Senior Credit Analyst, Lucror Analytics

Leonard Law, CFA

Senior Credit Analyst

High Yield Experts

Lucror Analytics

Lucror Analytics is a leading credit and ESG research specialist and a provider of technology solutions for differentiated fixed income strategies. Our roots are in bottom-up fundamental credit analysis with a specialization in high yield corporate credits from Europe, Asia and Latin America. We are one of few research specialists integrating ESG considerations with fundamental credit research through a dedicated ESG platform. Our ESG assessment covers five key criteria: Disclosure, E,S, & G Pillars, Controversies, ESG Impact on Credit and ESG Momentum.

Recognizing the importance and value-add of Factor Investing in fixed income, Lucror developed the Smart Quant Navigator (SQN), an intuitive platform that helps clients devise and implement factor-based strategies ranging from pure quant to active fundamental, with integrated ESG.

Our company has been at the forefront of developments in the fixed income markets, identifying opportunities and consistently delivering new products and value-adding solutions to clients. Lucror has close relationships with the largest and most reputable asset managers, family offices, hedge funds, investment and wealth managers globally.

Credit

The Asia HY Trade Book for the month of July includes a summary of our recommendations, as well as our high-conviction ideas. The report also features relative-value charts and lists of the bonds in the Lucror Asia HY index.

  The Asia HY Trade Book for the month of July includes a summary of our recommendations, as well as our high-conviction ideas. The report also features relative-value charts and lists of the bonds in the Lucror Asia HY index. 

Asia HY Trade Book - July 2021 - Lucror Analytics

Independent Asian Credit Research, Bondcritic

Warut Promboon

Independent Asian Credit Research

Asian Fixed Income/Frontier Market Research

Bondcritic

Bondcritic, established in 2009, is designed to be an independent credit research voice that helps investors gain insights and unbiased analyses on Asian fixed income market. Our mission is to discover deep-value Asian high-yield and distressed bonds with a bottom-up approach, together with the help of our proprietary ESG (Environmental, Social Development, and Governance) model. At the same time, we focus on bringing investment cases of unrated and unloved issuers to the general public.

Since our last China Credit Chronicle (CCC) on 28-April, the sentiment on high-yield credits in China has not improved, to say the least. The “3 Red Lines” requirements on Chinese property developers are proven to be a bit too draconian, in our view. The strict rule forced Chinese property developers to cut prices and may have incentivized a few to manipulate their balance sheets to lower their debt levels, in our judgment. The latest spotlight is on <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/china-evergrande-group" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:479:1" rel="noopener">Evergrande Real Estate Group (3333 HK)</a> (China Evergrande Group) of which we are working on the updated report to capture additional information once the information from the group is sufficient to form a judgment.
In this flash note, we update recent events of <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/hna-group-co-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:25987:1" rel="noopener">HNA Group (HNAGRZ CH)</a>(HNA) on its on-going bankruptcy procedure. HNA-related bonds have not been active of late on a lack of liquidity and recent updates from the group. We believe it is impossible at this stage to gauge the recovery rate of the HNA complex on its hidden liabilities and potential frauds evidenced by the embezzlement cases this year.
At 29 cents on the dollar (ask), we are not confident to recommend a Buy on the maturing SANYPH 10/21s without additional knowledge on the restructuring plan, but we believe the market prices HNA’s recovery around 12 cents on the dollar, based on HONAIR Perp’s bid price.
At the end of the day, HNA shows us that these Chinese mega corporates (i.e. <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/china-huarong-asset-management-26375cc4-728e-4f75-b058-64298b10f256" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:28089:1" rel="noopener">China Huarong Asset Management (HUAZ CH)</a> and China Evergrande Group) have enticed international investors (and perhaps rating agencies) to ignore credit fundamentals and believe they will be supported by the local and/or central government when necessary. Liquidity of these companies are all about credit facilities with Chinese banks, many of which are state-owned. Once the state support wanes, we believe the local bank credit facilities will be reduced and that could lead to an eventual default, in our view. We believe the fall of HNA and others to come is a necessary step of the learning curve for investors in Chinese credits although we do not believe the fallout will turn into a contagion for all Chinese high-yield credits.
That said, we believe investors need to learn how to price Chinese credits on a stand-alone basis properly, and rating agencies, especially Chinese rating agencies, need to adjust their rating models. In our opinion, wishful ratings at the issuances, followed by multiple and rush downgrades simply do not work and have left investors unprepared to sell bonds.

