Europe

Aktia Bank has agreed to buy the remainder of its subsidiary, Aktia Real Estate Mortgage Bank (Aktia REMB), by 2017. As a result Finland’s savings banks will refinance their own mortgages by establishing a new covered bond issuing institution, expected to be called SP Mortgage Bank, which will start issuing from next year.

Singapore-listed Frasers Centrepoint (FCL) has signed a £300m ($468.5m) five year acquisition loan via Frasers Hospitality UK Holdings.

In this round-up, Moscow Exchange sees drop in RMB swap and spot trading in September, RMB denominated trade settlement reaches new record in Q3 2015, Taiwan RMB deposits see slight fall in September, HKEx plans launch of new RMB metal contracts, and BAML finds investor sentiment improved on China.

Deezer, the French music streaming service, opened the book for its IPO on Thursday morning, as the autumn’s busy season of flotations continues to produce successes, failures and deals that get done at weakened terms.

European credit index curve trading came into focus this week with some traders and strategists looking to take advantage of what they describe as an anomaly in iTraxx Europe flatness between the five year point and longer tenors.

Uncertainty over the make-up of the Portuguese government following an inconclusive election is playing havoc with the sovereign’s yields — but analysts warned it is not alone in suffering from potential political risk.

Matalan’s credit spreads surged wider this week and put pressure on other European retailers after the company dropped an earnings bombshell.

A Berlin Hyp €500m five year was the success story of covered bonds issued this week from banks in the eurozone, standing out among deals that also included bonds from Caisse Francaise De Financement Local (Caffil) and Raiffeisenlandesbank Niederösterreich-Wien (RLB-NW).

Guarantor: Republic of Austria

Senior SSA bankers are fretting that situations such as this week's clash between two Dutch agencies, which drove one of the pair to pull its deal, could become unavoidable, writes Craig McGlashan.

Garfunkelux, the German debt collection company, on Thursday issued £795m of notes in the first sizeable European high yield issue for three weeks. Market participants are now eager to see if other issuers finally follow in its steps.

Lithuania landed its longest, largest and lowest yielding deal ever in one fell swoop this week. But with the eurozone sovereign’s order book dominated by rates buyers rather than emerging market accounts, the deal has implications for Spain just as much as Slovenia.