Asia Pacific

The Asian Development Bank has sold its first ever education bond. The proceeds will go towards financing technical and vocational training for educators in the Asia Pacific region.

Hong Kong’s stock exchange operator has named Nicolas Aguzin, chief executive of JP Morgan’s international private bank, as its new CEO.

Chinese regulators have made a long overdue move to reduce the number of boards at the Shenzhen stock exchange. That points to a greater commitment towards streamlining the country’s sometimes confounding capital markets.

Solar and wind power company ReNew Power added further momentum to India’s green bond market this week with a new $460m deal.

China-based Betta Pharmaceuticals, a developer of cancer treatments, is planning a Hong Kong IPO, having filed draft paperwork with the city’s stock exchange on Monday.

India's UltraTech Cement sold Asia’s second dollar sustainability-linked bond (SLB) this week as the instrument steadily gains traction among issuers.

Mining Industry Indonesia, a holding company for the government’s stakes in five domestic mining firms, is seeking an up to $750m borrowing from the loan market.

Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) is planning to introduce new rules that will require syndicate teams on bond and equity deals to be fixed earlier and brokers to disclose their fee structures, moves that are aimed at improving transparency in the city's capital markets and hold banks more accountable for their transactions.

Banks operating in Hong Kong are actively pushing for the adoption of alternative risk-free rates as the deadline for phasing out Libor, the old lending benchmark, approaches.

GlobalCapital and HSBC hosted a virtual roundtable in mid-January to discuss the blowout start to high yield bond issuance in 2021. Leading market experts highlighted how Asia’s debt markets have shifted — and how borrowers are positioning themselves for the rest of the year.

HH&L Acquisition Corp has bagged $360m after increasing the size of its New York Stock Exchange IPO, in yet another sign that Asia-focused blank cheque companies are surging in popularity.

Vietnam Technological and Commercial Joint Stock Bank is in discussions with lenders for a comeback to the loan market.