Firms ordered to disclose issued bonds

    LISTED firms in China must disclose information on their issued bond debt in their mid-year reports, the nation’s securities regulator said Friday.

    Listed firms usually disclose information on their balance sheets to investors, but in the wake of a sharp sell-off in corporate bonds in April and rising defaults, policymakers appear to be increasingly focused on debt risks. A commentary published in the People’s Daily earlier last week warned about the risks of relying too much on debt for future growth.

    Burbank recommends betting on Tencent

    JOHN BURBANK, founder of Passport Capital, has recommended betting on Tencent Holdings Ltd., Asia’s biggest Internet company, Bloomberg reported Friday.

    “Tencent will be one of the largest market stocks in the world,” Burbank said. He said his hedge fund’s earnings estimate for Tencent, which owns six of the top 10 smartphone apps in China, is 30 percent higher than bank analyst projections. “The analysts who cover Tencent don’t seem to understand what’s happening with Facebook, they don’t understand the upside from monetizing mobile ads, which we think will be a big theme this year,” he said.

    Wanda Cinema to take over Wanda Media

    WANDA Cinema Line Corp., the country’s biggest cinemas operator, said Friday it plans to acquire movie-making affiliate Wanda Media for 37.2 billion yuan (US$5.7 billion) in cash and shares.

    Wanda Cinema, whose parent Dalian Wanda Group acquired U.S. film studio Legendary Entertainment in January for about US$3.5 billion, said in a filing with the Shenzhen Stock Exchange that it now aims to acquire Wanda Media, the current owner of Legendary Pictures. The company also said it plans to raise up to 8 billion yuan in a private placement of shares to help fund the building of theatres and replenish working capital.

    Alibaba, SoftBank in cloud computing venture

    ALIBABA Group Holding Ltd. has teamed with its largest shareholder SoftBank Group Corp. to form a cloud computing service venture targeting Japanese customers, the two firms said Friday.

    The venture, known as SB Cloud Corp., will open a new data center in Japan to tap SoftBank’s customers ranging from startups to global organizations. Alibaba will provide services including data storage and processing services.