One of S. Korea's largest builders applies for debt restructuring

SEOUL, Dec. 28 (Xinhua) -- One of South Korea's largest builders applied for a debt-restructuring program due to cash crunch, a regulatory filing showed Thursday.

Taeyoung Engineering &Construction, the country's 16th-largest builder in terms of construction capacity, submitted the application to its main creditor Korea Development Bank (KDB) after its board decided to request the debt workout, or an out-of-court agreement between a borrower in default and creditors to restructure debt.

The builder struggled with liquidity shortage, affected by large-scale real estate project financing (PF) loans, or loans secured by future cash flows from real estate development projects.

Taeyoung E&C was required to repay its maturing PF loans worth 48 billion won (37 million U.S. dollars) to creditors on Thursday and about 400 billion won (310 million dollars) by the end of this month.

The builder's PF loans estimate totaled around 3.2 trillion won (2.5 billion dollars), according to Yonhap news agency.