Europe

An investor protection deal between the EU and Singapore, approved by the European Parliament last week, would make sovereign debt restructurings harder for governments to manage, according to industry observers.

UK retailer J Sainsbury’s acquisition of Walmart-owned Asda looked on the edge of failure this week, potentially scuppering around £2.95bn of loans supporting the deal at a time of rock bottom volumes in the market.

Crédit Agricole was building momentum behind a new additional tier one in the dollar market on Wednesday morning, the third deal in the asset class in the space of seven days.

BBVA and Rabobank were both selling non-preferred senior bonds in euros on Wednesday, with investors showing a real thirst for new supply after a quiet start to the year.

Investor confidence in European equities is fragile as the asset class suffered its worst week of outflows since July 2016, but bankers are still confident of buyers'commitment to new issues over the rest of the year.

CPI Property Group, which owns real estate in Berlin and central and eastern Europe, has mandated four banks for a roadshow to market its first dollar bond.

Dutch issuer NN Bank attracted twice as much demand for its conditional passthrough (CPT) covered bond on Wednesday as its compatriot Achmea managed last week. Moreover, the issuer was able to tighten the spread much further from the initial level, enabling it to be priced with virtually no new issue concession.

Banks have been drawing strong demand for new and outstanding bonds as financial debt funds gain confidence having posting some of their highest monthly returns since 2016.

Middle East issuers are expected in the bond market in droves, with Egypt and Mashreqbank leading the charge this week.

UniCredit’s German subsidiary, HVB, attracted much more demand for a €500m tap of a 10 year benchmark on Wednesday than when the bond was originally issued in January. Not only that but it did so at a tighter spread and new issue concession. The strong execution underscores just how much market sentiment has improved.

Tylor Hartwell is starting at National Australia Bank, after leaving Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation earlier this year.

The UK banking sector has more links to China than the equivalent sectors in the US, Japan, the euro area and South Korea do combined. Analysts are warning that China's growth is slowing, and HSBC’s poor results have been linked to this. But those espousing that view are overstating the connection.