Barclays

The global sell-off in commodities and stocks has brought the US corporate bond market to a standstill, leaving corporate issuers unsure about when they can tap the market after the only trade of the week stumbled and AB InBev’s $46bn blockbuster continued to underperform.

Barclays beat a hasty retreat this week from the bulk of its investment banking operations in Asia, shuttering offices in multiple countries and slashing hundreds of jobs amid a wider global cull in costs and personnel. It did not pull any punches, with the cuts stretching across the equities, loans and bonds products. John Loh reports.

The World Bank and Cades were both able to bring large deals at the short end of the dollar curve on Thursday, despite a difficult market backdrop for issuers.

Veritas Technologies, the US software firm that Carlyle Group is buying from Symantec, will aim to complete a revised $7.4bn sale next week after failing to secure financing in November.

Barclays insists it can continue to thrive in Asian and emerging markets equity financing and equity derivatives, even while closing its cash equities businesses in those regions. It also wants to strengthen its core investment banking activity in Europe and the US.

Barclays is pulling out of the cash equities business in Asia Pacific as the bank stages a total exit from a number of countries in the region including Taiwan and Korea.

Investors have taken up the vast majority of the shares offered by RPC Group, the plastic packaging maker, in a £233m rights issue it launched last month.

The State of Baden-Wüerttemberg and NRW.Bank priced deals in euros on Wednesday thus avoiding a clash with Thursday's European Central Bank meeting.

Bank Nederlandse Gemeenten (BNG) is the first SSA borrower this week to brave the dollar bond market as tricky conditions in other markets make life tough for issuers.

FMS Wertmanagement has added £150m to a two year benchmark due to mature in April 2018.

Irish Residential Properties REIT has put a new €250m loan facility to use in its acquisition of 442 Dublin apartments.

The Inter-American Development Bank has printed a £250m December 2019 bond that has set a new record for year-to-date supranational and agency sterling issuance.