Europe

Shares in Norwegian Air Shuttle, the Norwegian budget airline, fell 25% on Tuesday after the company announced an Nkr3bn (€308m) rights offer to avoid breaking its financial covenants following widening losses and an abandoned takeover attempt by IAG.

MET Group, the originally Hungarian, now Swiss-based energy trading, generation and distribution company, has agreed an €885m revolving credit facility. It has more than doubled the amount of bank debt it has available in the past three years.

Telefónica received overwhelming demand for its debut green bond on Monday with more than €5.4bn of orders, but unfulfilled investors were left with a blank new issue screen on Tuesday as corporate bond issuers move into reporting season. However, it has been one of the busiest Januaries on record.

Sparebank Soer Boligkreditt has mandated leads for a covered bond and taken advantage of demand identified in the previous three Norwegian deals issued so far this year.

French insurance firm Scor said on Tuesday that it was looking to take legal action against compatriot Covéa, as well as Barclays and Rothschild, in relation to a rejected acquisition proposal. Covéa had announced earlier in the day that it was no longer looking to combine with Scor.

Società per la Gestione di Attività (SGA), Italy’s bad loan management vehicle, is preparing to sell its first senior unsecured bond in the euro market. The company’s funding needs have risen amid a growing focus on cleaning up the Italian banking sector.

After a string of very successful 10 year covered bond trades, it was clear that seven and five year deals would “fly like hell,” said a syndicate manager on one of the deals issued on Tuesday by Swedbank and Aareal Bank.

Berlin Hyp showed that there was plenty of demand for bonds with longer and more unusual tenors on Tuesday, surprising some on-looking bankers on its return to the preferred senior format.

The £200m ($262.56m) listing of Global Sustainability Trust, a London socially responsible investing (SRI) private equity vehicle, has been postponed due to negative market conditions — primarily the political chaos surrounding the UK’s exit from the European Union (EU).

Although the UK’s eventual relationship with the European Union remains shrouded in doubt, politicians on the parliament's Treasury Select Committee are set to look into whether it should remain aligned to the continent’s regulations or diverge when it leaves.

NRW.Bank is preparing to issue its first Sonia-linked bond in 2019, joining several public sector borrowers that have made their first foray into the alternative sterling reference rate market this year.

Georges Elhedery will be moving from Dubai to London in order to take up a new role as head of global markets at HSBC. He replaces Thibaut de Roux, who reportedly left in September after an accusation of inappropriate conduct.