Barclays

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has begun a price discovery process for its eagerly awaited inaugural bond, which is expected to be issued on Thursday.

Barclays Bank kept the primary covered bond market alive on Wednesday, launching its first deal of the year and its first Sonia-linked transaction — though at £500m it was the bank’s smallest covered bond yet.

Emma Broughton, who quit Barclays last month, will join ANZ Bank in June.

The Co-operative Group, the UK food retailer, undertaker, insurer and legal services provider, has announced a £250m sustainable bond issue which will be unusual in three ways. Green and sustainable bonds are rare in the UK and rare in the high yield market, while the use of proceeds Co-op is planning is close to unique.

Ireland appointed banks on Tuesday for its second syndicated bond of the year, which will extend its euro benchmark curve to 2050 (31 years).

Watches of Switzerland Group, the largest retailer of luxury watches in the UK, is exploring an IPO on the London Stock Exchange to cut its debt and allow its private equity owner Apollo Global Management to sell down some of its shares in the company.

The vast majority of Barclays’ shareholders declined to support activist investor Edward Bramson’s bid to put himself on the board of the bank at its annual general meeting on Thursday.

Rating: Aaa/AAA/AAA

Euro investors have become more receptive to UK bank debt this year, leading to a blowout reception for a covered bond from Yorkshire Building Society this week. But issuers are yet to break a long period of silence in sales of unsecured products, mindful as they are of a Brexit hangover in the euro market.

BP on Thursday gave the European corporate bond market its first test of a really big, multi-tranche, investment grade issue since Easter, and showed that the market is every bit as keen as before the break. Order books for the three part bond were big and new issue premiums slim to invisible.

The Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) and European Investment Bank (EIB) swung by the sterling market this week, as a lack of competitive activity and a favourable basis swap proved to be a strong lure for issuers.

William Hill’s £350m seven year high yield deal last week grabbed an opportunity opened up by the extension to the Brexit deadline, according to group treasurer Mark Hirst, supplying a sterling market that has seen sparse issuance so far this year. But the constrained supply in the market meant the company’s attempt to buy back its 2020s at 103 attracted limited investor interest.