The dollar was steady in early trading Monday and Asian stocks looked set for a muted start as traders digested President-elect Joe Biden’s pledge to detail plans for huge U.S. economic aid, which spurred the S&P 500 to reach another record Friday. The greenback was little changed against the euro and pound, while the yen edged up.

Equity futures pointed modestly higher in Australia and Hong Kong. Traders will be assessing earnings this week, including reports from JPMorgan and Citigroup. Elsewhere, Bitcoin retreated from the high of almost $42,000 it reached on Friday.

China Everbright's indirect wholly owned subsidiary has won a public bid for the purchase of a 65 per cent equity interest in water treatment firm Tianjin Binhai New Area Huantang Sewage Treatment. The consideration for the purchase is 666.3 million yuan (S$136.4 million). Tianjin Binhai New Area Huantang Sewage Treatment is a wholly state-owned enterprise. The projects it owns have an aggregate daily water treatment capacity of 220,000 tonnes.

Keppel Corporation said that offshore vessel player Floatel has reached an agreement with lenders of its revolving credit facilities and bank vessel facility, which will deliver a full discharge of security over the assets owned by some of the Floatel group entities. The agreement is conditional upon securing and satisfying all conditions precedent to a new revolving credit facility, which will be drawn in part to fund a settlement payment of US$46 million to the lenders. Cash in the blocked accounts and other assets retained by the relevant company in the group, and any and all claims of the lenders against the group - including the US$115 million owed under the bank vessel facility and the revolving credit facilities - will be fully and unconditionally released.

Renaissance United said its third-quarter earnings, due to be released by March 17, will be impacted by a sharp increase in cost of sales due to the use of liquefied natural gas (LNG) during winter gas shortages in China. Its China operations based in Hubei province had to supplement the company's piped gas supply with LNG, which is subject to market spot pricing, the group said in a bourse filing late on Friday night. In December 2020, LNG prices in China peaked to three-year highs. Reuters reported that an early cold snap, post-lockdown manufacturing activity and a national drive away from coal were likely causes. The spike was exacerbated by dealers hogging imported fuel. Renaissance United's China operations were not able to pass the increased supply prices to end-users as pricing is regulated by local governments.

ISDN Holdings keeps focus on China and diversification strategy amid pandemic. It also sees growth opportunity for disinfectant products and solutions. WHILE the Covid-19 pandemic continues to hamper economic activity and business sentiment, ISDN Holdings' president Teo Cher Koon said that the company has been fortunate enough to have registered "good growth" this year. ISDN sells systems incorporating components such as monitors and industrial computing units, assembles and manufactures special purpose motors and gears, and also provides hardware and software solutions to clients. For the first nine months of 2020, ISDN's net profit more than doubled to S$15.1 million. Revenue for the period increased 24.7 per cent to S$264 million, which the company attributed to "continued strong demand for industrial automation" across its key markets.

Energy and utilities group, Sembcorp Industries, announced on Friday that its India energy arm Sembcorp Energy India has won a 400 megawatt solar power project in the northern Indian region of Rajasthan. The project's entire output will be sold to the Solar Energy Corporation of India under a 25-year long-term power purchase agreement

Source: SGX Masnet, The Business Times, Bloomberg, Channel NewsAsia, Reuters, PSR