Headlines

Grupo Aeromexico SAB cut a last minute deal with the main group of its unsecured creditors, easing the way for the airline to seek final approval to exit bankruptcy from a judge in New York, Bloomberg News reported. The official committee of unsecured creditors in the company’s Chapter 11 case agreed to join more senior debt holders who back the plan, including Apollo Global Management Inc. and Delta Air Lines Inc. In return, unsecured creditors will get a note for $40 million, contingent on future performance.

Latam Airlines Group SA “flatly rejected” Azul SA’s offer to buy the bankrupt carrier even though the sale would be a better deal for creditors, Azul contends in new court filings, Bloomberg News reported. Azul for months has been expressing interest in a tie-up with Chile’s Latam, but the bankrupt airline has refused to seriously engage in talks, lawyers for Brazil-based Azul said in court papers. Azul said its deal outlined in a Nov. 11 term sheet values Latam at $13 billion and would provide more for creditors than Latam’s current proposal, which is on the verge of seeking court approval.

Embattled property developer China Evergrande Group said Wednesday that within six months, it aims to release a global restructuring plan that would respect offshore creditors’ legal rights, after a group of its bondholders threatened last week to sue the company for failing to engage with them, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. During a call with offshore creditors, Evergrande promised to follow the rule of law and respect bondholders’ rights, which in some cases include claims on the company’s secured offshore assets, according to people familiar with the matter.

China Evergrande Group shares slumped on Thursday after the developer's thinly detailed roadmap for restructuring left investors dissatisfied and its indebted peers also fell on concerns higher interest rates would raise financing costs, Reuters reported. Regulatory curbs on borrowing have driven China's property sector into crisis, highlighted by Evergrande, the world's most indebted property firm.

The Bank of Canada's decision to delay a rate hike for five more weeks will add fuel to Canada's scorching housing market as buyers scramble to clinch deals before borrowing costs rise, realtors said, Reuters reported. The Bank of Canada held its overnight rate at a record low 0.25% on Wednesday, but warned multiple increases would be coming soon. The U.S. Federal Reserve separately also said it would start hiking soon. Canada's housing market has been on tear throughout much of the pandemic, with prices up 39% nationwide from February 2020 to December 2021.

Swiss banks have criticised planned new measures designed to cool the country's red hot property market, saying the steps were unnecessary and would do nothing to slow rising house prices, Bloomberg News reported. The government said on Wednesday that from October, lenders must increase their cushion against home lending risks, sounding the alarm over one of Europe's most expensive housing markets, where total mortgage lending has swollen to more than $1 trillion.

Argentina’s looming deadline to make a payment of over $700 million to the International Monetary Fund on Friday is exposing a growing divide within the ruling coalition, Bloomberg News reported. The public disagreements in the government of President Alberto Fernandez, with its more radical wing suggesting the country could default on the Washington-based organization, come as Economy Minister Martin Guzman leads negotiations with IMF staff for a new program to reschedule payments on over $40 billion in outstanding debt.

Britain hopes to secure significant progress in post-Brexit trade talks with the European Union by February and win the support of pro-British unionists in Northern Ireland opposed to the current arrangements, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said, Reuters reported. Truss was speaking on Thursday during a visit to Belfast, where she spoke to politicians and business people about their concerns about post-Brexit restrictions on trade between the British region and the rest of the United Kingdom. "I want to make significant progress by February. That's important.

Two former Deutsche Bank AG traders were cleared by an appeals court in the latest blow to the troubled transatlantic crackdown on manipulation of the London interbank offered rate, Bloomberg News reported. Matthew Connolly and Gavin Black were found guilty of wire fraud in 2018 for rigging Deutsche Bank’s Libor submission. But the U.S. Court of Appeals in Manhattan on Thursday threw out their convictions, saying prosecutors failed to prove the two men influenced the bank into making false or misleading submissions. Prosecutors in the U.S. and the U.K.

Stellantis is preparing to early repay a 6.3 billion euros ($7 billion) loan backed by Italian government its predecessor Fiat Chrysler obtained at the peak of a COVID-19 outbreak, two sources close to the matter said on Thursday, Reuters reported. Repaying the loan potentially frees Stellantis from a set of conditions that Rome attached to it, including preserving jobs at its Italian operations, timely paying suppliers that are crucial for local plants or financing domestic investments, in particular for electric vehicles. The repayment is imminent, one of the sources said.