Credito Real filed a prepackaged insolvency agreement in a Mexican federal court on Friday, people familiar with the matter said, in a bid to resolve the collapse of what had been the country’s biggest payroll lender, Bloomberg News reported. The company filed a so-called concurso mercantil with a plan that is backed by more than 50% of holders of its $1.9 billion of dollar bonds, said the people, requesting anonymity since they were not authorized to speak with media.

Newly licensed private businesses are becoming a lifeline for Cuba, bringing in about half of the country’s total food imports as the cash-strapped Communist government struggles to keep power plants running and provide public transport because of acute fuel shortages, the Wall Street Journal reported. Havana passed laws allowing Cubans to form small businesses that can employ up to 100 people in the wake of countrywide protests that shook the impoverished island two years ago. Since then, more than 8,000 small and midsize businesses have registered with the government.

The Dominican Republic's economy is expected to grow 3% this year, its presidency said in a statement on Wednesday, marking a slowdown from previous levels and below recent forecasts, Reuters reported. The growth forecast would mark a slowdown from the 4.9% posted last year and the International Monetary Fund's June estimate of 4%. The IMF had forecast that growth would return to around 5% next year. The Caribbean country's inflation should meanwhile remain "within normal parameters" this year, the presidency said in the statement.

A Bank of Canada official said there’s a risk firms will continue to raise prices more frequently and more sharply, complicating efforts to bring inflation back to 2%, Bloomberg News reported. In a speech in Montreal, Deputy Governor Nicolas Vincent said that while the bank sees signs that corporate pricing behavior is gradually returning to normal, it’s still not what it was before the pandemic and progress is slow. “If recent pricing behavior settles into a new normal, it could complicate our return to low, stable and predictable inflation,” he said on Tuesday.

Current home prices in Canada can’t be justified if medium-term interest rates stay elevated, a former Bank of Canada official said, underscoring the risk to one of the country’s most important sectors, Bloomberg News reported. Paul Beaudry, who spent four years on the central bank’s rate-setting committee, said the outlook for the housing market remains highly dependent not only on the policy rate, but on longer-term fixed rates. If they don’t come down, “then it becomes much more difficult to support these valuations,” he said on BNN Bloomberg Television.

The Canadian economy rebounded slightly last month but still saw little growth, backing a case for the central bank to keep rates on hold despite inflation remaining elevated, Bloomberg News reported. Preliminary data suggest gross domestic product edged up 0.1% in August, Statistics Canada reported Friday in Ottawa, as declines in the retail and oil and gas industries partly offset increases in the wholesale and finance sectors. That followed a flat GDP reading in July, which missed expectations for a 0.1% increase in a Bloomberg survey.

Mexico’s central bank kept interest rates unchanged for a fourth straight meeting and increased its inflation projections for next year, a sign that borrowing costs could stay higher for longer, Bloomberg News reported. Banxico, as the central bank is known, voted to hold the key rate at 11.25% on Thursday, matching the forecasts of all 23 economists surveyed by Bloomberg.

Ebix Inc. Chief Executive Officer Robin Raina received a $1.8 million bonus last week, even as a Sept. 30 deadline looms for the company to repay a loan of more than $600 million to a syndicate of US banks without having the cash on hand, Bloomberg News reported. Ebix, based in Johns Creek, Ga., disclosed the bonus in a regulatory filing Monday. It said that $1.2 million of the bonus was paid on Sept. 19, the day the board awarded it to Raina. The remainder will be paid in October, according to the filing.

Canada’s banking regulator said he’s concerned about the prevalence of ultra-long mortgages and that his agency is working with lenders to stem the ubiquity of such loans, Bloomberg News reported. The country’s banks have about C$250 billion ($185 billion) of mortgages with amortization periods — the length of time permitted to pay off the loan — that sit at 35 years or longer, according to Peter Routledge, the superintendent of financial institutions.