Commerzbank

In a first for the Russian loan market since EU and US sanctions were imposed on the country, a borrower has agreed an unsecured dollar loan. Norilsk Nickel has signed a $500m deal from five lenders.

Commerzbank has offered further details on how it plans to scale back its trading operations, and on the future path of the bank and its focus on digital. On Thursday, it announced around 9,600 job cuts, and the combination of the Corporates and Markets division with the Mittelstandbank.

Rating: Aaa/AAA/AAA

Deutsche Bank isn’t even close to being the most-litigated-against bank in the post-crisis era — that honour goes to Bank of America, which has paid more than $150bn in fines, settlements and lawsuits since the crisis. But any potential settlement it strikes with Department of Justice over RMBS mis-selling will keep on hurting the bank's peers, for years afterwards.

A chaotic start to the week for the euro corporate bond market saw one deal pulled on a combination of soured sentiment and aggressive pricing, causing issuers to engage in a balancing act before risk appetite returned in force at the end of the week.

Investors threw off the caution on Thursday that saw them hesitate over lower-rated investment grade corporate bond deals offering low spreads on earlier in the week.

Commerzbank confirmed on Thursday morning that it planned a new revamp of it’s strategy, dubbed Commerzbank 4.0, which would cut back further on trading activities, merge the investment bank with the Mittelstandbank, write off goodwill and intangibles, and axe its dividend.

The European Investment Bank has pushed the green bond curve out to the unprecedented length of 21 years with a new issue on Wednesday.

After a rocky beginning to the week that saw an offering from Lufthansa pulled — a rarity in the European corporate bond market — French transnational utility and service company Veolia managed to sell a total of €1.1bn in senior unsecured bonds across two tranches on Wednesday.

Phoenix Group Holdings, the UK life insurer and asset manager, will carry out a £735m rights issue to partly finance its takeover of Abbey Life, which it announced on Wednesday morning, causing its share price to rise by 3.6%.

The ebullient tone that characterised the first three weeks of September has faded as investors begin to fret over the US presidential election on November 8, but there is still life in the SSA market.

Books were nearly $2bn for the UAE's Union National Bank’s return to the markets on Wednesday With issuance from UAE banks limited thus far, the 20bp-25bp starting premium offered good value, according to one EM banker.