Europe

Acadia Healthcare, the US psychiatric and behavioural health care provider, has agreed to buy UK peer the Priory Group from Advent International for around £1.5bn.

Caisse Francaise De Financement Local (CAFFIL) raised €1.5bn in the covered bond market on Tuesday with a two tranche public sector-backed deal. The higher yielding €500m 15 year tranche was subscribed, but the €1bn six year was not.

Lloyds opened the sterling covered bond market on Tuesday with a three year floating rate bond. The deal encouraged another issuer to look to tap the market with the same instrument.

Keval Shah has been promoted to head of bond syndicate at Lloyds Bank, GlobalCapital understands.

Barclays has offered to buy back up to £7.5bn of senior unsecured notes, and could shortly be in the market with fresh holdco debt as it looks to satisfy regulatory capital requirements.

Abengoa, the Spanish construction and renewable energy group that is in pre-insolvency proceedings, signed a €106m loan on December 24 to pay employees' December wages, but will need more cash this month to avoid a full insolvency filing.

Credit Suisse and UBS dominated Dealogic’s European FIG bookrunner rankings for 2015, helped by their issuer parents cranking up their issuance of holdco and capital instruments.

Any hopes among European credit traders of easing back into 2016 with a peaceful first week were shattered from the outset on Monday, as spreads gapped wider due to China’s stock market woes and oil price volatility arising from Saudi Arabia’s new stand-off with Iran.

The International Swaps and Derivatives Association has accepted a request from investors to rule on whether Portugal’s Novo Banco has triggered a government intervention credit event.

Bank Nederlandse Gemeenten is the solitary public sector borrower in the euro market so far this year, with a public holiday across much of Europe likely to limit issuance in the currency this week.

Eurozone quantitative easing may benefit new high yield issuance less than it will help other primary debt markets, Standard & Poor’s said in its European corporate credit outlook for 2016 on Monday. Nevertheless, market participants remain hopeful.

Electra Partners and Patron Capital have agreed to buy Grainger Retirement Solutions, the home reversion equity release business of Grainger plc, for £325m.