Europe

Private equity firm Advent International has agreed to buy UK electronics company Laird for around £1bn, in a purchase that will be financed with debt.

KBC became the first Belgium bank to issue a covered bond this year, attracting moderate demand despite a seemingly generous new issue premium.

A private debt investment specialist at Pricoa Capital Group is joining the European Central Bank.

When the equity markets had a severe wobble in the first half of February, corporate bonds spreads widened, but only marginally compared the wild swings seen in the equity markets. Spreads are still at some of the lowest levels ever seen. Issuers would do well to remember that in coming months.

Finnish residential property developer Kojamo and French care home operator Orpea added to the geographical diversity of the property company corporate bonds sold this week with a €500m seven year deal, while frequent issuer RCI Banque sold a dual tranche offering

Santander announced a mandate for an additional tier one (AT1) bond in euros on Thursday, in what could be the first public deal in the format since markets sold off in February.

Insurance firm Chubb brought two tranches of senior debt to the market on Thursday, to raise €1.8bn in its first ever euro deal.

The German Laender owners of HSH Nordbank sold the bank this week in a move that bodes well for the performance of its Pfandbriefe and may improve its market access, said analysts at Commerzbank.

Nationwide Building Society sold the UK’s first ever non-preferred senior instrument on Thursday, having removed the contractual barriers to issuing in the format by altering the terms of three of its outstanding tier two bonds.

Yapi Kredi has privately placed Turkish mortgage backed covered bonds to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and Clean Technology Fund (CTF) to promote energy saving improvements in the financial sector.

D Carnegie & Co, Sweden's largest listed residential property developer, is raising capital through a rights issue to expand is investment and development opportunities.

Slovenia printed €1.25bn by way of a triple tranche euro bond tap on Wednesday from a book of €4bn, paying small new issue premiums. Marjan Divjak, director general in Slovenia’s Ministry of Finance, said that the country is “more or less done” in the international bond markets for the year.