China

Pressure is building on Beijing to intervene more forcefully to restore confidence in its reeling property market, the Wall Street Journal reported. In the latest sign of stress for the market, people with knowledge of Beijing’s decision-making said authorities are investigating whether Hui Ka Yan, the billionaire founder of heavily indebted property developer China Evergrande Group, attempted to transfer assets offshore while the company was struggling to complete unfinished projects.

Germany has welcomed a show of support from China for the G20 debt restructuring framework for poorer countries in a joint statement after their financial dialogue in Frankfurt over the weekend, Reuters reported. "We welcome the fact that the Chinese side is also committed to this in our Joint Statement, because solutions are inconceivable without China as such an important player in world politics," German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said on Sunday, after his meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng.

Just a few weeks ago, China Evergrande, the world’s most debt-saddled real estate developer, was writing its next chapter and working to resolve financial disputes with its creditors. Then a stream of bad news came and the pages were torn up, the New York Times reported. Staff at the company’s wealth management arm have been detained by the authorities. Two former top executives are reportedly being held, and its billionaire chairman is under police surveillance.

China’s gigantic real estate bubble has popped, but despite the market’s prolonged downturn, prices still haven’t fallen much, the Wall Street Journal reported. In part, that is because of price controls which many Chinese cities imposed on housing over the past two years to keep values stable. Now China is starting to loosen the rules—with unpredictable consequences. Under the rules, which were applied in dozens of cities, local governments typically blocked developers of new homes from offering discounts of 10% to 15% or more on unsold properties.

Hui Ka Yan, the billionaire chairman of beleaguered property developer China Evergrande Group, has been placed under police control, Bloomberg News reported. Hui was taken away by Chinese police earlier this month and is being monitored at a designated location. It’s not clear why Hui is under so-called residential surveillance, a type of police action that falls short of formal detention or arrest and doesn’t mean Hui will be charged with a crime.

Guangdong Adway Construction has filed for bankruptcy in a Shenzhen court due to its inability to repay debts amid China’s stressed real-estate sector, the Wall Street Journal reported. The company filed the application with the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court, seeking restructuring to reduce its debt burden and improve operations, Adway said in a filing on Monday. Adway, which provides interior and exterior decoration and design services, is the latest company to fall victim to China’s weak property sector, which has weighed on the world’s second-largest economy.

A major group of offshore creditors of China Evergrande Group is planning to join a winding-up court petition filed against the cash-strapped developer if it doesn't submit a new debt revamp plan by next month, Reuters reported. The creditor group holds a large portion of Evergrande offshore bonds and, if it decides to join, would add more weight to the winding-up petition filed against the developer by an investor in a Hong Kong court.

Shenyang is the capital of Liaoning Province, one of three large provinces in the northeast that constitute the cradle of China’s heavy industry. Now the central government, confronting a national economy that has slowed because of a real estate crisis that defies easy fixes, is turning to cities like Shenyang. It hopes to squeeze more productivity and efficiency out of the region’s factories, the New York Times reported.

Another obstacle to embattled developer China Evergrande Group's long-pending debt restructuring plan rekindled fears for China's crisis-hit property sector on Monday, sparking a stock sell-off, Reuters reported. Developer China Oceanwide Holdings added to investor concerns in an exchange filing which said that a Bermuda court had ordered its winding up and appointed joint provisional liquidators.

The steepening downturn in China’s real-estate markets has led China Evergrande to scrap a $35 billion debt-restructuring plan designed to ensure the property developer’s survival, a sign that China’s ongoing housing crisis could still get worse, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. China Evergrande, among the largest property developers in China, popped the country’s real-estate bubble in 2021 when it spiraled into insolvency and set off a chain of developer defaults.