Europe

Finnvera took its first ever billion sized bite of a core currency bond on Tuesday, enticing investors with a juicy pick-up over its sovereign’s curve.

Pentair, the UK-headquartered maker of fluid and thermal systems, priced a €500m bond in line with initial price thoughts on Monday, after deciding to plough ahead with its funding plans despite a difficult market.

Natixis has promoted its former head of aviation, export and infrastructure finance in the Americas to a global role.

Sanofi, the French pharmaceutical company, priced a €2bn three tranche bond on Monday — a large slice of the day’s activity as issuers kept up strong supply in a heavy-feeling European corporate bond market.

Société Générale has appointed a new chief executive officer of SocGen Americas and chosen a new head of global finance for United Kingdom.

Deutsche Kreditbank just managed to raise €500m of eight year funding on Tuesday with a public sector pfandbrief. The transaction only just managed to get over the finishing line but in the current ‘dull and shaky’ market conditions, this was good enough.

Four covered bonds have been issued so far this week, but only one deal from Sparebanken Vest Boligkreditt was comfortably oversubscribed. The choice of tenor, deal size and generous spread ensured a solid reception, despite tough market conditions — which Credit Mutuel Arkea will face on Wednesday when it is expected to opens books for another covered bond.

Investors placed orders of over €3.5bn for ABN Amro’s long awaited debt additional tier one offering on Tuesday, proving the resilience of that asset class in what is once again a difficult market.

Spain kicked off a busy week for the eurozone periphery with a bill sale where the sovereign’s borrowing costs repeated their pattern for much of this year by bumping around 0%.

The first trades in Italian punto di scambio virtuale (PSV, or virtual trading point) futures contracts have taken place on Intercontinental Exchange’s ICE Endex platform.

Banco Popolare struggled to sell €500m of three year debt on Monday as there is no longer a natural investor base for the product. Spreads must widen or these banks will find their long term funding options limited.

The Republic of Latvia has mandated DNB, HSBC and Natixis to arrange a 10 year euro denominated benchmark bond, its first since the start of ECB sovereign bond buying.