Europe

Following the success of the first Spanish public sector green bond, the market’s attention has turned to the highly anticipated debut green bond from the Spanish sovereign.

Demand in the European corporate bond market may not be quite as blindly all-encompassing as it was a fortnight ago, when almost every deal was coming with no new issue premium or through the curve. But investors’ urge to buy paper is still very strong. With government bond yields depressed, buyers are eagerly grabbing longer and riskier bonds to get some yield. Perhaps surprisingly, they are also piling into the opposite: short-dated notes from high quality issuers.

Stellar market conditions have been helping smaller financial institutions find room to access funding, with Iceland’s Islandsbanki joining Aareal Bank and NIBC Bank in selling senior bonds with sizes of below €500m this week.

Ageas gave investors a rare chance to invest in subordinated debt from an insurance company this week, with the firm’s new €500m tier two attracting eight times as many orders from investors.

Financial institutions flocked to the euro market this week to take advantage of extremely favourable issuance conditions in the run-up to earnings season. As many as 13 borrowers raised close to €9bn of senior funding in the space of four days.

An attractive Scandinavian market led two European sub-sovereigns to print private notes this week.

European IPO bankers are positive about what they regard as a strong crop set to be priced before Easter, but investors are wary of committing too much.

Russian equity capital markets are red hot again, after almost two years in the cold, with supply being driven by some of Russia’s most powerful oligarchs. As investors warm to Russian equities, more of these billionaires are set to monetise some of their holdings, writes Sam Kerr.

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Young and Co’s Brewery, the owner and operator of roughly 220 pubs in London and the south east of England, has entered the US private placement market.

A French agency and a Belgian sub-sovereign are preparing to issue their first bonds.

The European Investment Bank and Flemish Community brought sustainability-linked transactions on Thursday, with investors piling in despite a busy market elsewhere.