Foreign bankers, city leaders and officials of their financially strapped window company, Guangzhou International Trust and Investment Corp (Gzitic), are bracing for a landmark creditors' meeting scheduled for tomorrow in Guangdong's capital.
Gzitic, like dozens of mainland window companies, tapped short-term loan markets to finance long-term operations, creating a burden of liabilities that now threaten the firm with bankruptcy.
According to the latest estimates of Guangdong vice-governor Wang Qishan, Gzitic is holding foreign currency debt of US$700 million.
Gzitic's repayment problems started making headlines in October at the same time as the central People's Bank of China decided to shut Gzitic's provincial counterpart, Guangdong International Trust and Investment Corp, rather than rescue it from chronic mismanagement and massive debts.
Tomorrow's meeting will be the first time since then that foreign bank creditors will have heard directly from the provincial government and Gzitic officials.
A truncated meeting in October failed to make any progress on the repayment by Gzitic of a US$30 million syndicated loan that had fallen due in September.