Americas

Canada’s Barrick Gold has launched an almost $18bn hostile swoop on rival Newmont on Monday, as the wave of consolidation in the gold sector reaches new heights.

Colombian airline Avianca could tap investors for a new bond issue in the coming weeks as it looks to refinance an existing bond maturing in May 2020.

Chinese broker Up Fintech, best known for its platform Tiger Brokers, is planning a listing of American Depository Shares (ADS) on the Nasdaq. It wants to raise as much as $150m.

In this round-up, US president Donald Trump extended the March 1 trade negotiation deadline, Bond Connect established an online information platform on the Chinese primary market and the Shanghai Stock Exchange finished soliciting public opinion on tech board rules

Financial institutions have accessed the dollar market with ease this week, but Yankee bank supply has nonetheless remained subdued.

Latin American bond bankers were left envying colleagues covering other markets as the region missed out on strong global credit conditions with a dead week for new issue activity.

Bonds issued by Mexican state oil company Pemex have had a torrid week after support measures announced by the government did not reassure markets.

Latin America's primary bond market has had its slowest start for nine years despite strong appetite for emerging market debt. This has presented an unexpected opportunity for issuers, and those from Brazil are best placed to take advantage.

The dollar new issuance market enjoyed a hot streak this week, as a series of blue-chip names took advantage of tightening spreads to cram supply into a holiday-shortened week.

Sparebanken 1 Boligkreditt’s (Spabol) 10 year has the highest covered bond mark of all deals issued by any bank outside the eurozone this year on GC BondMarker. SEB issued the highest scoring Swedish deal and Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) issued the best ranking Canadian covered bond this year.

The past week has been the busiest of the year so far in the international segment of the Swiss franc market, with European bank issuers accounting for much of the new issue flow.

Brazil’s first attempt to reduce the pension burden at the heart of its fiscal problem impressed analysts on Wednesday, though it did little to lift bond prices with many investors having already taken a bullish view on the prospects of reform.