Covered Bonds

Berlin Hyp and HVB took advantage of strong market conditions this week to issue to highly successful Pfandbriefe.

A draft regulatory technical standard (RTS) assessing risk weights and loss given default of mortgage risk, which the European Banking Authority has opened a consultation on, should give discretionary power to member states, said a lawyer on Thursday.

Pfandbriefbank Schweizerischer Hypothekarinstitute priced its smallest deal in 18 months this week, attracting several international accounts to a tightly priced Sfr350m ($385.8m) note.

GlobalCapital talked to Sarim Farooqi, senior vice-president and treasurer at Laurentian Bank, about the issuer’s recent C$250m five year debut covered bond, established under its new C$2bn covered bond programme, and what the bank’s next moves in the covered bond market could be.

UniCredit’s German subsidiary, HVB, enjoyed a stunning investor reception for its negative yielding eight year Pfandbrief that was issued on Wednesday, thanks to the lack of supply this year, the small but rare premium on offer and the superb market conditions.

The European Central Bank is struggling to maintain its exposure to peripheral European covered bonds this year, due to falling issuance, and has therefore increased its exposure to core European markets. This trend is set to continue, as supply will remain muted — even though banks are running out of eligible collateral to pledge for repo funding.

Berlin Hyp took advantage of its flat covered bond credit curve and the steepness of the interest rate curve to issue a high yielding 12 year mortgage Pfandbrief on Tuesday, in a larger than usual size.

Commonwealth Bank of Australia's New Zealand subsidiary ASB Finance issued its largest covered bond on Tuesday, the first 10 year from New Zealand and the first covered bond from the country since January 2019.

SSA issuers are flocking back to the dollar and euro market this week after seemingly just pausing for breath over the last two weeks, when deals were thin on the ground with many of the top tier names well ahead on their funding rates. They will be hoping to match a trend from last week, where conditions approved across most markets.

Sparkasse Holstein has obtained a provisional rating from DBRS for its mortgage Pfandbriefe, though whether this leads to distributed issuance remains to be seen.

Aegon Bank has registered its soft bullet covered bond programme with the Dutch central bank and has published its base prospectus, suggesting it could be ready to mandate leads after posting results this week. Aegon follows NN Bank, which became the first Dutch bank to switch away from using conditional pass through (CPT) covered bonds, with Achmea Bank set to follow.

Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s New Zealand subsidiary, ASB Finance, has mandated leads for the first Kiwi covered bond since January 2019. At the same time, Berlin Hyp has appointed lead managers for a 12 year mortgage Pfandbrief.