Headlines

The Ahmedabad Bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has recently rejected an insolvency plea against Suzlon Energy Limited, LiveLawBiz.com reported. The plea was rejected after finding that the claim was time-barred and arose out of a pre-existing dispute. The petition was filed by Harri Wind Farms, which sought initiation of insolvency proceedings after claiming Rs 9.70 crore towards land procurement, No Objection Certificates (NOCs), and Power Evacuation (PE) connectivity for a proposed 25 MW wind power project in Tamil Nadu.

A year on from the Court of Appeal's Petrofac decision — which many read as a blow to the UK's Part 26A restructuring plan (RP) process — the regime appears to have emerged stronger rather than weakened, according to a PitchBook.com commentary. As practitioners adapt to heightened judicial scrutiny, the English restructuring plan is increasingly being embraced by U.S.-linked debtors seeking an alternative to chapter 11.

A Chinese municipal borrower said that it has enough funds to repay 1.08 billion yuan (RM660 million) in offshore notes due next week, after people familiar with the matter said that a plan to refinance that debt with a new bond sale had been delayed, Bloomberg News reported. Luoyang Shangdu City Investment Holding Group Co was scheduled to price a 364-day yuan-denominated offshore bond last Friday to help repay the notes but the deal was postponed due to disagreements with investors over pricing, the people said, asking not to be identified as the matter is private.

India has moved a step closer to reintroducing merchant fees on transactions made through its popular Unified Payments Interface (UPI) after proposed changes to the ‌country's payments laws were introduced in parliament on Tuesday, Reuters reported. UPI, one of the world's largest real-time ‌payments networks, processed 23.6 billion transactions worth 29.9 trillion rupees ($313.5 billion) in July, according to official data. Walmart's PhonePe and Alphabet's Google ​Pay dominate payments via UPI.

A private gauge showed China’s manufacturing activity expanded at a slower pace in July, remaining in expansion territory and broadly echoing the official factory survey, which signaled a contraction, the Wall Street Journal reported. The RatingDog general manufacturing purchasing managers index fell to 50.9 in last month, down from 51.7 in June, according to a statement released Monday. The result was better than the official gauge, which dropped to 49.2 in July, from 50.3 in June. The 50 mark separates expansion from contraction.

UBS Financial Services Inc., a subsidiary of UBS Group AG, has agreed to pay $125 million in fines to settle allegations by the U.S. government that it willfully and repeatedly violated anti-money laundering rules, Bloomberg News reported. A 2018 consent decree, for which UBS paid $14.5 million in civil penalties, said the company failed to sufficiently monitor foreign currency transfers due to poor controls in its automated monitoring system.

South Korea’s headline inflation moderated in July after reaching a 30-month high in June, partly because government measures helped restrain fuel and electricity prices, the Wall Street Journal reported. Price pressures persisted, however, with inflation remaining above the central bank’s 2% target. The Ministry of Data and Statistics said Tuesday that the benchmark consumer-price index rose 2.8% in July from a year earlier, slowing from 3.2% in June—the fastest pace since December 2023.

Statistics Canada says the country’s merchandise trade surplus rose to $3.9 billion in June, compared with a surplus of $3.7 billion in May, BNNBloomberg reported. Total exports gained 0.4 per cent in June to post the fifth consecutive monthly increase and rose to a record $77.5 billion. Exports of metal and non-metallic minerals rose 16.5 per cent, boosted in part by higher gold exports to the United Kingdom. Total imports edged up 0.2 per cent in June to $73.6 billion, largely driven higher by computers and computer peripherals such as processing units used in data centres.

Employment in the Irish manufacturing sector rose at its fastest rate in more than four years last month, with businesses upbeat about their prospects for the rest of the year, the Irish Times reported. The sector reported “robust” expansion of activity in July on the back of growing demand, according to the AIB Ireland Manufacturing purchasing managers index. At 55.1, the reading for activity in the sector was up slightly on the 54.9 recorded in June, and the second-highest since May 2022, the report said.

Police detained a contractor and several other businesspeople for questioning on Monday on suspicion of concealing real-estate interests and transferring assets during bankruptcy proceedings, the Israel Police said, The Jerusalem Post reported. One of the figures questioned is considered close to senior Likud circles, the police said.