Banks

The State of North Rhine Westphalia was flooded with demand for its 30 year euro benchmark this week as investors braced themselves for the European Central Bank’s meeting on Thursday, in which it laid down the groundwork for a rate cut in September and additional quantitative easing.

JP Morgan became the first US bank to issue a preferred bond linked at the back-end to the secured overnight financing rate (Sofr), amid a torrent of bank supply in dollars this week.

Deutsche Kreditmarkt-Standards (DKS), a German industry body, held a conference call with Schuldschein participants on Thursday afternoon to discuss restructuring in the Schuldschein market, and whether there is a case for a standardised collective action clause.

A pair of Middle Eastern credits received large orders for what may be among the last bonds issued before the summer lull.

Darren Novak, head of activist defence at UBS, has moved from New York to London, with the bank seeing an opportunity to improve its service for European companies seeking to deal with activist investors.

Investors have looked towards structured and long dated notes in their hunt for yield as the summer break creeps closer.

Clearing house LCH has hired Isabelle Girolami as its chief executive. She comes from Crédit Agricole’s corporate and investment bank (CIB), where she was deputy CEO.

Worldline, the French payments company, attracted strong investor demand for a negative-yielding €600m convertible bond due in 2026, to refinance its acquisition of a minority stake in equensWorldline, its transaction processing subsidiary.

As core markets in the northern hemisphere begin to cool, SSA issuers are looking towards an Australian dollar sector unaffected by the summer close.

Rentenbank printed a £250m December 2026 bond on Tuesday, as top rated issuers found plenty of demand at the longer end of the sterling curve.

An infrequent FIG issuer returned to the medium term note (MTN) market this week to place the second of a pair of identical floating rate notes (FRN) this month. While on Wednesday, another bank brought back a structure that has rarely been seen since the financial crisis, according to one banker.

As the market prepares for Libors to end their run as the world’s most prevalent reference rates, there is growing support for the benchmarks to be reprieved.