Europe

Ocado, the UK online grocery delivery platform, has raised £1bn by selling new shares and convertible bonds to fund its expansion plans amid a huge increase in demand for its services during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Robert Begbie has been appointed permanent chief executive of NatWest Markets, while David King, formerly head of MUFG Securities in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, becomes chief financial officer.

DZ Bank has signed up to the leading digital platform in the Schuldschein market, VC Trade. The German bank brings roughly 850 affiliated co-operative banks with it, which VC Trade’s founders believe is a game changer.

Unédic, the French unemployment agency, raised €4bn on Wednesday with a November 2029 social bond — its third under its new funding programme, which consists entirely of social bonds.

Two sovereigns pulled off successful deals on Wednesday, adding to the pile of syndicated European government bond issuance this week.

RAG Stiftung, the foundation set up by the German government to finance the discontinuation of coal mining in the Ruhr region, has issued a new €500m bond exchangeable into shares in speciality chemicals producer Evonik Industries, reopening the equity-linked bond new issue market in Europe after a lull since the end of May.

Tuesday proved to be another good night for UK primary equity capital raisings as Segro, the warehouse company, and insurance group Lancashire issued new shares.

Spain’s Ferrovial has sold a Z255m ($65m) chunk of its majority stake in Budimex, the Polish infrastructure construction company, via an accelerated bookbuild.

Deutsche Pfandbriefbank (PBB) has announced a tender offer for up to €250m covered bonds. Like Berlin Hyp, it has ensured that the affected deal will remain at benchmark size, but, in contrast to its peer, it is not planning a replacement issue.

Nationwide Building Society was able to tighten pricing by 50bp on the sale of an additional tier one bond on Wednesday, landing at a 5.75% coupon. The new issue will increase the bank’s leverage ratio, which went down last year amid a net redemption of tier one debt.

Members of the European Parliament have agreed on a series of temporary changes to the EU’s bank capital framework, including the introduction of a prudential filter for sovereign bond exposures. They stopped short of adopting amendments that would restrict the payment of additional tier one (AT1) coupons.

BPER Banca opened books for its inaugural sale of senior debt on Wednesday, giving investors their first chance to buy into a new issue from a second tier Italian bank during the Covid-19 pandemic.