Deutsche Bank

Ghana's national cocoa board Cocobod is garnering interest from banks new to its lending group as the Friday response deadline approaches for its $1.6bn annual pre-export finance facility.

Global Cloud Xchange (GCX), a subsidiary of Indian telecom giant Reliance Communications, has mandated for its debut international bond. The company joins a number of Indian names looking to tap a market that is seeing a record volume of G3 issues from the country.

Mobile phone company Xiaomi HK is back in the market for its second attempt at a syndication, this time for a jumbo financing of $1bn via two tranches.

Southeast Asia’s largest e-payment firm MOL Global filed for a $300m Nasdaq IPO on July 14, which could see it become the first Malaysian firm to go public in the US.

Loxam, the French equipment rental group, wants to issue €660m of senior notes to refinance debt.

Paper and packaging company Mondi has signed a deal to extend the maturity of a €750m revolving credit facility from 2016 to 2019.

Générale de Santé, the French private healthcare group, has announced price guidance and covenant terms on the €1.75bn of loans backing its takeover by Ramsay Santé.

E-commerce giant Alibaba revealed on July 11 that it now values itself at $130bn, up from $117bn in June, as yet more information is unveiled by the Chinese firm ahead of an upcoming listing.

Greenko Dutch, a subsidiary of Greenko Group, a key player in the Indian green energy sector, is looking to issue a Reg S/144A dollar bond. If successful, the deal will be the borrower’s first in international markets and comes on the back of a favourable government budget for India’s fledgling renewable energy sector.

OTE, the Hellenic Telecommunications Organisation, was tempted back to the bond market this week by the remarkably strong rally in its debt, to buy back €500m of old bonds and issue €700m of new ones.

Scentre, the new Australian listed property company that holds the Westfield Group’s Australian and New Zealand shopping centres, issued its first bonds on Tuesday, and turned to the European market. Despite a weak day, it exceeded its target of €2bn, finding strong demand for a rare four tranche issue in euros and sterling.

Greece braved the furore surrounding Banco Espírito Santo this week to print its second deal since receiving a bailout in 2010. But the trade fell short of some bankers’ expectations — both in volume and maturity — and some worried that the politically driven rigidity of the sovereign’s funding strategy could come back to bite it if there is similar volatility when it next comes to the market, most likely a seven year bond later this year, writes Craig McGlashan.