Covered Bonds

OP Mortgage Bank’s green debut €750m 10 year covered bond was priced on Thursday in line with where a Pfandbrief might have been expected to come. At the same time, National Bank of Canada made a rare appearance with a €500m seven year that was priced well inside fair value.

Všeobecná úverova banka (VUB) issued a €500m five year covered bond on Wednesday at the tightest spread for any issuer from Slovakia. At the same time the Mortgage Society of Finland issued a sub-benchmark sized 10 year at close to fair value. The resounding outcomes for both deals partly reflected the generous spreads on offer. At the same time OP Mortgage Bank has announced plans to issue its debut green covered bond.

Covered bonds and RMBS secured on green mortgage collateral do not deliver issuers much of a saving over conventional issuance in those markets, but favourable regulatory initiatives stand to tip the balance towards an increase in green mortgage production. Secured issuance will be the best way to fund this activity — expect green RMBS and covered bond issuance to surge.

The volatility that defined the first week of March for SSA issuers meant the paid higher new issue premiums than before — an average NIP of 1.5bp. But the same metric fell to 0.71bp last week, suggesting growing investor comfort that will have been buoyed by the ECB’s decision last week to step up its Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme to meet rising government bond yields — and even those numbers were well below last year’s average SSA NIP of 2.6bp.

Berlin Hyp’s six year green Pfandbrief and Bawag’s 20 year vanilla covered bond attracted strong demand on Tuesday reflecting the paucity of supply, a steadier rates outlook, the rare tenors on offer and, in Berlin Hyp’s case, the green collateral. At the same time VUB mandated leads for a five year covered bond, the first from Slovakia this year.

Sustainability is likely to have a pivotal place in prudential discussions and properties secured on energy efficient mortgages could be in line for more favourable treatment than vanilla ones, the European Covered Bond Council and European Mortgage Federation’s secretary general, Luca Bertalot told GlobalCapital.

Berlin Hyp mandated leads for a rare green Pfandbrief on Monday. The deal has emerged amid a dearth of covered bond supply so far this year and takes advantage of a recent stabilisation in yields at higher levels.

FIG deal arrangers breathed a sigh of relief as the European Central Bank doubled down on its support for bonds this week. They expect to be able to build on the ECB’s latest statement, following a tricky period for primary credit markets.

A flurry of Swiss franc issuance dusted the market this week, as domestic and foreign borrowers entered a more settled market.

The Climate Bonds Initiative has said the evidence for price benefits of green bonds is becoming "increasingly visible". Though proof of a pricing advantage in covered bonds is limited, it was on display this week when Crédit Agricole Italia issued is first green covered bond and more generally, the product attracts a wider investor base.

While European banks have been ducking the covered bond market in favour of central bank liquidity, issuance from the asset class’s newer markets has also been light, but for different reasons. Attention is now on South Korea and Japan, which are seen as the most promising sources of new issuance, according to a senior S&P ratings official.

In the first week of March 2020, the Covid-19 news was already hammering the markets and volatility, as measured by VIX, was almost at levels not seen since 2008. Although the VIX reached 28.57 last week, that figure was only around half the value it was this time last year. With the pandemic still going on Primary Market Monitor takes a look at what has changed in bond execution dynamics since then.