Europe

Buried in a hay bale of legal documentation last week, the European Union’s final draft of margin rules for uncleared swaps contained a joke that is sure to needle major banks. The question is whether anyone, including regulators, will still be able to smile at it when the September 1 deadline passes.

KommuneKredit is set to print a seven year euro deal on Wednesday, following a debut euro benchmark from Municipality Finance in the form of a €1bn October 2021 on Tuesday.

Italy will bring the next line of its domestic inflation linked BTP Italia product in three weeks, sticking with a similar process to its last issue.

The right way to keep banks off the Russia deal is adding Russia to official US and EU sanctions lists. Having words with banks through back channels opens up a grey area ripe for misinterpretation. It’s only fair to everyone involved to sanction the sovereign or let it do the deal.

UniCredit has announced a series of changes to its international wholesale businesses, including establishing a new UK coverage business.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch has hired Fredrik Reinfeldt, the former prime minister of Sweden, as senior advisor to its EMEA business.

Delta Lloyd’s largest shareholder continues to oppose the Dutch insurance company’s planned rights issue, which it said on Monday was “massively dilutive” and would “unnecessarily overcapitalise the company at the expense of shareholders”.

Santander brought peripheral bank capital back to the FIG market on Tuesday, as the recent rally showed little sign of wearing off following last week’s European Central Bank meeting.

Royal Bank of Scotland returned to the market for its first holding company senior issue in nearly two years, raising €1.5bn in seven year debt as spreads across the asset class continue to perform strongly.

Deutsche Bank launched a defensive three year senior trade on Tuesday, as the lender looked to make its way back to the public debt market after a tumultuous start to the year.

Sappi Papier, the Austrian-South African paper manufacturer, is seeking to issue €350m of secured notes to refinance its 2021 dollar bond, in a European high yield market that has brought forward its post-Easter pipeline of deals.

Bulgaria marked its capital markets coming of age on Monday after timing its first intraday execution of a Eurobond to perfection. The €1.994bn note left the country fully funded for the year.