Euro

Portuguese covered bonds were steady on Friday following news that a Portuguese court had granted a provisional injunction against Bank of Portugal (BdP), and following a concern raised on Monday by Moody’s that Portuguese covered bond holders could lose their priority claim. The news emerges as DBRS decides on Friday whether to maintain its investment grade rating on Portugal, without which government bonds would not qualify for the ECB’s purchase programme.

The dollar denominated covered bond market has tightened further this week maintaining its long term trend. Funding levels are now looking more interesting for a number of regular dollar denominated covered bond issuers that have yet to make an appearance this year.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has outlined plans to speed up approvals for wholesale debt issues listed in London, a change which it hopes will particularly benefit borrowers from outside the EU, and ABS and covered bond issuers.

Türkiye Vakiflar Bankasi, or VakifBank, this week issued the first publicly syndicated Turkish covered bond, sending a powerful message to other Turkish banks and emerging market issuers that the investor base is wide open and eager for more EM names.

Berlin Hyp has increased the volume of mortgages eligible for its Grüner Pfandbrief, or Green Pfandbrief, by more than 50%, suggesting a second deal from the lender could soon be on its way.

Moody’s has favourably adjusted its Asia Pacific covered bond rating assumptions with respect to the likelihood of a payment interruption and the ability of banks to refinance bonds. The changes should lead to less rating volatility and more efficient funding structures.

Vakifbank’s euro Turkish covered bond is good for investors, good for emerging markets borrowers and good for the global economy. But the deal would probably never of happened without the intervention of the European Central Bank.

Türkiye Vakiflar Bankasi (Vakifbank) brought a slew of new faces to its investor base when it issued Turkey’s first publicly syndicated euro benchmark covered bond — at an extremely low cost of funding.

The German lender paid no premium for its sub-benchmark sized Pfandbrief, issued on Tuesday.

Compagnie de Financement Foncier took advantage of strong market conditions to issue a long eight year on Monday. Its third covered bond of the year was priced tighter than the previous two and comes as the European Central Bank has become more active in the secondary market.

Covered bonds will help Virgin Money achieve its stated aim of optimising funding costs and extending tenor, especially when taking account of its latest Gosforth RMBS, which gave funding that was both short and more costly compared to covered bonds.

The Italian parliament approved a new law earlier this month that is expected to help finance a broad range of assets. Investors of the secured bonds have recourse to the underlying asset pool as well as an unsecured claim against the issuer.