Australian dollar

Korea Expressway Corp made its debut in the Kangaroo market this week, taking A$450m ($324.6m) from a dual tranche deal.

BNP Paribas has issued a series of green medium-term notes linked to the performance of the new Australian Climate Transition Index (ACT), which is made up of companies expected to thrive in the transition to keep global warming below 2°C.

The case of O’Donnell versus the Australian Commonwealth, if successful, could force all issuers seeking to make use of the Australian bond market to make thorough disclosures of their climate strategy.

Australia announced a bumper funding programme for 2020-21 on Thursday, almost double its previous effort. Two days earlier, the sovereign surprised the market with a long end deal that attracted a substantial amount of offshore interest.

The International Finance Corporation sold the first SSA Kangaroo deal in over three weeks on Thursday, returning to the market with a A$100m ($71.9m) 11 year bond.

UBS raised A$2.75bn ($1.96bn) with a triple tranche senior unsecured deal through its Australian branch on Thursday, printing the largest ever Australian dollar bank deal for a foreign issuer.

In a world first this week, 23-year-old student and Australian retail government bond investor Katta O’Donnell filed a legal challenge against the sovereign on Wednesday, claiming that the government does not do enough to disclose the risks of climate change to investors. If successful, the case could change issuers’ obligations regarding climate risk disclosure.

While bankers in the Northern hemisphere plan well-deserved summer breaks, the Australian and New Zealand dollar markets are set to remain open for business, with some competitive pricing on offer.

Deutsche Bahn tapped the Kangaroo and Swedish kronor markets on Wednesday after having spent the first half of 2020 focused on the euro market.

Kommunalbanken snagged NZ$500m ($324.5m) on Friday with the second largest Kauri bond of the year. Interest in the New Zealand dollar is high, with NZ$1.1bn worth of SSA Kauri deals printed so far this month — and more are set to follow.

Finland’s Municipality Finance returned to the domestic New Zealand dollar bond market on Friday after a long absence, to raise its largest Kauri bond since 2008.

Two recent policy changes from the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) spurred a pair of foreign banks to scoop A$3.2bn ($2.2bn) from the bond market this week. An expansion of repo-eligibility and a term funding facility for domestic banks have freed up the funds to drive the bumper deals, according to a banker at one of Australia's big four banks.