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The founder of China Evergrande ‌Group, the world's most indebted property developer, pleaded guilty ‌to charges including misuse of funds, fundraising fraud and illegally taking public ​deposits, a court in China's southern city of Shenzhen said, Reuters reported. The company has defaulted since 2021 on most of its $300 billion in liabilities as well as billions of dollars of wealth ‌management product payments, in ⁠troubles emblematic of China's property sector woes that have long dragged on economic growth.

The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has directed initiation of insolvency proceedings against Videocon's former chairman and MD Venugopal Dhoot for defaulting on loans of Rs 6,158 crore, as a personal guarantor of two group companies, the Times of India reported. Admitting a plea from State Bank of India (SBI), NCLT said Venugopal Dhoot has "committed defaults in repayment of loan amount" granted by the financial creditor.

Oncoclínicas is set to file a precautionary court request seeking protection from creditors after breaching its debt limits and receiving a going-concern warning from Deloitte, Bloomberg News reported. The company must also negotiate with physicians this week, as doctors have threatened a coordinated resignation over drug shortages that have already delayed treatment for around 6,000 cancer patients. Sources added that Porto and Fleury requested an extension of their exclusivity agreement, which expired on Sunday (12), though approval appears uncertain.

Central banks may need to inflict much more economic pain to control inflation fueled by a long Middle East ‌war than they did to control the spike in prices after the pandemic, ‌the International Monetary Fund's chief economist said, Reuters reported. When Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 drove oil prices above $100 a ​barrel, an already overheated post-COVID economy meant small increases in interest rates went a long way to cool demand, IMF Chief Economist Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas said in an interview on Tuesday.

Spain's inflation rate rose to 3.4% in March, driven mainly by higher fuel prices linked to the Middle East war, Reuters reported. The figure, confirmed by the National Statistics Institute (INE), represents an increase of 1.1 percentage points from the 2.3% recorded in February and one tenth above the provisional estimate published at the end of March. Core inflation, which strips out energy and fresh food, reached 2.7% in March, two tenths above both February's reading and the INE's initial advance.

Australia's corporates are starting to count the cost of the war in the Middle East, with profit warnings from two top companies and a crash in business sentiment pointing to ‌pain from rising prices, raising the risk of stagflation, Reuters reported. The country's top airline Qantas Airways and second largest lender ‌Westpac Banking Corp flagged their earnings could be hurt by soaring fuel prices and the impact on customers, as feared by the country's central bank.

The federal government is set to temporarily suspend the federal fuel excise tax on gas and diesel starting next week, Bloomberg News reported. Prime Minister Mark Carney made the announcement in Ottawa on Tuesday, just hours after his government secured a majority through three byelection wins. The suspension will come into effect on April 20 and last until Sept. 7, and it comes as global oil prices remain volatile amid U.S.-Iran tensions.

Austrian bank Bawag and Permanent TSB have agreed on a takeover deal that values the Irish retail lender at 1.62 billion euros ($1.90 billion), the Wall Street Journal reported. PTSB, which is majority owned by the Irish government and competes with larger peers AIB Group and Bank of Ireland, put itself up for sale last year to allow the finance ministry to exit its remaining 57.5% position. Bawag is offering 2.97 euros in cash for each PTSB share, the companies said Tuesday.

Corporate bond issuance in Japan is poised to breach a record this year on growing funding demand for mergers and acquisitions as the economy continues to move away from three decades of deflation, Bloomberg News reported. The appetite for funds is outweighing concerns about the Middle East conflict after the U.S. and Iran failed to reach an agreement as the war enters its seventh week. Yen bond issuance in Japan has been unfazed, with sales rising 94% in March on a year earlier. That’s more than four times faster than all global corporate debt combined, according to compiled data.

The International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday it expected the Bank of Japan to raise interest rates gradually, but at a ​slightly faster pace than projected six months ago, Reuters reported. After Japan's economy expanded ‌1.2% in 2025, growth is projected to slow to 0.7% in 2026 and 0.6% in 2027, the IMF said in its World Economic Outlook report, roughly unchanged from its ​forecasts in October. The effect of the government's fiscal stimulus package and ​steps to curb fuel bills will offset headwinds from weaker overseas ⁠demand and the Middle East conflict, the report said.