Europe

A large majority of derivatives users have not yet started to prepare contracts for the end of Libor, according to a survey published on Thursday.

Barry Callebaut, the chocolate company headquartered in Switzerland, has launched a triple tranche Schuldschein a month after a roadshow for a sustainable bond failed to produce a public market result.

Belgian private equity firm Cobepa is funding its acquisition of Scalian, the engineering consultancy, with two French investment banks.

Anta Sports Products has launched its €2.2bn loan to back the acquisition of Amer Sports Oyj into general syndication, with HSBC joining the bookrunning group.

Public sector borrowers might switch some of their attention away from a rampant euro market towards dollars, said SSA bankers, after the Inter-American Development Bank and Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations brought strong trades in the currency on Wednesday.

Appetite for eurozone sovereigns is showing no signs of slowing down after Ireland and Portugal joined Belgium this week in scoring their largest ever syndication order books. Several other borrowers sold euro trades on Wednesday, with more supply expected this week as the pipeline has “accelerated” ahead of next week’s parliamentary vote on the UK’s Brexit deal.

The proportion of overall issuance in US private placements sold by UK borrowers may have risen to over 20% for the first time in years.

When it failed to notify investors it would call its 6.5% hybrid corporate bonds in December, Italian energy company Enel said it still intended to offer noteholders the opportunity to redeem the notes at par via a tender offer. It confirmed the tender offer earlier this week, but it is difficult to see why any investor would take it up.

Landesbank Hessen-Thueringen Girozentrale (Helaba)’s decision to issue a rare three year covered bond as part of a two part offering, clearly paid off despite concerns over the lack of yield.

After a run of triple-B rated corporate bond issuance, A-rated names have returned to the market and paid lower premiums than the higher beta issuers had, but 10.75 years remains the longest tenor to date.

Small benchmark covered bond deals issued on Wednesday by Deutsche Bank’s Spanish subsidiary and UniCredit’s Austrian subsidiary were slow to build and priced in line with initial guidance. This led some to question whether this was due to a degree of unease with their parent groups or whether investors baulked at the pricing process.

Danske Bank offered its senior non-preferred bond to dollar investors on Wednesday, after UniCredit raised $3bn in the format the day before.