Asean

The conglomerate ownership of the largest banks in the Philippines is coming under greater scrutiny as the regulator and even the International Monetary Fund express concern. Increased foreign ownership is one way to reduce the risk, but that strategy presents its own challenges. Peter McGill reports.

A range of credits from India, Malaysia and Greater China stormed the Asian debt market on Thursday, vying for investor attention.

Thailand has ambitious plans to plug its infrastructure gap but before these investments can take off, funding must take centre stage. Project bonds are one way to overcome this. Asiamoney speaks to a group of leading market participants about how the Kingdom’s domestic liquidity can be harnessed to fund infrastructure developments, and why project bonds make sense for both issuers and investors.

International investment banks are taking a knife to their Asian operations amid slower capital markets activity, even as competition from Chinese lenders intensifies.

The Philippine market regulator has given the go ahead to the local arm of oil and gas giant Royal Dutch Shell to list in the country.

Singapore’s OCBC Bank has promoted Elaine Lam to the position of head of global corporate banking, succeeding George Lee who is retiring.

Indonesia’s Bumi Serpong Damai is looking for a window to sell a seven year dollar deal via wholly-owned subsidiary Global Prime Capital.

Intercontinental Exchange has added JP Morgan as the fourth clearing member of its ICE Clear Singapore subsidiary.

The Philippines’ largest lender BDO Unibank is planning a rights issue of up to Ps60bn ($1.2bn) in an attempt to boost its capital base.

Singapore Telecommunications raised $500m on Monday, a day when credit markets in Asia slumped. Nevertheless, the investment grade issuer managed to get away with offering no new issue premium on its bonds.

Mitsui & Co subsidiary MBK Healthcare has pocketed MR1.0bn ($249.7m) after offloading a chunk of its shares in IHH Healthcare, with the leads having to walk investors up from the bottom of the price range.

Singapore-based auto leasing company Ethoz Group has attracted commitments equalling the base amount of its up to S$120m ($89m) loan, according to a source.