Singapore

Singapore-listed oil and gas company Linc Energy Ltd owes creditors A$289.4 million ($210.28 million) and should be wound up, according to its administrators. The company entered into voluntary administration a month ago, suffering from debt woes amid a slump in energy prices. Administrators PPB Advisory released a report on Friday recommending the company be liquidated. "We recommend that it is in the creditors' interests that the company be wound up," the report said.

Commodities trader Noble Group Ltd. on Thursday swung to a net loss of $1.67 billion for the 2015 fiscal year, its worst annual financial performance since its Singapore listing in 1997, largely due to an impairment charge related to its coal assets, The Wall Street Journal reported. The company’s performance is the latest sign of weakness in the commodities trading industry. Lower demand from China and a stubbornly slow pace of recovery in the global economy have hit companies like Noble, which make their money as middlemen between producers and consumers of commodities.

COSCO Corporation (Singapore) took a beating after its shares resumed trading on Monday, December 14. Investors punished the shipping company after a much-awaited privatisation deal with its parent company fell through last week, Singapore Business Review reported. COSCO shares have been suspended from trading since August 11, after it was reported that its majority shareholder Cosco Group is eyeing a privatisation exercise for the struggling shipping company.

Singapore’s bond market is bracing for the latest unfortunate export from Indonesia: debt defaults, Bloomberg News reported. The city state, shrouded in smog from fires in its neighbor, is also starting to feel the impact of that nation’s currency woes. Indonesian phone retailer PT Trikomsel Oke’s Singapore-dollar bonds plunged to record lows last week after it blamed a weak rupiah when flagging a possible bond restructuring that would be the local market’s first in six years.

Jurong Aromatics Corp (JAC), which operates a large petrochemicals complex in Singapore, has gone into receivership because of debt problems, according to its restructuring firm and a filing with Singapore's accounting authority. JAC's debt problems mounted in recent months after it halted production in December to fix a technical issue. The company is the latest victim of a global commodities rout which has seen a Japanese shipper filing for bankruptcy on Tuesday and lower profits at global trading firm Louis Dreyfus.

Jurong Aromatics Corp, operator of one of the world's largest petrochemical plants, cannot service its interest payments and is negotiating a debt restructuring with bankers amid a plunge in oil prices, people familiar with the situation said, The Straits Times reported. Operations at the US$2.4 billion (S$3.4 billion) plant have stalled since December as the Singapore-based group remains locked in talks with lenders including BNP Paribas and Standard Chartered, as well as suppliers Glencore, BP and SK Energy, the sources said.

Holders of senior debt from Singapore's banks will have reason to breathe easy if the Monetary Authority of Singapore implements proposals to limit its statutory bail-in framework to subordinated debt, Reuters reported. The proposal, part of a set of proposed enhancements to the bank resolution regime, will turn Singapore into one of the most investor-friendly nations for senior bank debt, as opposed to the approach favoured in Europe and elsewhere.

Things have gone further south for Jones the Grocer Singapore (JTG), three months after the gourmet grocer from Down Under assured that it was business as usual, The Straits Times reported. The Singapore arm of the Louis Vuitton-backed Australian gourmet cafe and retail chain has been placed under judicial management, and its assets are now up for public sale.

A second dry cargo shipper has filed for bankruptcy following a collapse in freight rates that has forced many companies to idle vessels used to haul iron ore, coal and grain rather than hire out the ships at a loss, Reuters reported. Weaker demand from China and an oversupply of ships has led to the worst industry downturn in 30 years, pushing the Baltic dry index - the industry benchmark for freight rates - to an all-time low. China's Winland Ocean Shipping Corp filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States on Feb.

OW Tanker, a unit of bankrupt OW Bunker and owner of its marine fuel supply ships, has been taken over by a newly-created company, the fleet manager told Reuters on Wednesday. OW Bunker, the largest ship fuel supplier in the world, collapsed earlier this month after it said it had lost almost $300 million in hedging losses and unauthorised credit lines given in Singapore. Henrik Pedersen said the takeover by Alba Tanker ApS, which has the trustees of the bankrupt company on its board, is part of the process of securing assets for the estate.