Europe

The UK’s Royal Mint has partnered with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Group to create a blockchain-based digital platform for trading gold, in an attempt to cut costs for investors and improve perceptions of the asset class.

Italy’s bond yields hit their highest levels at auction since June 2015 at the country’s final bond sale before Sunday's constitutional reform referendum that could lead to the resignation of prime minister Matteo Renzi.

Morpho leads the way for European leveraged loan issuance this week, the largest of five deals in the market and the largest euro leveraged buyout of the year by some distance.

The European Central Bank is expected to announce a six month extension of its Covered Bond Purchase Programme when it meets on December 8. However, as the programme may end after that, credit curves could steepen and spreads could widen next year. GlobalCapital spoke to a number of funding officials and other bankers to gauge their views on the topic.

The credit arms of private equity firms CVC and EQT have joined efforts to provide Paymentsense, the UK card payment services firm, with a refinancing unitranche facility — a form of financing that could increase next year.

BPCE and Morgan Stanley chose different currencies for their dual tranche bond issues on Tuesday, as they tested investor appetite at a late stage and difficult period in the year.

Since Qatar National Bank completed its acquisition of Turkey’s Finansbank this year, the acquired bank has been able to hold pricing on its annual syndicated loan steady — but most of its country’s other banks are paying more for deals this year, as lenders’ dollar funding costs have risen and the threat of downgrades hangs over Turkey.

After several weeks of discussions with investors Ceska Telekomunikacni Infrastruktura (CETIN) finally hit the screens with a new bond on Tuesday – though it had to sweeten the deal with a coupon step-up – and had pulled in over €1.4bn of orders by mid-morning.

Standard Chartered has outlined the next stage in its plans to cut costs and reorganise the bank in a recent memo to staff. The strategy puts relationship managers at the centre of the corporate banking team under Paul Skelton, who starts at the bank in December, but the changes are expected to lead to job cuts.

The IPO of Arcus, the Norwegian distiller owned by private equity group Ratos, is multiple times covered within its revised price range.

DNA, one of Finland’s largest telecommunications companies, has revised the price range for its Helsinki IPO to the lower middle end of its initial range, having gathered a book two thirds made up of foreign investors.

Severn Trent issued the first corporate deal for a month into the sterling market bond market on Monday as it tapped investors for a 15 year transaction.