Bank of America

Nicholas Lee, managing director and head of syndicate for Asia equity capital markets at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, has left the firm to join an investor.

Korea Land & Housing is the latest Korean issuer to tap the international markets, launching guidance on a new bond on Monday morning.

Bankers announced comps for Lenovo’s debut dollar bond on April 28 as they continue investor meetings in Singapore. The issuer has already received strong indications of interest and is guiding investors to a five year transaction.

Tata Motors is meeting investors in Asia this week, and plans to issue a dollar bond from its subsidiary TML Holdings.

SingTel signed loans worth a chunky S$3.5bn ($2.8bn) via two separate facilities this week, in deals that saw a large number of banks piling in.

Asia’s top refiner China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) has picked Bank of America Merrill Lynch, CICC, Citic Securities and Deutsche Bank to advise on the restructuring of its retail unit, the company announced on April 24.

National Bank of Greece bucked the typical route taken by peripheral banks with renewed access to the capital markets, starting with a covered bond or short maturity senior unsecured, to mark its return with a five year senior bond that it printed though the level that the Greek sovereign was trading. It's a deal that has market participants both trumpeting the peripheral recovery story and wondering: to what extent yield hunger is distorting decisions?

Nationwide Building Society is eager to return to the private placement market after a two-year absence. It won’t be short of demand, as financial institution private placements are being snapped up. Investors scrambled for ING Bank’s paper after the borrower revised its levels at the start of the week.

Russian Tatfondbank’s $70m Reg S private placement was sold to around seven to eight investors, with an average ticket size of $10m, according to a source close to the deal.

Tencent printed the largest ever dollar bond for an Asian technology company on Tuesday night, and the $2.5bn three and five year dual tranche transaction was more than five times subscribed. A ratings upgrade since its last outing ensured the issuer received a good response from the US and allowed it to price comfortably inside its curve.

Vista Land & Lifescapes priced the first corporate dollar bond from the Philippines this year after closing a tender offer. Despite continued strong domestic demand for its name, the issuer took the opportunity to distribute its new bond to a more international investor base.

Union Bank of India launched its latest bond into a busy market on Tuesday, pricing with a new issue concession to help allay investors' concerns after the heavy sell-off of State Bank of India’s recent bonds.