Americas

Bondholders overwhelmingly backed Suriname’s request for a debt standstill until at least the end of March, allowing the government to exit default. The sovereign is likely to use the payment holiday to begin negotiating a comprehensive debt restructuring.

European banks will have longer than expected to correct the fallback language in their dollar-denominated additional tier ones (AT1s), now that dollar Libor has been given an extra 18 months to live.

Standard & Poor’s cut Braskem Idesa’s credit rating from B+ to B on Friday, placing the rating on negative watch as the Mexican government’s termination of a gas transportation contract disrupted the polyethylene producer’s operations. The rating agency warned the company needs to address its gas supply shortage urgently, but some credit analysts eye a buying opportunity.

Latin American power generation company EnfraGen will look to sell $710m of split-rated 10 year senior secured notes this week, nearly three years after it postponed an earlier attempt at tapping bond markets.

Flutter Entertainment, the parent of bookies Paddy Power and Betfair, has returned to the equity capital markets with a £1.1bn share sale to finance its acquisition of a stake in FanDuel Group, the New York-based fantasy sports and online casino company.

Dada Nexus, which operates on-demand retail and delivery platforms in China, raised $450m this week after selling a chunk of new equity.

Latin America primary enjoyed a rare bustling start to December this week with three deals catching the eye for different reasons, despite several market participants saying they were ready for a calmer end to the year.

Argentina’s second largest provincial issuer, Córdoba, improved its consent solicitation to bondholders on Thursday, increasing proposed coupon payments. The offer comes as Argentine provincial debt talks gain momentum, but Córdoba is still some way off its bondholder group’s latest proposal — though the creditor committee has not yet reacted to the improved offer.

The dollar bond market is wide open for companies to take advantage of strong demand and a rally in spreads, boosting hopes for a busy end to a record year for investment grade issuance.

The Commonwealth of the Bahamas raised $225m of 12 year money on Wednesday, taking advantage of a strong rally in its most recently issued bonds to tap markets 125bp inside where it did less than two months ago.

After monitoring bond markets for several weeks, Brazil took the plunge on a slightly softer day on Wednesday to raise $2.5bn via the reopening of three different notes.

Baker Bros Advisors, a shareholder in Chinese biopharmaceutical company BeiGene, has raised $340.1m from a sell-down of the firm’s American depositary shares.