Bank of America

The bounce in international equities since the election of Donald Trump as US president has led, as widely expected by market participants, to a wave of block trades this week, some of which were covered very quickly.

Financial markets have changed their whole investment mindset in the past seven days, as lightly as an actor changing clothes. Out has gone lower-for-longer pessimism and slavery to central banks; in has come a belief in growth and enthusiasm for higher rates and inflation, writes Jon Hay.

Vodafone’s plans for an IPO of its Indian unit suffered a setback after it wrote down the value of the business by €5bn ($5.4bn) amid fierce competition, saying the float will not happen before March.

Bayer successfully pulled off what was arguably this year’s biggest European ECM deal on Tuesday night, with a €4bn mandatory convertible and €1.5bn delta equity placement. But although both were fully sold and have traded stably, a good number of deal-playing investors are still putting in small orders.

Bayer, the German life sciences group, picked Tuesday night to launch the first part of its $19bn equity financing for its $66bn takeover of Monsanto. Bayer's deal comes as equity markets are revitalised by the new conviction that Western policy is shifting to reflation.

Vodafone will not launch an IPO for its India business before March, even as the UK telecommunications giant wrote down the value of its India arm by €5bn ($5.4bn) following mounting domestic competition.

South Korean heavy industry company Doosan Infracore Co priced a new bond on Tuesday, giving investors a break from the procession of offerings from China. Although Korean borrowers are known for their aggressive pricing strategy, recent market volatility forced Doosan to pay up.

The deal the equity-linked bond market has been awaiting for months has arrived this evening. Bayer, the German life sciences group, has launched a €4bn mandatorily convertible issue as the first part of its $19bn equity financing for its takeover of Monsanto.

As expected, the loans for the leveraged buyout of Polish auction website Allegro are tightly priced, with tenors of six and seven years for less than 400bp.

Shares in Dis-Chem Pharmacies, the South African retail pharmacy group, closed 16% above their offer price on their debut on Friday, after the company had raised R4.38bn ($305m) by pricing its IPO slightly above the middle of its range on Monday.

China’s Yancheng Oriental Investment & Development Group Co and South Korea’s Doosan Infracore Co ventured out to the DCM market on Tuesday for their respective dollar-denominated bonds.

US pharmaceutical company Abbvie hit the corporate new issue market on Monday, making its euro debut as a volatile backdrop in government bonds began to filter into the corporate bond market.