Europe

Italy could move to ban banks’ sale of subordinated debt to retail investors, after bondholders suffered losses during the recent rescue of four failed lenders.

The loan market brought in the Christmas period in style at the Loan Syndicate Managers' Forum carol service last Wednesday. The singing was angelic, the mulled wine delicious and the sermon inspired some intriguing ideas.

UniCredit has appointed a new head of funding as part of an internal reorganisation.

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) London has become the lender’s third branch to issue a dollar bond in just over a month. This is part of the issuer’s plans to ramp up its presence in the international debt market with bankers expecting more of its branches to join in.

Pfandbriefbank, the Swiss mortgage lender, printed a dual tranche covered bond on Friday, drawing strong demand from local insurance companies and pension funds for the longer tranche of the deal.

Standard Chartered and Lonmin both begin new chapters in their stories today, with fresh capital from rights issues. In both cases the underwriting banks had to work for their fees, as the stories required explaining and each deal ended in a rump placement today.

Abengoa has triggered a failure to pay credit event, ISDA's Determinations Committee has ruled, only days after the company narrowly avoided a bankruptcy trigger for most credit default swaps.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) published its second set of proposals for gauging risk and capital charges under the Standardised Approach on Thursday. It has recommended dropping the debt service coverage (DSC) ratio for mortgages, in favour of relying on the Loan to Value (LTV) ratio, a decision that is expected to hit Dutch banks in particular.

Abengoa will come under further scrutiny from ISDA’s Determinations Committee on Friday, only days after the Spanish renewable energy company narrowly avoided triggering a bankruptcy credit event for most credit default swaps.

Russian steel company Evraz raised $750m from a bond that was printed tight to secondary levels on Thursday as it benefited from huge pent up demand for Russian corporate paper, even in a volatile market for metals and mining firms.

Vonovia

Any bankers who had written off December for corporate bond issuance were forced to eat their words on Wednesday, when Vonovia, the German housing company, issued a €3bn deal to finance its hostile takeover bid for Deutsche Wohnen, and won a book of over €7bn.