Europe

Ratings agency Moody’s has said that it expects a high level of refinancing of hybrids by utilities in 2018, following €4.2bn of hybrids issued by the sector in 2017.

Promsvyazbank, Russia’s ninth largest bank by assets, has become the third major Russian private bank this year to be bailed out by the Bank of Russia.

Italian sovereign green bond issuance could be scuppered by risk monitoring difficulties arising from the regional complexities of the country.

As bankers look under the Christmas trees of the European IG corporate bond markets for 2018, the shapes and sizes are all very predictable. A year dominated by a lack of surprises, particularly compared with previous years, is coming to a close in similar fashion.

Senior bonds subordinated to other senior liabilities will no longer be eligible as collateral when financial institutions borrow from the European Central Bank (ECB), the organisation has announced.

Hong Kong-listed China Mengniu Dairy has won regulatory approval to tap the Panda bond market for the first time, and is seeking as much as Rmb15bn ($226.7m) from short and medium term notes.

UK and Chinese officials press ahead with London-Shanghai Stock Connect, China tops the October league table of foreign holders of US Treasuries, and Bank of China opens a new branch in Qatar.

Wohnungsbaugesellschaft Magdeburg, a German housing company owned by the city of Magdeburg, has issued a Schuldschein with tenors above the usual maximum threshold of 10 years.

The travails of Steinhoff International, the embattled South African retail holding company, deepened today as Christo Wiese, the entrepreneur who has built up the business, resigned as chairman.

Conviviality, the UK alcohol distributor that owns Bargain Booze and Wine Rack, has completed a £30m share sale to finance its takeover of a portfolio of stores from WS Retail, a division of Palmer & Harvey, the UK wholesaler that fell into administration in November.

Maria Cannata of the Italian Tesoro, one of the sovereign bond market’s best known and longest serving funding heads, is to retire, just after the new year.

British and Chinese officials consider launching a bond link between the two countries, Hong Kong and National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) sign agreement to promote the city’s participation in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and Man Group sets up the first fund under its private fund management (PFM) licence.