Europe

Sparebank 1 Boligkreditt and Aareal Bank issued well oversubscribed covered bonds on Wednesday, paying virtually no new issue concession. Both banks took advantage of enduring demand for five year tenors, while for Aareal the issue was cheaper than the European Central Bank’s term liquidity.

Slovenia reopened the bond market for central and eastern European issuers in style on Tuesday with a well received dual tranche euro deal.

3i has hired ING’s co-head of technology, media and telecoms mergers and acquisitions in a raft of additions to its private equity practice around the world.

KfW has invested more money in Frontclear, an organisation which offers guarantees to help clear emerging market and frontier market trades, boosting access to international interbank markets.

Agrokor, a Croatian retail, food and agriculture company, has abandoned its syndication of a three year term loan complaining of unfavourable terms.

DCM bankers will be hoping that central and eastern European issuers gathered in Vienna this week will have taken Slovenia’s Eurobond success as a sign that for CEE borrowers, the funding market is well and truly open once more.

Groupama exchanged a legacy tier one and a legacy tier two instrument for a new bullet tier two on Tuesday, as the French insurer looked to optimise its capital structure under Solvency II.

The thaw in Western equity investors' and banks' sentiment towards Russia continued this week as Detsky Mir, the toy retailer, announced plans for the first Russian IPO of 2017, to be led by an array of bulge bracket investment banks.

Lithuania plans to raise €1.75bn in the international markets this year, the last year to go "long in size", according to its deputy head of the state treasury, Gediminas Norkunas.

Every shade of corporate bond has been able to find a home with euro investors this week, despite investors’ mutterings about overly zealous spread tightening and continued scepticism about the long end.

Plans for the Chicago Board Options Exchange to link up with Bats Global Markets took a big step forward this week, with both sets of shareholders approving the exchanges’ merger and a motion to issue shares supporting the deal.

European Central Counterparty (EuroCCP) is to become the third central counterparty for clearing services on the SIX Swiss Exchange.