Americas

There were no new bond issues from Latin America this week, but one EM syndicate banker claimed to be “brutally busy” pitching for September as market participants said Brazilian and Argentine issuers are likely to dominate new issue activity.

High yield bond portfolios have been left dangerously undiversified under central bank policies, meaning investors have little margin for error, French investor Tobam warned this week, ahead of the Jackson Hole meetings in Wyoming.

Third quarter profits in Royal Bank of Canada’s capital markets business fell by 4% on Wednesday, a C$24m drop that the bank attributed to benign market conditions and low volatility.

Some EM bond investors said that they were interpreting the drop in Venezuelan bond prices on Wednesday as a buying opportunity, saying that it was unlikely that the US would block all trading in the securities.

Chilean copper miner Codelco completed the second leg of its tender offer on Tuesday, bringing the total amount of debt that it has repurchased using proceeds from last month’s new issue to $2.357bn.

Investors were unperturbed by the first outflows from EM funds since 2016 last week, adding that some sources still recorded inflows, but noted that after good returns this year, they were happy to take less risk for the rest of the year.

The new chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), Christopher Giancarlo, chose Bruce Tuckman to succeed Sayee Srinivasan as the regulatory body’s chief economist on Monday.

Credit Suisse’s decision to ban trading in certain Venezuelan bonds is understandable, but ultimately raises more questions than it answers.

Juan Carlos Echeverry has left his position as CEO of Colombian state-owned oil giant Ecopetrol.

European corporate bond market participants are expecting supply to start again after the UK bank holiday on August 28. Kimberly-Clark was the first issuer into the pipeline when it announced a European roadshow on Monday morning.

Scotiabank’s head of Latin American debt capital markets has left both the Canadian bank and the banking industry after more than 20 years working in EM bond markets.

Mexican broadcaster TV Azteca told bondholders on Friday that it would call some of its 7.625% dollar bonds due 2020, using proceeds from its recent debt issuance to do so.