Headlines

Towards the end of last year, it was announced that the UAE’s long anticipated reform of the insolvency reform bill was reaching its final stages prior to implementation, Emirates 24/7 reported. The legal framework was drawn up following the establishment of the Dubai World Tribunal that resulted from its inability to pay its creditors in November 2009. The case cast spotlight on the UAE, which until today does not have an officially passed insolvency bill that helps local businesses as well as international investors.

Offshore bond sales by mainland property developers have stalled in January as rising investor fears of a flurry of debt defaults have junked one of the usually busiest months of the year for real estate issuance, South China Morning Post reported. With an estimated US$10 billion in offshore debt falling due for repayment this year and next, a bad January bodes ill for the ability of developers to refinance huge foreign borrowings.

Troubled Chinese property firm Kaisa Group is talking to banks and rival developers about selling its assets as the company scrambles to raise cash, according to people with knowledge of the matter. A number of developers have approached the company about possibly buying some of its holdings, said one person. "Banks, developers, Shenzhen government want this to happen," said another. The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that developers speaking to Kaisa include China Vanke and Shenzhen Overseas Chinese Town. Shenzhen Overseas and China Vanke could not be reached for comment.

Governor Haruhiko Kuroda says the Bank of Japan may need to get creative in any further monetary stimulus. Among options analysts highlight: regional-government bonds, a type of security that could aid public support. Kuroda, speaking in an interview with Bloomberg Television Friday in Davos, Switzerland, said “there are many options and I don’t think it’s constructive to say this or that could be done.” He reiterated that if inflation expectations are “seriously” affected by disinflation, policy can be changed.

As the European Central Bank deploys its most powerful economic weapon, the onus for growth now lies with the 19 individual countries in the euro currency union, a fractious and highly political group, the International New York Times reported. The central bank’s plan calls for buying 60 billion euros, or about $69 billion, of government bonds and other debt each month. It is the kind of aggressive action that leaders in weaker eurozone countries have long wanted and that Germany has tried to block.

Italy’s latest effort to address its chronic tax evasion problem is keeping Tancredi Marino very busy. The Milan-based tax lawyer is hiring extra attorneys to handle dozens of requests from Italians looking to use an imminent amnesty to bring back money stashed in Switzerland and Monaco, The Wall Street Journal reported. But Mr.

Canadian oil exploration company Southern Pacific Resource Corp. has sought protection from creditors with an insolvency filing under Canada’s bankruptcy law, The Wall Street Journal reported. Southern Pacific Resource said Wednesday it determined that protection under Canada’s Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act was in its best interest, considering the world-wide low oil and gas prices and its own depressed levels of production. The company added that it has sufficient liquidity to last through its initial protection period in Canada, which expires Feb. 20.

Ireland has the fourth highest government debt to GDP ratio in the European Union, despite recording the largest drop in debt from the third quarter of 2013 to the end of the same quarter last year, the Irish Times reported. New figures published by the EU statistics office Eurostat show Irish debt now stands at 114.8 per cent, having fallen by 9.4 per cent from 124.2 per cent over the period under review. With a government debt to GDP ratio of 176 per cent, Greece has the highest debt among Member States.

Nicolás Maduro promised “God will provide” after Venezuela’s president returned to Caracas apparently empty handed from a world tour where he had sought financial help for his country’s ravaged economy. Venezuela — which is a member of Opec, the oil producer’s cartel — is heavily dependent on exports of crude, the price of which has more than halved since the summer to under $50 a barrel on Thursday. In a televised state of the nation speech, Mr Maduro said oil would “not return to $100”, adding: “We have less foreign currency . . . But God will provide”.

Latin America is turning into the world leader in corporate-bond defaults, Bloomberg News reported. Four companies in the region have skipped dollar-denominated debt payments this month, more than any other area and almost half the total in all of 2014. In a sign bond investors are increasingly concerned about Latin American companies’ ability to repay debt, borrowers led by Mexico’s oil-rig operators have pushed the amount of the region’s bonds trading at distressed prices to $58 billion, about a third of all emerging-market debt trading at such levels.