Headlines

A high-level executive at Latin America's largest shipping company in terms of revenue, Chile's Compania Sudamericana de Vapores SA, said the company won't go bankrupt despite recent financial troubles that have led to market speculation it could fail, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. Vapores, whose finances have been weighed down by hefty ship and container leasing fees, as well as rising international crude oil prices, is looking to stanch its financial hemorrhaging through a $500 million capital increase and the listing of up to 49% of its SAAM ports unit.

The High Court issued a landmark judgment Friday in relation to the crystallisation of floating charges in the Belgard Motors liquidation, InsolvencyJournal.ie reported. This is the first time that the Irish Courts have determined the issue of the validity of a crystallised floating charge by a Bank. In short, the Official Liquidator, Tom Kavanagh of kavanaghfennell, sought directions from the High Court in relation to whether crystallised floating charges had been converted to fixed charge over assets of circa €2M.

Faced with the collapse of the government of debt-troubled Portugal, European leaders on Friday called on competing political parties in Lisbon to commit to tough financial targets, while Spain sought to protect itself from contagion by announcing new economic policies, the International Herald Tribune reported. The moves followed a two-day meeting in Brussels, which was originally intended to put a capstone on the euro debt crisis but ended up being overshadowed by the resignation of the Portuguese prime minister, José Sócrates, who lost a parliamentary vote Wednesday.

Chancellor Angela Merkel Thursday said she would seek to secure an agreement for Germany to spread its contributions to the euro zone's permanent bailout fund over five years instead of the three- to four-year timeline European Union leaders had been discussing, The Wall Street Journal reported. Germany had agreed, at a meeting of finance ministers in Brussels on Monday, to make €22 billion ($31.03 billion) in total contributions to a permanent bailout fund that would take effect in 2013, Mrs.

Chancellor Angela Merkel Thursday said she would seek to secure an agreement for Germany to spread its contributions to the euro zone's permanent bailout fund over five years instead of the three- to four-year timeline European Union leaders had been discussing, The Wall Street Journal reported. Germany had agreed, at a meeting of finance ministers in Brussels on Monday, to make €22 billion ($31.03 billion) in total contributions to a permanent bailout fund that would take effect in 2013, Mrs.

Japan Airlines Corp is expected to complete restructuring its business, under court guidance, on Monday, the Nikkei business daily said. After filing for bankruptcy protection in January, last year, the airline has tried to turn around, backed by Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corp of Japan (ETIC), Nikkei said. Restructuring measures, including cutting workforce by 16,000, worked and operating profit for the nine months through December stood at of 158.6 billion yen, the paper reported. On Monday, the company is slated to receive 254.9 billion yen from 11 lenders.

The IMF told Zimbabwe to contain public-sector pay demands to avoid stoking inflation and reiterated it would not resume lending until Harare clears its arrears, a Finance Ministry official said Thursday, Times Live reported on a Reuters story. Public servants, who get an average of US$200 a month, are pressing for a doubling of their pay, putting pressure on authorities already spending 70% of revenue on remuneration. An IMF team in Harare for annual talks with the government has warned that pay demands could push Zimbabwe back into an inflation spiral. The team ends its mission next Friday.

The vice chairman of the nation’s financial regulator hinted Thursday that the financial authorities are against the consolidation between Woori Investment & Securities and Daewoo Securities, The Korea Times reported. “I wonder if it will work efficiently when financial firms are combined just to beef up their size,” Kwon Hyouk-se, vice chairman of the Financial Services Commission (FSC), said in a meeting with reporters. The 54-year-old life-time bureaucrat is also a nominee for the governor of the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), the executive body of the FSC.

Prime Minister Jose Socrates' resignation has left legal experts in debt-laden Portugal debating whether a caretaker government has the power to request an international bailout if its economic woes deepen, Reuters reported. Opposition parties on Thursday rejected Socrates' latest austerity measures, forcing him to resign and most likely lead a government with limited powers until a snap election expected to take place in late May at the earliest. President Anibal Cavaco Silva will meet leaders of political parties on Friday as he weighs whether to call such a poll.

Only the largest of Spain’s merged savings banks or cajas are likely to succeed in raising capital through stock market offerings because of uncertainty about corporate governance and the value of property assets, according to Madrid investment bankers and senior commercial bank executives, the Financial Times reported. Banks and cajas have been given until Monday to tell the Bank of Spain how they intend to raise new capital.