Bloomberg (June 12)
“The owners of the Westfield San Francisco Centre mall are giving up the property to lenders, adding to deepening real estate pain in a city struggling to bring back workers and tourists after the pandemic.” Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield and Brookfield Corp. will default on $558 million in remaining debt. “San Francisco has been among the hardest-hit cities since the pandemic as office vacancies soar, retail vacancies rise and concerns about safety deter visitors.”
Tags: Brookfield, Cities, Debt, Default, Hardest-hit, Lenders, Mall, Office, Pain, Pandemic, Real estate, Retail, Safety, San Francisco, Struggling, Tourists, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Vacancies, Workers
Reuters (April 25)
The U.S. “standoff over the debt ceiling is a white swan, or an entirely predictable, very frequent event that has the potential to be as catastrophic as its darker sibling.” Arriving at the “deadline without a congressional fix would lead to a calamitous default,” which could “exacerbate the very risks that sparked last month’s bank failures.”
Tags: Bank failures, Calamitous, Catastrophic, Congressional fix, Deadline, Debt ceiling, Default, Exacerbate, Predictable, Risks, Standoff, U.S., White swan
Barron’s (June 27)
“Russia’s first default on its foreign debt in more than 100 years is the latest sign that the sanctions… have consequences,” but it’s a “symbolic win.” Energy prices remain the biggest impact of sanctions. “Oil prices aren’t coming down as long as Western powers are working to wean themselves off Russian supply. Faster inflation and rising interest rates, meanwhile, are bringing the global economy to its knees.”
Tags: 100 years, Consequences, Default, Energy prices, Foreign debt, Impact, Inflation, Interest rates, Oil prices, Russia, Sanctions, Supply, Symbolic win
Financial Times (September 22)
“While Evergrande’s US dollar bonds are trading at levels that suggest default, Beijing is unlikely to allow the company’s woes to proliferate to the point at which they risk creating a systemic crisis. The correct way to view the Evergrande meltdown is to see it as a controlled explosion. Beijing is teaching the developer a very public and painful lesson.”
Tags: Beijing, Bonds, Controlled, Default, Evergrande, Explosion, Lesson, Meltdown, Painful, Risk, Systemic crisis, Trading
Institutional Investor (March 20)
“The coronavirus pandemic has pushed the world’s economy into a slowdown that may lead to default rates jumping as high as 10 percent in the next twelve months, according to analysts at S&P Global…. The sudden stop in global economic activity, the recent drop in oil prices, and record market volatility are all putting pressure on the creditworthiness of companies.”
Tags: Analysts, Coronavirus, Default, Economy, Oil prices, Pandemic, S&P, Slowdown, Vlatility
Bloomberg (June 26)
“China is losing the war against shadow banking. Look beneath the headline numbers and you’ll see that activity is picking up, a sign of the economy’s overreliance on this opaque funding channel.” In the first quarter, “financing using trust assets climbed 4.4%” and the “proportion prone to default and repayment risks climbed to a record high of 90% from a year earlier.” Despite the talk of deleveraging, “what’s clear is that China needs its shadow banks now more than ever.”
Tags: China, Default, Deleveraging, Opaque funding, Overreliance, Repayment risks, Shadow banking, Trust assets
Financial Times (June 7)
“Given today’s high level of public sector debt and worsening demographics, it is inevitable that governments will resort to soft forms of default, including inflation, to escape from their fiscal straitjacket. This is a world in which elderly savers will be condemned to subsidise borrowers for a long time.”
Tags: Borrowers, Debt, Default, Demographics, Elderly, Governments, Inevitable, Inflation, Public sector, Savers
Wall Street Journal (May 7)
As its economy slows, China is taking “tentative steps toward crucial financial reform.” These steps may leave some firms without the comfortable support of the Government’s safety net. “A few bankruptcies and defaults in recent months suggest that the bailout culture may give way to creative destruction. The year ahead should show whether China has reached a reform turning point.”
Tags: Bailouts, Bankruptcies, China, Creative destruction, Default, Economy, Financial Reform, Government, Turning-point
Euromoney (November Issue)
With returns on some Ukraine sovereign debt exceeding 16%, there are obviously concerns over a possible default. “Ukraine’s policymakers, however, are adamant that default or even restructuring is out of the question. The main reasons given are national pride and, more cogently, a desire to maintain access to international capital markets.”
Tags: Capital markets, Default, Policymakers, Pride, Restructuring, Returns, Sovereign debt, Ukraine
Financial Times (August 1)
“Argentina’s 12-year dispute with a group of hedge funds holding out for full payment on defaulted Argentine bonds is proving to be one of the most wasteful debt restructurings in history…. Indeed the case once again illustrates the need for a better way of managing sovereign defaults.”
Tags: Argentina, Bonds, Debt restructuring, Default, Dispute, Hedge funds, Hold outs, Payment, Sovereign defaults
