Citi

Medtronic grabbed the record for the biggest high grade corporate bond issue of 2014 this week, as investors returned from their Thanksgiving breaks keen to put cash to work in one of the busiest weeks of the year.

Bankers close to Chile’s international bond market comeback said that the quality of the order book and long-term diversification meant it was worth the sovereign paying as much as 30bp more to sell 10 year debt in euros than it did in US dollars.

Another rash of block trades appeared in the European market this evening, though not as many as yesterday’s seven. The crop of four deals was led by a trade of €350m in Belgian nappy maker Ontex, where private equity groups TPG and Goldman Sachs are selling down after its IPO in June.

Grupo Actividades de Construcción y Servicios (ACS) of Spain is in talks with a group of banks to refinance €2.2bn of debt, and plans to complete the deal in January 2015.

Volvo joined the growing group of corporate issuers of hybrid capital on Wednesday, when it priced its first hybrid bonds. The deal was popular with investors, generating €7.4bn of orders.

Chile entered the market on Wednesday with its debut euro trade. It is also expected to announce a long dollar 10 year at the US open, which investors say could be printed at a yield of lower than 3%.

Sunac China Holdings joined the procession of Chinese property companies that have come to the market since China cut borrowing rates. The company raised $400m from a five non call three year bond on December 2.

After many days in which bankers have wondered why more sellers were not bringing block trades to what are very strong equities markets, today a burst of deals hit the screens.

Publicis, the French advertising and PR firm, has mandated BNP Paribas and Citi to arrange a roadshow on Friday for a possible euro bond. The proceeds will be used as part of the funding for Publicis’s $3.7bn all cash acquisition of US company Sapient, announced on November 3.

National Australia Bank has announced a 144A/Reg S deal hoping to print in what may be the only safe primary market format to sell bonds in for the remainder of the year.

The Spanish insurance company Mapfre is near to completion on a loan refinancing deal with 11 banks.

Linekong Interactive Co, which started testing investor appetite on Monday, December 1 for a $150m IPO, has had to turn away cornerstone investors due to swelling demand for the game developer.