Central and Eastern Europe (CEE)

Several big name investors this week called the start of a bond bear market after a back-up in 10 year US Treasury yields but there was little sign of reticence from the emerging markets buy-side, with three sovereigns pulling in jumbo order books.

Macedonia has set final terms for its first international bond in over a year, with books for the deal hitting over €3.5bn

Expat Asset Management has joined German exchange group Deutsche Boerse as a new exchange traded fund issuer, debuting with an ETF that provides exposure to Bulgarian stocks.

The Republic of Turkey sold a $2bn 10 year bond on Tuesday just as a sell-off in US Treasuries took hold, but it still managed to raise a book of $5.3bn for the deal.

Though bankers may have expected the first quarter of 2018 to play out with a glory run of slam dunk deals, a recent back-up in US Treasury yields has left some big name investors calling the start of a bear market in bonds.

Turkiye Sinai Kalkinma Bankasi batted away suggestions on Tuesday that its deal would suffer from pricing on the same day as the Turkish sovereign, printing a $350m five year bond from a book of $1.15bn and 15bp inside initial price guidance.

Puma Energy made a strong start for non-financial corporate issuers on Monday, making full use of investor familiarity with the credit — and some excess cash — to make its $750m market return.

PhosAgro, a Russian phosphate-based fertiliser company, is embarking on a series of investor meetings to market a five to seven year dollar bond.

The Turkish sovereign has mandated three banks for its usual start of year dollar bond while Turkiye Sinai Kalkinma Bankasi released guidance for its note. But the latter drew criticism for going head to head with its sovereign.

The equity block trades market in EMEA opened the week on Monday night with a TL496m ($132m) sale of stock in Mavi Jeans, the Turkish jeans maker that floated in Istanbul last year. The trade was covered inside an hour.

MLP Sağlık Hizmetler, also known as MLP Care, the largest private healthcare provider in Turkey, has begun investor education for its flotation on Borsa Istanbul, in which it hopes to raise about TL500m ($133m) of primary proceeds.

Two corporate issuers are making early moves into the capital markets this year without waiting for sovereign issuers to establish benchmarks, showing the strength of funding conditions in emerging market debt, said bankers.