Bank of America

David Ross, former head of EMEA leveraged finance at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, has joined a leveraged loan-focused buyside firm as chief operating officer.

Conan Tam, a managing director in UBS’s DCM syndicate desk, has left the Swiss lender and is joining Bank of America Merrill Lynch, GlobalCapital Asia understands.

The Ministry of Strategy & Finance of the Republic of Korea has sold another chunk of its shares in Industrial Bank of Korea (IBK). Strong investor demand allowed the government to increase the size of its sale by a whopping 46%, to W364.2bn ($353m).

Patience, timing, confidence and precision. Brazil’s football team may have lacked these attributes in the recent world cup, but the liability management exercise that the sovereign carried out on Wednesday earned praise for showing these very factors.

The trend for ever more highly leveraged corporate deals gathered pace this week, as France’s Sebia prepared to sign its buyout loan after receiving healthy demand from investors, even as it emerged that US regulators were cracking down on the supposed excesses of the leveraged finance market.

Financials dominated the US investment grade issuance calendar this week as investors refused to be put off by geopolitical risks.

Tata Steel announced a 5.5 year and 10 year dollar denominated dual trancher on Wednesday afternoon. The borrower is the second from the Indian high yield arena to open books for a debut dollar deal today, joining renewable energy company Greenko.

The idea of the US leveraged finance market being regulated – even down to the debt multiples on deals – may seem far-fetched. But it is becoming a reality. Tangible evidence is beginning to emerge of US banks turning down deals because they do not want to fall foul of regulators that frown on over-leveraged or risky financings.

A total of 12 banks have signed the mandate letter this week for Tata Steel’s multi-currency jumbo fundraising of around $5.62bn.

Admiral Group made its debut in the bond markets on Friday as it priced a £200m 10 year tier two deal in a move to introduce leverage into the insurance firm’s capital structure and move toward Solvency II compliance.

David Azéma, chief executive of the Agence des Participations de l’Etat, the French state holding company, will join BAML as chairman of the global infrastructure group and vice chairman of global corporate and investment banking EMEA.

Tata Steel is kicking off investor meetings for what could be an inaugural dollar and euro denominated deal this week. In addition to being the latest in a string of Indian borrowers to explore the euro market this year, the company joins a club of high yield issuers from India that are surfacing in dollars.