Headlines

The private equity fund that backed the buyout of parts of the former Quinn Group last year is poised to swoop on the Irish arm of troubled Dutch engineer, Imtech, saving 700 jobs, the Irish Times reported. The parent of Waterford engineering business, Imtech Suir, confirmed yesterday that it is in talks about a possible sale of the company to US and European investment fund Endless LLP and predicted that a deal would close next week.

Signs are emerging that Chinese property investments abroad will maintain their torrid pace despite the market turmoil, as wealthy individuals and well-heeled companies seek to shelter their money in more stable havens abroad. In Australia, where China earlier this year topped the U.S. as the biggest source of foreign real-estate investment, officials are worried that wealthy Chinese investors will pour more money into an already overheated Australian property market.

Ukraine and its main creditors agreed on Thursday to restructure $18 billion of the country’s foreign debt, in a rare deal between bond funds and a wobbly, emerging-market government, the International New York Times reported. If the deal is approved by the Parliament of Ukraine, it would write off 20 percent of the nation’s foreign debt, helping to avoid a drawn-out, Greek-style negotiation with large bondholders. The terms would also offer financial relief to Ukraine during a deep recession and an armed conflict with pro-Russia separatists.

John Purcell, a former executive director of Irish Nationwide Building Society, has launched a High Court challenge to the constitutionality of the Central Bank’s inquiry into alleged regulatory breaches at the financial institution, the Irish Times reported. Mr Purcell, along with several others, is the subject of an inquiry into allegations that certain proscribed contraventions were committed by INBS, and certain persons concerned with its management, between August 2004 and September 2008. Irish Nationwide was nationalised in 2010 after receiving a €5.4 billion bailout.

Baha Mar Ltd. has filed a plan outlining the way the $3.5 billion stalled resort project in the Bahamas hopes to restructure in chapter 11 ahead of a hearing Friday to dismiss its U.S. bankruptcy case, The Wall Street Journal reported. The structure of the proposed plan swaps the ownership of Baha Mar for new financing, meaning whoever finances the project will end up owning the Bahamian resort, a key driver of the island nation’s economy. The plan also issues replacement debt to the resort’s current lender and unsecured creditors.

State owned enterprise minister Todd McClay says Landcorp won't turn a profit for "the next few years" and is again foreshadowing land sales, Stuff.co.nz reported. Record low dairy prices saw profits plunge by $25m, Landcorp said Thursday. It's got debts of around $250 million and is locked into an expensive dairy conversion project of 26,000 hectares at Wairakei, near Taupo. McClay says there will be no taxpayer-funded bailout for the state-owner farmer. And he rejects Labour's comparisons with troubled coal company Solid Energy, which is in voluntary administration.

The opening of regular insolvency proceedings on the Walsum Papier magazine paper mill in Germany has been postponed to the start of October, EUWID Pulp and Paper reported. According to information from the administrators' office, the payments of insolvency benefits covered by the German state could have been extended for another month until the end of September. Meanwhile, operations at the 205,000 tpy LWC paper machine PM 10 are running to capacity as the mill's customers continue placing orders with the company, despite it being in preliminary administration.

Boom times for luxury in China are largely over, after the recent stock market rout and currency devaluation, compounded by an already slowing economy and a government crackdown on lavish gift-giving, the International New York Times reported. The effect of those woes on Chinese shoppers — who make up as much as a third of global spending on high-end goods — has rattled both investors and global luxury brands.

Romania's financial regulator ASF withdrew the operating licence of the country's second-largest insurer Astra Asigurari on Wednesday and said it will start the process of declaring it insolvent. ASF chief Misu Negritoiu said Astra Asigurari, which has a market share of just over 10 percent, had a liquidity coverage ratio of 0.03 at the end of June and additional capital needs of 968 million lei ($248.19 million). The company has been under special administration since early 2014.

PrivatBank could finally make a breakthrough with its creditors after a minority holdout group of investors that has previously blocked the Ukrainian lender's attempts to restructure its debts said it will agree to the latest set of proposals, Reuters reported. "We will now support this latest consent solicitation," said Daniel Freifeld, founder of Washington-based Callaway Capital Management, an asset manager that heads the creditor committee. The struggles to get the restructuring over the line at the systemically important bank are a microcosm of the challenges facing Ukraine.