Citi

A tremendously supportive SSA market brushed off Thursday’s European Central Bank (ECB) meeting, printing all the way up to the morning of the press conference by bank president Mario Draghi, writes Lewis McLellan.

Guarantor: Federal Republic of Germany

The dollar high grade bond market returned to barnstorming form this week following the summer break with a Who’s Who of corporate America tapping the market.

Sean Weissenberger has moved to Citi to run EMEA chemicals investment banking.

Lewis Kaden, a former vice chairman at Citi, has taken a position on the advisory board of Baton Systems, the fintech payments processing company.

LCH SwapAgent has processed its first trades, with Citi and Deutsche Bank becoming the system's first counterparties as they executed a Swiss franc denominated interest rate swap and a euro denominated inflation swap.

Asian equity capital markets jolted back into life this week, with a handful of overnight blocks signalling the end of the summer lull during the constant furore on the Korean peninsula. Despite the uncertainty, bankers predict equity markets will absorb the noise and battle through. Jonathan Breen reports.

JD.com has hired five banks to arrange its $500m debut in the international loan market, making it the latest borrower from China’s red-hot technology sector on the prowl for funds.

China Petrochemical Corp (Sinopec) sealed its second benchmark transaction of the year, a four tranche $3.25bn deal, just five months after the state-owned company took home $3.4bn from a similar transaction.

K Balasubramanian is returning to Citi as the new head of corporate banking for India, succeeding Rahul Shukla who will turn his focus to senior client coverage.

The loan backing Global Logistic Properties’ (GLP) leveraged buyout by a consortium of Chinese investors has been launched into senior syndication at a smaller size of $4.108bn, said bankers arranging the financing.

Chinese logistics firm Best hit the road on Thursday to start drumming up demand for its $931.5m IPO of American depositary shares (ADS).