Asia Pacific

Chinese issuers are back following the Lunar New Year break. Far East Horizon and Redco Properties Group are both wooing bond investors, effectively reopening the dollar debt market in Asia.

United Overseas Bank issued its debut covered bond in sterling on Wednesday, and the first from a Singaporean bank. Despite being its maiden deal, UOB was able to match the spread of more established sterling issuers. At the same time, Overseas Chinese Banking Corporation (OCBC) has mandated for a euro covered bond benchmark.

Georgia Capital (formerly BGEO Investments), the Georgian holding company representing the investment business of BGEO Group, is embarking on a roadshow for a five year dollar bond.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is cracking the whip on banks managing IPO applications for retail accounts, saying investors may have to be compensated under certain conditions.

Indonesian rupiah-denominated debt will be eligible for the Bloomberg Barclays Global Aggregate Bond Index for the first time from June 1.

The People’s Bank of China has laid out its next moves to upgrade the domestic bond markets, including better market standards, clearer default rules and further opening to foreign investors — steps that could make regulators less active in the corporate debt market.

VPBank Finance is tapping international loan market liquidity for an up to $200m three year facility, which has two lenders at the helm.

Chinese financial services provider Far East Horizon is pursuing the sale of a dollar-denominated and offshore renminbi bond.

MUFG Securities Asia has appointed Royal Bank of Scotland veteran Pierre Ferland as its new chief executive officer, effective on February 20.

HG Infra Engineering is planning to launch its Rp4.7bn ($72.4m) IPO in India at the end of February.

China’s FX watchdog loosens its grip on FX forward settlement, HSBC becomes the first foreign bank to handle an individual RMB remittance transaction following a rule change in January and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) stopped an attempt by Chinese investors to acquire the Chicago Stock Exchange.

HSBC's annual results show the bank's focus on RMB business has yet to translate into revenue growth.