Headlines

It will be at least another 10 weeks before the Crafar farms creditors know if they will see any cash from a proposed Chinese acquisition, The National Business Review reported. The Overseas Investment Office has requested more information from Natural Dairy (NZ) Holdings and asked it to resubmit its application to buy the Crafar family properties, placed in receivership in October last year, owing more than $200 million to lenders Rabobank and Westpac.

Credit cards are emerging as one of the major threats to the Korean economy, as advances from card companies turned out to be the key culprit behind the rapid rise in consumer debt, The Korea Times reported. About two thirds of "excessive borrowers," defined as having more than two outstanding loans, are using "credit card loans," said the National Information & Credit Evaluation (NICE), a credit scoring agency.

Germany and France on Wednesday called for an international bank levy as Wolfgang Schäuble, German finance minister, outlined plans to force his country’s banks to pay €1.2 billion into an insurance fund to cover bail-outs in a future crisis, the Financial Times reported. After a German cabinet meeting attended by Christine Lagarde, French finance minister, Mr Schäuble and his French counterpart called the initiative “a very useful contribution to the international debate” about financial regulation.

Royal Bank of Scotland chief executive Stephen Hester has joined other creditors in lending his support to the $9.5 billion (£6.3 billion) restructuring of Dubai World, The Scotsman reported. Hester told regional newspaper Gulf News that the plan has sent out the "right signals". RBS was among the seven-member panel which held negotiations between the conglomerate and its other creditors, which total more than 90. Hester's comments come a day after two other creditors, HSBC and Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, lent their approval to the plan.

LyondellBasell Industries AF has reached a settlement resolving $5.5 billion in environmental-liability claims filed by the U.S. government and several states against the chemical company, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported. LyondellBasell has agreed to pay $170 million to fund cleanup at 15 polluted sites around the country. Government agencies will receive additional recoveries on a $1.2 billion claim against the company.

Another New Zealand finance company has gone into receivership, triggering a repayment to its investors under the Crown retail deposit guarantee, The National Business Review reported. Vision Securities, specialising in property finance for the retirement village sector, has been placed into receivership, close to $30 million. Its directors sought receivership from its trustee, Perpetual Trust, after failing to settle a major loan last week and concern for the company’s liquidity.

State-owned Anglo Irish Bank has posted a loss of €12.7 billion – the largest in Irish corporate history – for the 15 months to the end of December 2009 after writing off €15.1 billion on bad loans, The Irish Times reported. Some €10.1 billion of the write-offs were on loans of €35.6 billion – half the bank’s loan book – moving into the National Asset Management Agency (Nama).

German public-sector bank BayernLB says it lost nearly €2.62 billion ($3.5 billion) last year - a performance blamed largely on losses and expenses related to former Austrian unit Hypo Group Alpe Adria, The Associated Press reported. The 2009 performance was still an improvement on its huge loss of euro5.08 billion the previous year at the height of the financial crisis. BayernLB said Wednesday that it aims for a "positive result" in 2010. The bank said losses, writedowns and other expenses related to HGAA weighed down its results by a total €3.3 billion last year.

Quinn Insurance Limited, one of Ireland's largest insurance companies, said on Wednesday a decision to place it in provisional administration was "pre-emptive, aggressive and unnecessary", Reuters reported. It said it was fully able to meet all payment obligations and, excepting any consequences of the regulator's actions was on course to achieve cash profits of between €45 million ($60.42 million) and €50 million in the first quarter of 2010.

Skyservice airlines said Wednesday it has shut down of its operations following the appointment of a receiver by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, The Montreal Gazette reported. The Toronto-based charter service, whose primary partners are Sunquest, and the merged operations of Sunwing and Signature Vacations, said in statement: "Recent changes in the Canadian vacation tour market combined with Skyservice Airlines' debt level have rendered the company unable to maintain profitable operations.