The quiet is almost spooky here on the outskirts of Nassau, where the waterscape frills of nearby Paradise Island give way to the vast ghost-resort that is Baha Mar, Bloomberg News reported. Just how the place ended up like this -- in a bankruptcy so colossal that it’s jeopardizing the Bahamas’s credit rating -- is the biggest business story to hit this Caribbean nation for as long as anyone here can remember. It stretches far beyond the white beaches and across time zones, to none other than the State Council of China.

Champion Iron Mine said Friday it will buy a Quebec iron ore mine for C$10.5 million ($7.65 million), just a sliver of the C$4.9 billion that Cliffs Natural Resources paid in 2011, when metal prices surged on booming Chinese demand, Reuters reported. The downturn in bulk commodities allowed Champion to negotiate a "competitive" bid, said Chief Executive Michael O'Keeffe in a statement, including C$10.5 million in cash, C$41.7 million for environmental reclamation and about C$1.1 million for bonds.

Canada moved to address growing unease about housing-market conditions in two of the country’s biggest cities, as officials here continue to grapple with the risks posed by Canadians’ high debt levels, The Wall Street Journal reported. Finance Minister Bill Morneau on Friday unveiled the latest in a series of actions Canada has taken to stem the growth of household debt, especially mortgage debt, which has reached record levels as consumers capitalize on an extended period of low rates.

Cuba has reached a deal with its creditors where the county will pay $2.6 billion in arrears over an 18-year period while $4 billion of its debt will be forgiven, The Wall Street Journal reported. The deal comes after months of negotiations between the Communist nation and the Paris Club, an informal group of developed creditor nations. The talks stem from Cuba’s lingering $16 billion debt which it defaulted in 1986.

Offshore driller Vantage Drilling Co said it reached a support agreement with lenders and noteholders holding more than $1.6 billion in debt to reduce interest expense but one of its units will file for U.S. bankruptcy on Dec. 3. The agreement and bankruptcy will help its subsidiary Offshore Group Investment Ltd to ride out a downturn in the energy sector. The company said the deal with lenders calls for deleveraging the unit, which holds the contracts for some of its rigs.

Oilsands junior Laricina Energy Ltd. has settled debt obligations with the credit arm of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, with the result that its equity is now about 89 per cent owned by the board and its subsidiaries, it announced Tuesday, The Calgary Herald reported. The private company entered Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act protection in March after it defaulted on a production covenant related to its CPP Credit Investments Inc. secured debt.

Abengoa SA, the Spanish renewable energy company that has filed for creditor protection, missed interest payments to noteholders in Mexico, Bloomberg News reported. Abengoa de Mexico SA investors were due 1.16 million pesos ($70,000) on Thursday, financial advisory Monex Casa de Bolsa SA said in two regulatory filings with BMV, the Latin American nation’s securities exchange. Monex represents holders of the notes, it said. Seville, Spain-based Abengoa filed for preliminary creditor protection with a court in its home city on Nov.

RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust said Monday it had reached a settlement with Target Corp. over 18 leases the Minneapolis-based retail giant abandoned when it exited the Canadian market this year, The Wall Street Journal reported. RioCan, which owns and manages the largest portfolio of shopping centers in Canada, said Target paid 132 million Canadian dollars (US$99 million) as part of the settlement, including C$92 million to RioCan and the balance to various co-owners. Target in turn has been released from indemnity agreements covering those locations.

A meeting of creditors of Sir Anthony O’Reilly to see if a formal deal can be reached on the sale of his assets and the division of the proceeds is likely to follow Friday’s decision of the court in the Bahamas to declare him bankrupt. The judge in the case specifically mentioned that parties in the case could subsequently apply to the court to ratify such an agreement, the Irish Times reported.

Sir Anthony O’Reilly has been declared bankupt in a court hearing in the Bahamas and is now to be allowed file for an insolvency arrangement, the Supreme Court in the Bahamas has ruled. This followed a lengthy hearing on Friday when AIB, one of Sir Anthony’s creditors, had held that there were procedural errors in the existing filing and also that the court had no jurisdiction in the matter, the Irish Times reported. The ruling was delivered by Justice Milton Evans on Friday evening, following a day of legal submissions.