Europe

The junior debt of Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena rallied strongly on Wednesday on reports the Italian government was preparing to buy €2bn of subordinated bonds from retail investors, support which could potentially avoid the European Commission’s onerous state aid rules.

In yet another takeover funded entirely in the loan market, GoDaddy, the US internet domain registrar, is acquiring peer Host Europe Group (HEG) from private equity firm Cinven and raising dollar leveraged loans for the deal.

The focus was firmly on Italy this week. Despite the government’s failure to secure support for constitutional reform and the resignation of prime minister Matteo Renzi, financial bonds rallied across the board as shorts were covered and new risk was added.

In a rare win for the high yield bond market — which has repeatedly lost out to leveraged loans for new buyout financings this year — Schustermann & Borenstein, the German fashion retailer, on Monday began roadshowing a €260m bond to fund its acquisition by Permira.

Green bonds have been a hot topic for several years now, but sovereign issuers have been slow to step up to the plate. Until now. Poland is on the road for a euro-denominated green bond and is meeting investors in London this week.

Banca Monte dei Paschi’s shares leapt 7% on Wednesday morning, on growing hopes that a way will be found for the Italian state to strengthen its balance sheet, enabling it to achieve a €5bn capital raising demanded by the European Central Bank and avoid a bail-in.

All central counterparties, by their nature, are systemically important. But some are more systemic than others. Regulators should adopt a more tiered, and more technological approach to CCP recovery and resolution.

The market was already expecting that the European Central Bank would announce an extension to quantitative easing — and be tight-lipped on tapering — at its next governing council meeting on Thursday. The resignation of Italy's prime minister Matteo Renzi following defeat in a constitutional referendum on Sunday now means the central bank has little choice but to offer some more easing.

Tonight, Nordic Nanovector, the Norwegian developer of radio-immunotherapeutics for haematological cancers, is raising Nkr527m ($63m) to finance clinical trials, by placing new shares with institutional investors.

The first ever sovereign green bond looks set to be issued by Poland — a coal-reliant nation that was once one of the most outspoken opponents of the UN’s Paris Agreement. Despite incredulity from green finance experts, the deal is an important step for green financing. It raises the environmental agenda within Poland, and offers a firmer commitment to green financing than displayed by any other sovereign so far.

Aroundtown Property Holdings, the German residential property company, nipped in before year end to make an opportunistic grab for €500m from the European corporate bond market on Tuesday.

Business travel group Carlson is running a roadshow for what could be the European high yield market's last deal of the year as it aims to refinance its debt with a three tranche bond.