Headlines

Brazil's government submitted a bill to Congress on Wednesday that would modernize bankruptcy regulations, aiming to speed up proceedings by giving creditors more control over the process, Reuters reported. According to finance ministry official Marcos Pinto, Brazil's current regulations date to the 1980s, and the average bankruptcy process in the country lasts more than 11 years. With the changes, the government expects to cut that length in half while increasing recovery levels and reducing the cost of credit, Pinto added in a press release.

The parent company of Brazil’s Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes SA and Colombia’s Avianca is meeting creditors to kickstart negotiations in a bid to fix its balance sheet, Bloomberg News reported. Abra Group Ltd will host talks with representatives of its $1.5 billion bondholders in New York on Wednesday, the first step toward striking a comprehensive restructuring deal for the troubled low-cost airline group. Abra’s bondholders are working with financial adviser Houlihan Lokey Inc. and law firm Dechert LLP, while Abra hired Rothschild & Co., they said.

Creditors to Gayatri Projects (GPL), promoted by former Rajya Sabha MP T Subbarami Reddy, have voted to initiate liquidation proceedings against the company after rejecting the only bid from private equity fund Mark AB Capital Investment LLC, the Economic Times of India reported. Mark AB was offering a total of ₹650 crore, of which only ₹50 crore was upfront cash, ET had reported in October. It was the only serious offer lenders had received, which has now been rejected because of its low value.

State-owned lenders will soon evaluate the performance of legal firms engaged by them for insolvency and bankruptcy cases, the Economic Times of India reported. The move comes after government expressed concerns over large haircuts and delays in resolution under the Insolvency & Bankruptcy Code and directed lenders to build an effective framework for monitoring the progress of legal processes. Since the roll out of IBC in 2016, creditors have recovered 32.6% of their admitted claims against large, stressed firms.

The curtain has come down on several stores of British shoe brand Clarks. The stores in Amsterdam (two), Breda, The Hague, Eindhoven, Haarlem, Leidschendam, Maastricht, Rotterdam and Utrecht were declared bankrupt on January 9, according to the public insolvency register, FashionUnited.uk reported. G.A. De Wit has been appointed receiver. FashionUnited sought contact with the trustee, but is still waiting for a response.

Argentina's international dollar bonds rose on Thursday after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff and the government reached an agreement that should unlock some $4.7 billion from the country's embattled loan program with the fund, Reuters reported. The agreement removes in the short-term the risk of Argentina falling behind on IMF repayments. "Getting the program back on track is positive," Goldman Sachs analyst Sergio Armella wrote in a note, adding the program had been "derailed" last year when the previous government missed economic targets set out in the program.

Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said the integration of cryptocurrencies into the global financial system has stalled as the coins struggle to win over regulators and the public, Bloomberg News reported. “My own sense is that it’s not taking off as what I might call a core financial service,” Bailey told the UK Parliament’s Treasury Committee on Wednesday.

Poland’s top constitutional court, dominated by judges appointed by the former ruling nationalist, quashed plans by Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government to try the central bank governor in the latest blow to the new pro-European administration, Bloomberg News reported. Lawmakers can’t suspend Governor Adam Glapinski under parliament’s current rules and would need to pass a law requiring a three-fifths majority for a motion to pass, the same threshold as for cabinet members, Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal ruled on Thursday.

The World Bank's private investment arm has mobilised nearly $1 billion to rebuild Ukraine's private sector and is shifting its broader investment focus towards equity, its managing director told Reuters. Around $620 million of the funds mobilised for Ukraine - part of a $2 billion package announced in December 2022 - are from the investment arm's own balance sheet and another $360 million from external financing, said Makhtar Diop, managing director of the International Finance Corp (IFC). But the path ahead is not without its challenges.

Mexico's antitrust authority said on Wednesday it was investigating the country's freight rail transportation market amid government plans to build out railway infrastructure, Reuters reported. Without mentioning any companies by name, the antitrust watchdog Cofece said there were elements suggesting the "absence of competitive conditions" in the industry. Mexico's rail sector, which moves a quarter of the total merchandise transported by land, is dominated by Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) and Grupo Mexico's transport unit.