Awards

Last year was one of the toughest periods for Asia’s high yield debt market.

At a time when almost every bank is brandishing its ESG credentials in some way, HSBC has doubled down on its ESG work, making it GlobalCapital Asia’s pick for Best House for ESG/SRI Financing in 2021.

Wild swings in the equity market, unpredictable moves by Chinese regulators and multiple resurgences of Covid-19 across Asia made 2021 a remarkable year. Banks had to move quickly, adapt and retool their ECM franchises to remain relevant.

The GlobalCapital Asia Best IPO for 2021 is South Korean firm KakaoBank Corp's W2.55tr ($2.1bn) IPO.

GlobalCapital Asia's Best Follow-on/Accelerated Offering and Best ECM Deal for 2021 is Prosus' HK$114.17bn ($15bn) sell-down of shares in Tencent Holdings.

GlobalCapital Asia's Best Equity-Linked Deal and Best ECM Deal of 2021 is Posco's €1.1bn ($1.25bn) zero coupon convertible bond.

Bank of China continued to lead its peers in the Panda bond market during our awards period, making it GlobalCapital China’s winner of the Best Panda Bond House award for 2021.

An active foreign underwriter in China’s onshore ABS market, BNP Paribas notably expanded its presence during our awards period, a feat that makes it the Best Bank for ABS in 2021.

As a leading Chinese financial institution and one of the savviest issuers from the country, Bank of China made the most of different pockets of liquidity it had available during GlobalCapital China’s awards period, including tapping into a variety of currencies like Australian dollars, Hong Kong dollars, US dollars, euros, sterling and onshore and offshore renminbi.

BMW’s story as a renminbi bond issuer is a perfect demonstration of how much potential China’s domestic market holds when it comes to supporting the local funding needs of foreign institutions doing business in the country.

Manila-based Asian Development Bank was one of the first two foreign issuers to tap China’s onshore bond market. In 2005, ADB, together with International Finance Corp, opened the Panda bond market with a Rmb1bn ($157m) 10 year deal.

GlobalCapital polled loan market participants for its 19th Annual Syndicated Loan and Leveraged Finance Awards in November.