Geely Automobile halted trading in Hong Kong yesterday after it announced that it would be issuing convertible bonds, China Business News reports. This will be the first time for Geely to issue such bonds since the Geely Group brought it public, and has the potential to influence the development of plans for Geely to acquire assets of its parent. Reports from Hong Kong indicate that Geely will issue up to US$100 million worth of 5-year convertible bonds in the amount of HK$0.9-0.972 apiece, roughly 25-30% more than Geely's closing price on Thursday. The financing will be used toward company development of two joint ventures shared by Geely and its parent, Zhejiang Geely and Shanghai Maple. These two companies sold 12,900 vehicles in February, or more than twice that of February 2005. A Geely spokesperson said that the companies' sales target this year was 180,000 vehicles, an increase of 35% over last year, which would put them together at 5% of the domestic market. Geely Auto: 0175.HKLink: http://dycj.ynet.com/article.jsp?oid=7991200