Europe

French telecoms company Iliad is becoming a frequent borrower in the corporate bond market. Two deals in six years have been followed by two deals in seven months. The company’s latest deal, a dual tranche offering, was its largest to date, but order books were barely 1.5 times oversubscribed.

Leeds Building Society was around three times subscribed for its tier two deal on Wednesday as it completed the first of two transactions to meet its minimum requirement for own funds and eligible liabilities (MREL).

Rabobank issued two tranches of covered debt on Wednesday and was able to match ABN Amro’s record for the tightest ever 20 year spread. DG Hyp also issued a covered bond, its first since March last year.

Bawag was three times subscribed when selling its first additional tier one bond on Wednesday, with investors renewing their enthusiasm for the riskiest parts of the bank capital structure.

Turkish real estate developer Ronesans Gayrimenkul Yatirim is still assessing investor feedback and is yet to release initial price guidance, despite having told the market that it was looking to price its bond “as early as” Wednesday.

Intercontinental Exchange on Wednesday announced that it would be launching its three month futures on regulators’ chosen successor for Libor, the sterling overnight index average, on June 1.

Investors who can buy investment grade corporate bonds in a variety of currencies have been making the most of the relative value of dollar assets in recent years. However, the cost of hedging those assets has been steadily rising and is now at a point where such assets are looking much less attractive for non-US investors.

Investors are expecting banks to accelerate their plans to sell additional tier one (AT1) bonds in the coming weeks, but a number of recent new issues have been too tightly priced to excite some market specialists.

Fund managers were looking into €6.5bn of live high yield bond and loan deals in the European leveraged finance markets on Wednesday. Those speaking to GlobalCapital were happy to see that spreads are slightly widening across ratings from last year’s historic lows.

Opinion is shifting as to whether the European Central Bank will end quantitative easing this year, with poorer economic data perhaps forcing the rate setter’s hand into extending the programme.

JP Morgan has appointed Marta Arteaga to its EMEA equity capital markets execution team as a vice-president.

Canadian covered bonds are set to become even more attractive under the country’s newly published bail-in regulations, delegates heard at the European Covered Bond Council’s 27th plenary session held in Vancouver on Wednesday. If immigration policy remains unchanged, there will be limited scope for a correction in Canadian house prices.