Europe

Unione di Banche Italiane was looking to become just the second Italian lender to issue non-preferred debt on Thursday, and it was set to pay a hefty new issue concession.

Ukrainian steel and mining company Metinvest sold its dual tranche five and eight year bond on Wednesday, but the thin oversubscription and pricing at the wide end of final price guidance have suggested a meagre appetite for hairier bits of emerging market debt.

Deutsche Pfandbriefbank is lining up to issue its first additional tier one bond, which would give primary market investors their first chance to gain AT1 exposure to a German bank in close to three years.

Turkcell İletişim Hizmetleri, the largest mobile operator in Turkey, has released initial price guidance for its 10 year dollar benchmark.

Euro PP market players are growing confident that widening spreads and growing volatility in the unrated and high yield public bond markets will drive an increase in the average deal size in their market in the coming six months.

Czech investment fund PPF is in the market to syndicate a €3.025bn loan to fund the acquisition of Norwegian telecoms group Telenor’s central eastern European business. The loan is split into two term loans and a revolving credit facility.

The IPO of Belgian bank Belfius has been delayed, likely until the autumn, as the company is still waiting for the go-ahead from the Belgian government to prepare the sale prospectus.

ABN Amro is preparing to sell its third green senior unsecured bond, joining Credit Suisse in the pipeline for socially responsible deals.

Romanian supermarket chain Profi is in talks with banks to add to its €305m loan, signed in March last year.

Sterling seemed to be the only game in town this week. Two SSA issuers printed in the currency on Wednesday, taking advantage of a favourable basis swap.

European leveraged finance investors are expecting lower deal volumes and wider spreads in the primary market after an exceptionally busy and expensive 2017.

A pair of gatecrashers have burst into Temenos’ £1.4bn bid for UK trading technology firm Fidessa, with one party offering a 5% premium to the existing deal from the Swiss banking software company.