Since our last China Credit Chronicle (CCC) on 28-April, the sentiment on high-yield credits in China has not improved, to say the least. The “3 Red Lines” requirements on Chinese property developers are proven to be a bit too draconian, in our view. The strict rule forced Chinese property developers to cut prices and may have incentivized a few to manipulate their balance sheets to lower their debt levels, in our judgment. The latest spotlight is on Evergrande Real Estate Group (3333 HK) (China Evergrande Group) of which we are working on the updated report to capture additional information once the information from the group is sufficient to form a judgment.
In this flash note, we update recent events of HNA Group (HNAGRZ CH)(HNA) on its on-going bankruptcy procedure. HNA-related bonds have not been active of late on a lack of liquidity and recent updates from the group. We believe it is impossible at this stage to gauge the recovery rate of the HNA complex on its hidden liabilities and potential frauds evidenced by the embezzlement cases this year.
At 29 cents on the dollar (ask), we are not confident to recommend a Buy on the maturing SANYPH 10/21s without additional knowledge on the restructuring plan, but we believe the market prices HNA’s recovery around 12 cents on the dollar, based on HONAIR Perp’s bid price.
At the end of the day, HNA shows us that these Chinese mega corporates (i.e. China Huarong Asset Management (HUAZ CH) and China Evergrande Group) have enticed international investors (and perhaps rating agencies) to ignore credit fundamentals and believe they will be supported by the local and/or central government when necessary. Liquidity of these companies are all about credit facilities with Chinese banks, many of which are state-owned. Once the state support wanes, we believe the local bank credit facilities will be reduced and that could lead to an eventual default, in our view. We believe the fall of HNA and others to come is a necessary step of the learning curve for investors in Chinese credits although we do not believe the fallout will turn into a contagion for all Chinese high-yield credits.
That said, we believe investors need to learn how to price Chinese credits on a stand-alone basis properly, and rating agencies, especially Chinese rating agencies, need to adjust their rating models. In our opinion, wishful ratings at the issuances, followed by multiple and rush downgrades simply do not work and have left investors unprepared to sell bonds.

The China Credit Chronicle:  Hazardous National Anecdote

Silver Point

Thomas J. Monaco

Silver Point is a boutique research firm that focuses on the broader financial services sector, with a particular focus on troubled institutions globally. 

Asia Ex Japan

Equity Bottom-Up

China Huarong Asset Management / Equity Bottom-Up

*Stress All Around: China Huarong Asset Management (2799.HK) [Huarong] still continues to teeter on the edge of insolvency and ongoing silence from Beijing has materially impacted funding costs. The USD 23.3 bn in Huarong debt, however, still risks crippling the USD credit market in mainland China. As Huarong is one of mainland China's largest issuers in offshore markets, this would be by far the largest credit default to date of an important state-owned company. Potential contagion risks via higher a cost of funding for offshore borrowing are occurring;  and *Evergrande Harbinger: Mainland Chinese authorities are going to great lengths to prevent a systemic daisy chain impact of a China Evergrande Group (3333.HK) [Evergrande] default on the mainland Chinese financial system. Given the systemic risks also posed by Huarong, we believe the mainland Chinese will construct some form of bailout. Distressed investors should consider picking away at Huarong’s debt; we’ll believe it when see Beijing imposing losses SOEs.

*Stress All Around: China Huarong Asset Management (2799.HK) [Huarong] still continues to teeter on the edge of insolvency and ongoing silence from Beijing has materially impacted funding costs. The USD 23.3 bn in Huarong debt, however, still risks crippling the USD credit market in mainland China. As Huarong is one of mainland China's largest issuers in offshore markets, this would be by far the largest credit default to date of an important state-owned company. Potential contagion risks via higher a cost of funding for offshore borrowing are occurring;  and *Evergrande Harbinger: Mainland Chinese authorities are going to great lengths to prevent a systemic daisy chain impact of a China Evergrande Group (3333.HK) [Evergrande] default on the mainland Chinese financial system. Given the systemic risks also posed by Huarong, we believe the mainland Chinese will construct some form of bailout. Distressed investors should consider picking away at Huarong’s debt; we’ll believe it when see Beijing imposing losses SOEs.

