The Singapore High Court on Tuesday granted oil trader GP Global APAC Pte Ltd a six-month debt moratorium, the company’s lawyers said on Thursday, paving the way for its parent company to restructure more than $1 billion in debt, Reuters reported. GP APAC is the Singapore unit of GP Global, a global oil trader and ship fuel supplier based in the United Arab Emirates that is in default amid allegations that employers carried out fraudulent trades.
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About one third of the roughly 150 ships owned by companies controlled by Singapore tycoon Lim Oon Kuin and his family have been sold as part of efforts to repay billions of dollars of debt owed to creditors, Reuters reported. Accounting firm Grant Thornton, court-appointed supervisor of Xihe Holdings, put up several vessels for sale through shipbrokers in September last year. Xihe Holdings is owned by the Lim family and held the bulk of their fleet.
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Singapore Airlines Ltd said on Tuesday that it would defer over S$4 billion ($3.01 billion) of spending on Airbus SE and Boeing Co planes after reaching agreements with the aircraft manufacturers to delay deliveries, Reuters reported. It will convert 14 of its Boeing 787-10 orders to 11 additional 777-9s to meet its fleet needs beyond the financial year ending in March 2026, the airline said in a statement.
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Better operating numbers and lower write-downs saw Singapore Airlines report a lower loss in the third quarter compared with the previous three months, the Straits Times reported. The carrier racked up a net loss of $142 million for the three months to Dec. 31 compared with a net profit of $315 in the same period in 2019. However, the latest figures were a significant improvement on the massive $2.34 billion loss in the July-September period. Those second-quarter results were also marked by huge impairment write-downs in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Even as the Covid-19 pandemic ravages the economy, the number of people who went bankrupt in Singapore last year sank to the lowest in five years, the Straits Times reported. Bankruptcy orders tumbled more than 40 per cent to 965 from 1,645 in 2019. Figures from the Law Ministry's Insolvency Office website showed more than 1,600 bankruptcy orders were made annually between 2016 and 2018. Experts said the drop in numbers could be due to the Covid-19 (Temporary Measures) Act and government support schemes which provided temporary relief for financially distressed individuals.
Creditors to struggling Singapore shipper Pacific International Lines Pte will vote Monday on a restructuring deal that involves a capital injection from a unit of Temasek Holdings Pte., Bloomberg News reported. It’s an important day for investors who oppose the plan like Singapore businessman Kuah Ann Thia, an unsecured noteholder – the most vulnerable in the bond world. He and other individual investors hold parts of PIL’s S$60 million security ($45 million) that came due in November but which the shipper hasn’t repaid.
Small and micro companies that have been hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic and need to restructure their debts to stay viable or wind up their businesses can apply for support to do so under a new programme from Friday, the Straits Times reported. Applications for the Simplified Insolvency Programme (SIP) will be open until July 28 and the period may be extended if the need arises, the Ministry of Law (MinLaw) said on Thursday. The SIP consists of two separate programmes which eligible companies can apply for.
Beleaguered water treatment firm Hyflux has come under judicial management (JM) after a High Court ruling yesterday, following a marathon debt restructuring effort that has yet to put money on the table for creditors, The Straits Times reported. Mr Hamish Alexander Christie and Mr Patrick Bance of Borrelli Walsh, the restructuring firm advising the unsecured working group (UWG) of 19 banks that hold more than $931 million of Hyflux debt - were appointed the judicial managers and took over the firm's operations yesterday.
The Singapore High Court has granted leave for debt-ridden KrisEnergy to convene a meeting of its scheme creditors within three months from Nov 16, the Business Times reported. The mainboard-listed upstream oil and gas firm's debt moratorium has also been extended again, this time to Jan 16, 2021. It was first granted in September last year.
Recent debt restructuring cases underscore Singapore's position as a regional insolvency hub, with the latest being a note holders' go-ahead last week for a Jakarta-based conglomerate's scheme to restructure US$231 million (S$311 million) of secured notes due next year, The Straits Times reported. The note holders, who are a class of creditors of PT MNC Investama holding at least 75 per cent value of the claims, voted last Thursday (Nov 5) in favour of the "pre-packaged" scheme of arrangement.