Headlines

Dubai developer Nakheel , which completed a complex debt restructuring last month, wrote off up to 78.6 billion dirhams ($21.4 billion) of its real estate assets due to a property crisis in the emirate, according to a bond prospectus, Reuters reported. Nakheel, which overstretched itself building islands in the shape of palms and other ambitious projects, incurred impairments of 73.8 billion dirhams in 2009, primarily related to the carrying value of assets and capital work in progress.

Two Swedish labor unions Monday submitted applications for Saab Automobile AB's bankruptcy on behalf of about 1,130 workers who haven't received their August paychecks, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Both unions, Unionen and Ledarna, pledged to withdraw their petitions if the Court of Appeal overturns a lower court ruling last week that denied Saab Automobile protection from its creditors while it restructures its operations.

Homburg Invest says it needs $34.5 million from the partial sale of its investment in Homburg Canada REIT to provide it with liquidity during its restructuring under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act, the Winnipeg Free Press reported on a Canadian Press story. The transaction was scheduled to close Monday. Part of the proceeds will be used to reduce Homburg Invest's line of credit with HSBC to $5 million by Friday. The operating loan stood at $15 million as of last week's court filing. The Halifax-headquartered company announced Aug.

Brazilian consumer bad debt rose 3 percent in August compared with July, Serasa Experian, Latin America's largest credit bureau, said on Monday, Reuters reported. Compared with a year earlier, August bad debt was 29.2 percent higher, Serasa Experian said in a statement. In the January-August period, bad debt was 23.4 percent higher than the same period a year earlier, Serasa Experian said. Serasa Experian is part of the London-based Experian group, the largest credit bureau outside the United States.

Guarantors have become the lenders of last resort to small manufacturers who increasingly are getting squeezed by tight credit as well as soaring wages and other production costs, The Wall Street Journal reported. These private operators, using money raised from property developers, coal miners or other cash-rich individuals, aim to fill the funding void left by state banks that many say have all but stopped lending to small businesses. In return, they charge their clients a fee on top of high interest rates imposed on the loans.

Greece took desperate measures last nighton Sunday to calm fears that it is on the brink of default – or might even leave the eurozone – by announcing a new property tax to plug budget shortfalls, The Guardian reported. With the debt-stricken country at serious risk of being denied an €8bn (£6.9bn) rescue loan from the EU and International Monetary Fund, Athens said that it would apply the levy immediately.

LBC Development Bank, a unit of the LBC Group, has been placed under receivership of the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp (PDIC), the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported. In a statement over the weekend, PDIC said it took over the assets and liabilities of LBC bank after the Monetary Board of the central bank determined that the institution was plagued by liquidity problems. LBC Development Bank, with head office on JP Rizal St. in Makati City, had 19 branches nationwide. As of end-June this year, total deposits placed with the bank amounted to P6.09 billion.

Chinese carmaker Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile said it was getting positive signs from authorities in Beijing about its plans to invest in cash-strapped Saab, a Swedish daily reported on Saturday, Reuters reported. Youngman and Chinese car company Pangda Automobile Trade Co Ltd are seeking approval from China's authorities to invest 245 million euros in Saab, now owned by Swedish Automobile.

The National Asset Management Agency plans to seek tenants for some of its 8,000 apartments with a view to selling them as blocks to investors to help shift properties stuck on its books, the Irish Times reported. Brendan McDonagh, chief executive of Nama, said that most of the apartments were in Dublin. The apartment rental scheme is aimed at investment companies that manage rented apartment blocks, particularly in the UK.

The latest receivers' report for failed finance company Bridgecorp makes predictably grim reading for investors, with a mere $1.5 million recovered from its assets in the six months to July 1, Stuff.co.nz reported. Receivers Colin McCloy and Maurice Noone of PWC repeated their assessment that debenture holders owed $459m are likely to recover less than 10c in the dollar. Subsequent to the period covered by the report a further $4m was recovered and in August receivers sent debenture holders their first payment since Bridgecorp collapsed in July 2007.