Headlines

Escada AG, the German maker of luxury clothing for women, asked corporate bondholders to accept conditions that cut the nominal value of their investment by about 60 percent, as the company seeks to avoid insolvency, Bloomberg reported. Investors were asked to exchange €200 million ($281 million) in seven-year bonds due 2012, the company said in a statement today. Each €1,000 in old debt will be replaced by one bond worth €250 maturing in 2014 and a second bond worth €125 due 2016, the company said.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) known as the bank for central banks, which was founded in Basel, Switzerland in 1930, issued its 79th Annual Report, and said financial products should be treated like medicines and sold to consumers only when they are certified safe to prevent a repeat of global financial crisis, Finfacts reported. The BIS said government efforts to revive the global economy might have only a temporary impact because banks are not being pushed hard enough to fix their underlying problems.

Another superyacht company has gone into liquidation as slow conditions affect business, The National Business Review reported. The shareholders of VaudreyMiller Yachts voted to put the company into liquidation following advice from their accountant that it was insolvent. The company’s first liquidation report indicates that VaudreyMiller Yachts owes shareholders $2.9 million, while the liquidator John Buchanan estimates the company has around $200,000 in assets. Inland Revenue is the company’s biggest creditor – the department is owed $642,000.

Kleenmaid liquidators have sold two of the group's businesses in an attempt to repay millions of dollars of debt, The Australian reported on an Australian Associated Press story. The Queensland-based appliance group went into liquidation last month with debts of more than $80 million. The EDIS spare parts and Kleenmaid Customer Solutions (KCS) service and maintenance businesses were sold for an undisclosed amount.

Carlyle Group, Primus Financial Holdings Ltd. and MBK Partners Ltd. may seek to buy American International Group Inc.’s Taiwanese life insurance unit, three people familiar with the matter said. KKR & Co., Affinity Equity Partners Ltd., Cathay Financial Holding Co. and Chinatrust Financial Holding Co. have also asked New York-based AIG for information about the sale and may take part in a first round of bids scheduled for July 3, the people said. The unit may fetch about $2 billion, they said, declining to be identified because the discussions are private.

So much thought and effort went into the drafting and design of the Voluntary Administration (VA) regime but was it all worth it? Damien Grant asks in a New Zealand Herald commentary. Since the new regime came into effect in November 2007 more than 6000 companies have fallen into liquidation, and a mere 40 have entered the VA regime. For those of us on the frontlines of insolvency, this is a great shame. It is like having the cure for a disease but no one comes to see you about it until they are so sick your cure is powerless to help.

Japan's unemployment rate rose to a five-year high of 5.2% in May, the government said Tuesday. The country's jobless rate worsened from 5.0% in April, indicating that while Japanese companies may be starting to recover, their workers remain vulnerable to job and wage insecurities, The Wall Street Journal reported on an Associated Press story. The total number of jobless people climbed by 770,000 from a year earlier to 3.47 million, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications in a monthly report.

American Life Insurance Company (Alico) will restructure its western European businesses in order to generate cost savings, according to an internal document obtained by Reuters. The letter -- signed by Alico Chairman and Chief Executive Rodney Martin -- says Alico will merge its continental and western European business with that of its UK and Irish business to form one new entity. An Alico Europe spokesman said it was too early to assess what impact this move might have on jobs. Earlier this week, the U.S.

Shortly before the crash of Latvia’s Ogres Komercbanka, the bank's council chairman Arturs Jeresjko transferred his property to his family, Baltic Business News reported. A year ago Jeresjko was among 50 largest land owners in Latvia and was on the list of Latvian millionaires. According to the State Land Register, Jeresjko owned nearly 900 hectares of land last year.

Local marine and sports clothing company Line 7 has gone into receivership, The National Business Review reported. The business, owned by Ross Munro and Marilyn Horne, is most well-known for dressing Team New Zealand sailors in the America’s Cup. Receivers Grant Graham and Brendon Gibson of KordaMentha were appointed to the business today. It is not known whom they were appointed by; but Companies Office records show ANZ National Bank is the only bank listed as a Line 7 secured creditor.