Headlines

India’s Finance Minister Arun Jaitley goaded companies to boost investments as businesses bruised by a slowing economy and falling returns defer spending, Bloomberg News reported. Speaking at the Bloomberg India Economic Forum in Mumbai, Jaitley and Amitabh Kant, the chief executive officer at Niti Aayog, the nation’s economic think-tank, called for more private spending from local companies and said the banking system must get healthier to support that investment. Jaitley told companies that there’s “no need to panic,” while R.

Debt and corruption scandals at Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. make the utility the biggest risk to South Africa’s economy and the government needs to replace its management, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said. Eskom plans to raise almost 340 billion rand ($26 billion) in the next five years, while meeting 413 billion rand of interest and debt repayments, which amount to 8 percent of South Africa’s gross domestic product, Bloomberg News reported.

Swissport has started providing short-term loans to companies linked to the HNA Group, raising concerns among investors about the intermingling of the Swiss airline services company’s funds with its Chinese parent, the Financial Times reported. HNA acquired Swissport at the start of 2016, financing the deal with junk bonds and leverage loans, during the height of the Chinese conglomerate’s international buying spree. In a financial statement to its bondholders published this month, Swissport disclosed that it lent $100m to a “related party” on June 28 that was repaid nine days later.

The European Union’s plans to tighten up its oversight of financial firms have come under attack from industry and consumer groups that fear the move could hit businesses without doing enough to prevent misselling of risky funds, Reuters reported. The criticism comes after the European Commission on Wednesday published proposals aimed at ending national supervision of some financial industries in a bid to strengthen the EU’s common market and increase controls over foreign firms that operate in the bloc.

Lufthansa is set to pick up a large part of insolvent rival Air Berlin, and easyJet is also still in the running for some assets, two sources familiar with the matter said. Air Berlin’s creditors met on Thursday to discuss offers for Germany’s second largest airline and agreed the carve-up, the sources said. Air Berlin, which has about 8,000 employees and operates 144 mostly leased planes, filed for insolvency in August after major shareholder Etihad pulled the plug on funding, Reuters reported.

State-controlled oil producer Petróleo Brasileiro SA and Sete Brasil Participações SA have agreed to choose a mediator for a legal dispute that forced the rig leaser to seek creditor protection against 18 billion reais ($5.7 billion) of debt, Reuters reported. In a Thursday securities filing, Petrobras said Gustavo Binenbojm had been picked by both parties to mediate the dispute. Founded in 2008 to fill the world’s biggest deep-water drilling fleet order, Sete Brasil had to file for bankruptcy protection last year after efforts to secure a long-term contract with Petrobras failed.

UniCredit SpA executives have held discussions with German officials about a potential combination with Commerzbank AG once the lenders’ restructuring is complete, according to a person with knowledge of the talks. A transaction is unlikely in the short term because both banks are cutting jobs and selling assets to restore profitability, said people familiar with UniCredit’s thinking, asking not to be identified because the discussions are private, Bloomberg News reported. Contacts are at an early stage for what would probably be an all-share deal, Reuters reported Wednesday.

It’s crunch time for Concordia International Corp. With the junk-rated Canadian drug-maker facing two October interest payments, pressure is building for it to reach a debt-restructuring agreement with key bondholders. S&P Global Ratings downgraded Concordia on Sept. 18, citing its "unsustainable" capital structure and forecasting a “highly probable” likelihood of a restructuring or distressed exchange, Bloomberg News reported.

S&P Global Ratings cut China’s sovereign credit rating for the first time since 1999, citing the risks from soaring debt, and revised its outlook to stable from negative, Bloomberg News reported. The sovereign rating was cut by one step, to A+ from AA-, the company said in a statement late Thursday. The analysts also lowered their rating on three foreign banks that primarily operate in China, saying HSBC China, Hang Seng China and DBS Bank China Ltd. would be unlikely to avoid default should the nation default on its sovereign debt.

Brazil’s Mines and Energy Ministry has canceled nine licenses to build transmission lines that had been granted to Spain’s Abengoa SA after the company abandoned construction works in 2015, a senior official said on Wednesday. The decision formalizing cancellation of the licenses was published in the Wednesday edition of the official gazette, Reuters reported. The cancellation will not exempt the company from paying legal fines related to projects, according to the decision. The company did not have an immediate comment on the cancellation of the licenses.