Headlines

A key transit project on the India-Myanmar border, Kaladan Multimodal Transit Transport (KMTT), has been delayed due to bankruptcy and ongoing insolvency proceedings against one of the contractors before the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), the Union home ministry informed a parliamentary panel, the Economic Times reported. The project is considered crucial for improving connectivity.

The administrators of South African Airways (SAA) hope to hand control of the business back to management by the end of the month, the state-owned airline said in a letter to affected parties seen by Reuters. SAA has been under a form of bankruptcy protection since December 2019, and its fortunes worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. All operations were mothballed in September 2020 when funds ran low. The letter, dated March 18, said SAA’s board of directors and management were working on a plan to resume flights, without giving a date when that might happen.

SsangYong Motor's bid to file for a prepackaged bankruptcy is showing no progress, as its negotiation with new investor HAAH Automotive Holdings is being stalled amid the looming deadline to submit a restructuring plan to a local bankruptcy court, Korea Times reported. According to industry officials, Sunday, SsangYong Motor and HAAH have not reached an agreement over the latter's investment into the former, despite SsangYong's request for HAAH to express its intention to invest by Saturday.

UAE-based troubled contractor Arabtec Holding has submitted a bankruptcy petition to Dubai Court, following the company's former group CEO Wail Farsakh's resignation in February 2021, Construction Week reported. In a missive issued to Dubai Financial Market (DFM), Arabtec Holding stated that a bankruptcy petition was submitted to the Dubai Court in addition to certain subsidiaries, which include Arabtec Construction, Austrian Arabian Readymix Concrete Co., Arabtec Precast, Emirates Falcon Electromechanical Co.

Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd agreed on Sunday to acquire Kansas City Southern in a $25 billion cash-and-stock deal to create the first railway spanning the United States, Mexico and Canada, standing to benefit from a pick-up in trade, Reuters reported. It would be the largest ever combination of North American railways by transaction value. It comes amid a recovery in supply chains that were disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and follows the ratification of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) last year that removed the threat of trade tensions that had escalated under former U.S.

Australian lenders Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Australia and New Zealand Bank on Monday separately said they had agreed to settle a 2016 class action, filed in the United States against them, for alleged benchmark interest rate rigging, Reuters reported. The suit had been filed by U.S.-based investment funds and an individual derivatives trader against 17 global banks, including ANZ's three domestic peers that make up the so-called "big four" with it.

British officials are drawing up contingency plans in case the government needs to step in to save Sanjeev Gupta’s Liberty Steel from collapse, amid fears that thousands of jobs in a critically important industry are at risk, Bloomberg News reported. Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng and other senior officials have been holding intensive discussions with the company in recent days, aiming to secure the future of the steelmaker.

Thai Airways International Pcl is challenging some $7.4 billion in claims from dozens of aircraft lessors and engine service provider Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc, saying that it isn’t liable for the monies because they concern future expenses and were incurred after the airline received bankruptcy protection from a Bangkok court, Bloomberg News reported. Thailand’s flag carrier, which is undergoing a court-supervised restructuring to trim debt and return to profit by raising fresh capital, is disputing around 192 billion baht ($6.3 billion) claimed by 48 lessors including BOC Aviation Ltd.

Norwegian Air’s shareholders voted in favour of the company’s debt restructuring plan on Thursday, business news website E24 reported. The vote was the first of several procedural hurdles the airline faces as it battles to survive the coronavirus pandemic which has decimated air travel. More than 99% of shareholders supported the so-called scheme of arrangement, E24 reported, which will be voted on separately by several groups of creditors on Thursday and Friday.