Evergrande announces bond coupon payment to ease anxious markets

Evergrande Group’s main company announced today that it will make a bond coupon payment on September 23, providing some comfort to anxious markets that had been on edge over worries that China’s Number 2 developer’s failure might ripple through the financial sector. US stock futures, the yuan, and the risky Australian dollar all climbed, while safe-haven assets like the yen and US Treasuries fell.

Hengda Real Estate Group announced in a statement that the coupon payment on its 5.8% September 2025 bond, which is listed in Shenzhen, will be made on September 23.

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Even as Evergrande, the country’s once-top-selling developer, approaches an important deadline for making interest payments on a dollar bond, financial markets are nervous even as investors and experts downplay the possibility that its problems may turn out to be the country’s “Lehman moment.”

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According to Refinitiv statistics, Hengda Real Estate’s coupon payment amounts to 232 million yuan ($35.88 million). Trade-in of Evergrande’s onshore exchange-traded bonds has been stopped since September 16, when Hengda Real Estate sought a one-day suspension of trading. While trading officially restarted on September 17, it is now only done through negotiated deals, according to traders, in an effort to reduce volatility.

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Evergrande will make its onshore bond payment on time, but the developer has not said whether it will be able to pay the $83.5 million in interest due on its March 2022 bond on Thursday. Another $47.5 million payment for March 2024 notes is due on September 29.

As a result, if Evergrande fails to make interest payments within 30 days of the due dates, both bonds would default.

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Evergrande Chairman Hui Ka Yuan said in a letter to employees that the company will fulfill its duties to property purchasers, investors, partners, and financial firms in an effort to restore the company’s shattered reputation.

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Evergrande’s Hong Kong-listed shares plummeted as much as 7% on Tuesday, after falling as much as 10% the day before, on concerns that the company’s $305 billion in debt may spark massive losses in the Chinese financial system in the case of a collapse. On Wednesday, the stock exchange in Hong Kong was closed for a holiday.