Headlines

Shares of Dewan Housing Finance (DHFL) hit lower circuit on Tuesday after the insolvency court accepted bankruptcy proceedings against it, The Economic Times reported. DHFL became India’s first non-banking finance company to face insolvency proceedings after the Reserve Bank of India took the company to the Mumbai bench of the National Company Law Tribunal, which admitted the insolvency resolution plea on Monday.

China’s Peking University Founder Group is scrambling for funding after failing to repay an onshore bond, three sources told Reuters on Tuesday, which could trigger defaults on billions of the borrower’s U.S. dollar offshore debt, Reuters reported. State-owned Peking Founder told investors on a conference call on Tuesday it had yet to obtain the 2 billion yuan ($284 million) it needs to repay the overdue note, the sources said, although it had a grace period of 15 days to do that.

Ailing conglomerate Thyssenkrupp has worked out a new strategy for the group’s steel business, a leading labor representative said on Tuesday, adding the roadmap included significant investments but also restructuring steps, Reuters reported. The strategy paper was presented to the supervisory board of Thyssenkrupp Steel Europe on Tuesday, following labor protests at the division’s headquarters in Duisburg, in the heart of the Ruhr area, Germany’s industrial heartland.

Sweden’s central bank is this month expected to swim against the tide of global monetary policy by raising interest rates even as the Scandinavian country’s economy softens, the Financial Times reported. A manufacturing sentiment survey published on Monday showed the lowest activity reading since 2012, the latest in a series of gloomy economic data. Growth in the third quarter was weaker than the Riksbank expected, according to figures released on Friday, which showed the economy grew 0.3 per cent compared with the previous quarter and 1.6 per cent year on year.

Nigeria’s banking industry is opening the lending taps to avoid penalties, bowing to central bank demands to unlock credit to help revive the economy, Bloomberg News reported. Banks raised their loan-to-deposit ratio to 64% in the third quarter, one percentage point shy of the minimum target imposed by the central bank, according to Bloomberg calculations using quarterly banking data released by the National Statistics Bureau. The monetary authority gave banks until the end of the year to meet the threshold or hand over half of the shortfall to the central bank without earning interest.

Lebanon’s central bank plans to slash interest rates in an attempt to ease the country’s economic crisis and is considering formalizing temporary capital controls set individually by local lenders, Bloomberg News reported. Governor Riad Salameh told the Association of Banks in Lebanon that he will issue a circular within days to lower rates “to revive the economy” and limit the increase in “doubtful” loans, according to a document summarizing the meeting and seen by Bloomberg.

UniCredit, Italy’s largest lender, said it plans to cut 8,000 jobs and seek regulatory approval for a share buyback that will be seen as a litmus test for the wider European banking sector, the Financial Times reported. The moves were part of a four-year strategic plan unveiled by chief executive Jean Pierre Mustier on Tuesday, which will also lead to the closure of 500 branches in an effort to save €1bn of costs in Western Europe.

An Indian shadow lender whose debt problems are being closely watched amid a broader industry crisis is facing pushback on its restructuring plan, Bloomberg News reported. Some creditors to Altico Capital India Ltd., which focuses on real estate lending, are concerned that the absence of fresh equity in the proposal fails to address a dramatic surge in bad loans, said two people familiar with the matter, asking not to be identified because the information isn’t public.

South African Airways is in talks with lenders including Standard Bank Group Ltd. and Investec Ltd. about funds to alleviate a cash crunch brought on by persistent losses and a week-long strike, according to people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg News reported. Negotiations are also taking place with Absa Group Ltd., Nedbank Group Ltd. and FirstRand Ltd.’s Rand Merchant Bank, said the two people who asked not to be identified as the discussions are private.

China is hurtling toward another record year of onshore bond defaults, testing the government’s ability to keep financial markets stable as the economy slows and companies struggle to cope with unprecedented levels of debt, Bloomberg News reported. At least 15 defaults since the start of November have pushed this year’s total to 120.4 billion yuan ($17.1 billion), within a hair’s breadth of the 121.9 billion yuan annual record in 2018, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.