Europe

Commerzbank has outperformed expectations by reporting a net profit in the first quarter of the year — even accounting for a large restructuring charge — as the German lender trims its workforce and sharpens its focus on the domestic market and German clients.

French cloud computing company OVHcloud has mandated banks for its upcoming initial public offering on Euronext Paris.

BCS Global Markets, the investment services division of Russia’s largest independent broker, has hired a new treasurer.

Danske Bank set a careful foot into the Reg S dollar additional tier one market this week, in the wake of a difficult trading session for global equities.

Virgin Money UK was six times subscribed for a tightly priced tier two in the sterling market on Wednesday, despite having offered a very similar deal to investors last September.

UniCredit’s German subsidiary, HVB, enjoyed a stunning investor reception for its negative yielding eight year Pfandbrief that was issued on Wednesday, thanks to the lack of supply this year, the small but rare premium on offer and the superb market conditions.

Shares in Montana Aerospace, the Swiss-Austrian aerospace company, took to the skies on Wednesday morning, the company’s first day of trading on the Swiss SIX Exchange following its IPO.

Emerging market portfolio managers say that their confidence in buying assets has been restored now that US Treasury yields have stopped racing upwards. But although they say they have cash to splash, some still believe valuations are toppy.

This week, Antares Vision, the Italian technology company, has completed a large share sale on the Italian stock exchange which will act as a re-IPO.

The IPO of Pepco, the retail conglomerate, is due to be priced at Z40, valuing the company at Z23bn (€5.07bn) when it begins trading on the Warsaw Stock Exchange later this month.

Permanent TSB added to a recent run of Irish bank supply on Wednesday, tapping into strong investor demand with a new tier two in the euro market.

Safestore, the UK listed self-storage company, has issued £150m-equivalent of US private placement debt.