BNP Paribas

The US investment grade corporate bond market barely blinked this week when the US Federal Reserve called time on quantitative easing. Companies hit the market ahead of what is expected to be a bumper November for new issuance.

French professional clothing firm Elis has put its planned initial public offering on hold, joining the growing ranks of European businesses delaying equity deals as a result of weak markets.

Indonesian power company Pertamina, which mandated 12 lenders for its $1.8bn five year loan, will fund a portion of the financing onshore.

Raoul Hessling joined the debt capital markets team at BNP Paribas at the beginning of October.

Unrated Tewoo Group managed to make its debut in the bond market on October 27 thanks in large part to a standby letter of credit (SBLC) provided by one of the joint global co-ordinators on the trade.

Louis Dreyfus Commodities is refinancing a loan facility raised in December 2011, reducing the amount from $800m to $600m.

French chemicals company Arkema has closed the syndication of the €1.5bn bridge facility for its €1.74bn acquisition of Bostik.

Korea Expressway Corporation, China Travel Service (CTS) and Tewoo Group are all out in the market with new dollar bonds. The Korean government related issuer (GRI) was last seen in April this year and adds to a relatively busy month for Korean issuers. CTS, on the other hand, has not been in the market since 1996.

Rhiag, the Italian car parts distributor, has priced a €50m tap of its €215m 2020 bond at par.

Hanjin International priced what bankers said was the first public bond to be issued with a guarantee from the Export-Import Bank of Korea (Kexim).

Arkema, the French chemicals company, launched its hybrid bond issue successfully on Thursday, having decided to press ahead with the deal despite market conditions that are much less favourable for higher risk deals than in September.

Swiss franc investors snapped up a long dated Quebec issue this week following a shift in demand toward 10 year paper.