China Huarong Asset Management – Preventing Another Daisy Chain

Lucror Analytics Morning Views comprise our fundamental credit analysis, opinions and trade recommendations on high yield issuers in the region, based on key company-specific developments in the past 24 hours. Our Morning Views include a section with a brief market commentary, key market indicators and a macroeconomic and corporate event calendar.<ul><li><a href='#lucror-entity-479'>Evergrande Real Estate Group</a></li></ul>

Lucror Analytics Morning Views comprise our fundamental credit analysis, opinions and trade recommendations on high yield issuers in the region, based on key company-specific developments in the past 24 hours. Our Morning Views include a section with a brief market commentary, key market indicators and a macroeconomic and corporate event calendar.Evergrande Real Estate Group

Morning Views Asia: Evergrande Real Estate Group

SGX Market Strategist, Equity & Fixed Income, Singapore Exchange Ltd (SGX)

Geoff Howie

SGX Market Strategist, Equity & Fixed Income

Asia’s leading multi-asset exchange

Singapore Exchange Ltd (SGX)

Singapore Exchange is Asia’s leading and trusted market infrastructure, facilitating the exchange of capital and ideas to create value for people, businesses and economies. As a multi-asset exchange operating equity, fixed income and derivatives markets to the highest regulatory standards, SGX is a vertically integrated business that provides listing, trading, clearing, settlement, depository and data services.

With about 40% of listed companies and over 80% of listed bonds originating outside of Singapore as well as established linkages across the region and in Europe, SGX is Asia’s most international and connected exchange. Offering a full suite of derivatives products across Asian equity indices, commodities and currencies, SGX is the world’s most liquid international market for the benchmark equity indices of China, India, Japan and ASEAN.

As Asia’s pioneering central counterparty, SGX is globally recognised for its risk management and clearing capabilities, and was one of the first globally to adopt the Principles for Financial Market Infrastructure.

Headquartered in AAA-rated Singapore, SGX has over 800 employees including offices in Beijing, Chicago, Hong Kong, London, New York, Mumbai, San Francisco, Shanghai and Tokyo.

SGX Asia Currencies and Commodities Insights

China

China Evergrande Group is an integrated residential property developer. The Company, through its subsidiaries, operates in property development, investment, management, finance, internet, health, culture, and tourism markets.

Price Gauge
52-week Range	0.00 - 0.00
Market Cap (USDm)	0.00
P/E	0.00
Dividend (Yield)	0.00

Evergrande (3333 HK)

Asia HY Trade Book - July 2021 - Lucror Analytics

The Asia HY Trade Book for the month of July includes a summary of our recommendations, as well as our high-conviction ideas. The report also...

Lucror Analytics

The China Credit Chronicle: Hazardous National Anecdote

Here is an update on HNA, the recent fallout of more to come in the Chinese credit space. at 12c recovery, many factors remains uncertain....

Bondcritic

China Huarong Asset Management – Preventing Another Daisy Chain

CHINA HUARONG: Huarong still continues to teeter on the edge of insolvency. The USD 23.3 bn debt, however, still risks crippling the USD credit...

Thomas J. Monaco

Morning Views Asia: Evergrande Real Estate Group

Lucror Analytics Morning Views comprise our fundamental credit analysis, opinions and trade recommendations on high yield issuers in the region,...

Lucror Analytics

SGX Asia Currencies and Commodities Insights

By Macro Hive SGX Asia Currencies Insights Yuan risks escalate with China’s ongoing regulatory overhaul. Indian tech IPOs expected to...

Singapore Exchange Ltd (SGX)

Price Gauge

52-week Range

Market Cap (USDm)

P/E

Dividend (Yield)