking its liquidation offshore, Bloomberg News reported. The builder’s main onshore unit hasn’t fully prepared a 96 million yuan ($13 million) coupon that came due on Tuesday for a 4.8% yuan bond maturing in 2026, the company said in a response to Bloomberg. There is a 30 trading-day grace period for the payment, it added.