Korea Technology Finance Corp. announced on May 11 that it had signed a business agreement with the Busan Bankruptcy Court to support the utilization of intellectual property (IP) held by bankrupt companies and to promote technology transactions among small and medium-sized enterprises, The Asia Business Daily reported. This agreement was established in response to the increasing number of corporate bankruptcies due to prolonged high interest rates and inflation.

Uzbekistan will establish a new Chamber of Court Administrators bringing together all court-appointed insolvency managers under a unified self-governing system, according to a presidential decree signed on May 6, Daryo.uz reported. The new body will be created on the basis of the Uzbekistan Association of Court Administrators and will operate through regional branches in Karakalpakstan, all regions and Tashkent.

Already grappling with unresolved audit issues after many of its finance team members left the company, taking with them years of historical financial knowledge, Mary Chia Holdings is now facing claims filed by a creditor amid mounting financial pressure, The Straits Times reported. The Catalist-listed beauty and wellness group said on May 5 that its creditor, Fullink Capital, had officially commenced court proceedings against Mary Chia and wholly owned subsidiary Organica International Holdings, as well as chief executive Ho Yow Ping and chief financial officer Su Jun Ming.

A small group of bankers in Hong Kong tasked with cleaning up the city’s unprecedented pile of bad debt is done playing nice, Bloomberg News reported. They number under 200 people, less than 0.07% of the city’s finance workforce. But these so-called special asset bankers are up against a large and increasingly urgent task: cutting a HK$200 billion pile of soured debt that’s pushed the city’s distressed loan ratio to a two-decade high.

China’s exports and imports each set monthly records in April, further cementing the country as the world’s leading trading nation as Beijing prepares to welcome President Trump for a summit this week with Xi Jinping, China’s leader, the New York Times reported. China also ran a trade surplus — the excess of exports over imports — of $84.8 billion last month, according to data released on Saturday by the General Administration of Customs. However, that surplus did not set a record.

Australia's corporate regulator has urged the country's financial sector to take urgent action on tackling potential cyber risks from frontier AI systems such as Mythos, Reuters reported. The Australian Securities and ‌Investments Commission on Friday published a letter sent to the financial services industry saying greater action needed to ‌be taken to ensure cybersecurity practices were as strong as possible.

Australia's financial intelligence unit AUSTRAC has launched two targeted supervisory campaigns into the country's virtual assets sector as landmark anti-money laundering reforms take effect, Decrypt.com reported. "AUSTRAC is checking how well crypto businesses in Australia are managing money-laundering risks, ahead of major new laws coming into force," said the regulator’s Chief Executive Officer Brendan Thomas in a statement. AUSTRAC is conducting two distinct supervisory campaigns targeting crypto businesses across Australia.

Japanese authorities likely refrained from intervening in the currency market on Thursday, the first business day of this week, after multiple apparent actions during the long holiday weekend, according to a Bloomberg analysis of central bank accounts. The latest figures come as analysts try to gauge the scale of the latest salvo of yen buying and compare it with a similar campaign of intervention in 2024.