Headlines

Distressed Chinese developer Yuzhou Group (1628) needs financing to press ahead with an offshore restructuring plan that received court approval last year, Bloomberg News reported. The builder will use the next six months to “shore up its liquidity in advance of making the payments due on the restructuring effective date,” Christopher Hunker, a counsel at Linklaters on behalf of Yuzhou, said during a Tuesday bankruptcy court hearing in New York. Financing difficulties have led to delays implementing the plan, the company said earlier this month in an exchange filing.

Some large hedge funds and investors are accumulating long-shunned China property stocks at low prices, anticipating lucrative returns when the sector recovers from its prolonged crisis, Reuters reported. Investors said recent positive signs, from improving home prices in top cities to industry leader China Vanke's recapitalization plan, suggest this year will be the turning point for the real estate market. To be sure, they are selective and have set their sights on leading state-backed homebuilders and China's largest online property brokerage.

The founder of a cryptocurrency financial services firm has been extradited from Portugal to face U.S. charges that he participated in a wide-ranging scheme to manipulate the market for digital tokens on behalf of client companies, Reuters reported. Aleksei Andriunin, the CEO of cryptocurrency "market maker" Gotbit, was ordered detained following an appearance in Boston federal court on Wednesday, one day after his extradition. Andriunin was indicted in October on charges of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit market manipulation and wire fraud.

President Donald Trump says he plans to impose tariffs on Canada and Mexico starting next Tuesday, in addition to doubling the 10% universal tariff charged on imports from China, Reuters reported. Posting on Truth Social on Thursday, Trump said that illicit drugs such as fentanyl are being smuggled into the United States at “unacceptable levels" and that import taxes would force other countries to crackdown on the trafficking.

Israel's banking regulator on Wednesday asked commercial banks to allocate up to 3 billion shekels ($841 million) through 2026 to fund relief for retail customers and to improve interest terms offered to clients hurt by the 16-month old war, Reuters reported.

Thailand is in early discussions with carmakers to introduce a car trade-in and scrapping scheme in a bid to revive an industry hit by its biggest crisis in decades, three industry officials and two sources said, Reuters reported. Output in the Southeast Asian automobile hub, besieged by a flood of new EVs, has plummeted for more than a year, following a slowdown in exports and weak domestic sales, while tighter credit at a time of soaring household debt hit vehicle buying.

A Japanese labour union group representing major manufacturers said on Thursday its members are demanding a record increase in their base pay for this year, building on last year's momentum amid rising living costs, Reuters reported. The Japan Council of Metalworkers' Unions (JCM) is considered a pace-setter for annual wage negotiations and represents about 2 million workers for blue chip companies including Toyota Motor, Panasonic and Nippon Steel.

India’s world-beating economic growth faces headwinds from geoeconomic fragmentation and slower domestic demand, and it should implement crucial structural reforms to realize its ambition of becoming a developed country, according to the International Monetary Fund, Bloomberg News reported. Intensification of regional conflicts, volatile commodity prices, weakened international cooperation and cyberthreats pose high risk to India’s growth, the IMF said in its Article IV country report released Thursday.

Altice France, the European telecom giant led by billionaire Patrick Drahi, has struck a global debt deal with investors holding more than $25 billion in bonds and loans, one of the largest of a new breed of restructuring transactions, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The deal, which includes most of Altice’s creditors, could be the largest liability-management exercise for a European business to date.