Asia’s sobering wake-up call

Just a year ago, project finance was wallowing in liquidity. The Asian crisis has brought about a dramatic reversal. New and revived approaches ­ project bonds, club deals, indexation, hedging, more use of political risk insurance ­ have so far proved only partly successful in getting the business back on the road. James Featherstone reports.

Philip Crotty, head of Asian structured finance for Deutsche Bank, this year’s biggest project-finance provider, reflects on the remnants of the business in south-east Asia: “It depends on the country to an extent, but I would say that most of the major projects ­ even ones that were under construction ­ have either been postponed or shelved indefinitely. And there are delays and renegotiations of contracts going on all over the place. Some sponsors have abandoned projects completely, others are trying to keep them warm and then resurrect them when conditions improve.

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