Americas

The head of Mexico’s public credit office told GlobalCapital that the Latin American sovereign had been particularly keen to set a strong precedent for the country’s issuers after it kicked off a potentially volatile year with a $3.2bn blowout dual-tranche.

The dollar market picked up where it left off in 2017 with tight pricing and bulging order books as borrowers hit the ground running.

The sterling covered bond market enjoyed a strong start to the year, with four issuers raising a collective £3.7bn. Barclays priced the first deal of the year, which also happened to be one of the longest and largest.

A new dollar benchmark could be on the cards for multilateral lender Central American Bank for Economic Integration (Cabei), the bank’s CFO told GlobalCapital, as the issuer looks to increase its appeal to traditional SSA investors by gaining double-A ratings.

IHS Markit on Wednesday announced that Lord Browne of Madingley and Nicoletta Giadrossi have joined as board directors of the company, while its president and COO Lance Uggla became CEO on January 1.

Mexico returned to its habitual role of opening the Latin American bond markets for the year on Wednesday with a $2.6bn trade including a tap of its 2048s to make the most of an exceptionally flat curve.

After a booming 2017, with record deal volumes across securitized asset classes, S&P Global Ratings has predicted there will be $1tr of issuance across global ABS markets in 2018, driven by sustained economic expansion.

Canadian public sector issuers had a barnstorming year in the international debt markets in 2017, propelled by a strong economic performance by Canada and many of its provinces. But challenges loom — uncertainty over Canada’s trade relationship with the US, geopolitical instability and changing global monetary policy are just three of many concerns that borrowers, bankers and investors in Canada’s public sector bond markets will have to deal with this year. GlobalCapital met key market participants in Toronto in November to discuss the key issues.

Economic conditions are ripe for the mergers and acquisitions that drive capital markets. Into this mix comes a potential US tax reform more radical than any for decades. This is bound to tilt boardroom decisions about strategy — if nothing else, US CEOs could suddenly have more cash back at HQ than they know what to do with. Jon Hay and Sam Kerr report.

Non-US financial institutions have favoured going to the dollar market for unsecured offerings in the first two days of the year, with Crédit Agricole looking to raise tier two capital in the currency on Wednesday.

Emerging market bond fund managers say they are markedly more optimistic than 12 months ago when the "whole world was negative" after the start of Donald Trump’s US presidential term. And with plenty of sovereign trades rumoured for January, there is an abundance of investment opportunities.

After a record 2017, Latin America bond markets had a quiet start to 2018 on Tuesday but syndicate bankers covering the region said that they had a hefty pipeline and would start bringing deals as soon as possible.