(Bloomberg) — Sunac China Holdings Ltd. received court docket approval for its multibillion-dollar offshore debt restructuring plan, clearing the final key hurdle for it to develop into the nation’s first main developer to overtake such liabilities.
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A Hong Kong court docket choose dominated in favor of Sunac’s debt blueprint after a so-called sanction listening to Thursday. The developer secured assist for the plan two weeks in the past from collectors representing 98% of claims that voted.
The court docket’s sign-off units Sunac other than main trade friends akin to China Evergrande Group which are nonetheless struggling to discover a viable debt-restructuring highway map as an unprecedented housing disaster unfolds.
Sunac was China’s third-largest builder by contracted gross sales in 2021, simply as a government-driven effort to restrict actual property leverage development set off a plunge in new-home purchases and a money crunch that’s resulted in document quantities of offshore-bond defaults. The trade has weakened anew after exhibiting indicators of restoration earlier this 12 months.
The developer, now ranked sixteenth, first defaulted on a greenback bond in Might 2022 and unveiled its offshore-debt restructuring plan this previous March. Sunac’s proposal covers an estimated $10.2 billion of creditor claims, $5.7 billion of which might be compensated with new greenback bonds. The rest shall be settled by way of getting shares of its property-management arm and convertible notes.
Sunac sought Chapter 15 chapter safety in New York final month, a transfer typically required in finalizing a restructuring. Its shares, although down 53% this 12 months, have greater than doubled because the begin of September — simply one of the best performer in a gauge of Chinese language builders.
(Updates with court docket ruling)
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