Europe

Lloyds Development Capital, the private equity arm of Lloyds Bank, has sold a chunk of its stake in Yorkshire-based games developer Team17 after the stock hit an all-time high due to a huge increase in the volume of gamers during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Republic of Lithuania joined the ranks of top tier emerging markets issuers proving their access to bond markets in the teeth of the coronavirus pandemic on Tuesday, as it broke its issuance record with a €2bn dual tranche trade.

Rabobank has become the first Dutch bank to enter the credit markets in over two months, after launching a non-preferred senior bond on Wednesday. The issuer tacked on a call option, which bankers say are cheap to deliver in the market at the moment.

Fitch Ratings has lowered Italy’s credit rating one notch to BBB- on Tuesday night, making the move more than two months ahead of its scheduled review in July.

Barclays’ revenue from markets in the first quarter was its best ever, the bank said, but another large figure overshadowed this: credit provisions across the group came in at more than double the consensus estimate, on the basis of macroeconomic assumptions seen as conservative and a £300m hit from low oil prices.

Barclays saw its common equity tier one capital ratio fall 70bp amid balance sheet growth in the first quarter, but analysts suggest the bank should be able to maintain enough capital to carry on paying additional tier one coupons this year.

The Schuldschein market is expected to reopen in a matter of days, but arrangers will face a changed market and will have to adapt to the new corporate lending landscape created by the coronavirus pandemic.

The European Central Bank could take action to counter the rise in the level of Euribor at its meeting on Thursday by either cutting its deposit rate or buying commercial paper from financial institutions to ease interbank lending, according to analysts.

In contrast to what analysts had expected before its first quarter results, Deutsche Bank reckons its investment bank will outperform last year’s revenue figures in 2020. However, its fixed income and currencies sales and trading business did not match peers’ revenue growth in the first quarter.

Banco Santander wasted no time in heading to the non-preferred senior market this week, with investors responding well to the way in which European banks have been dealing with the coronavirus pandemic in their first quarter results.

Hiscox, the London-listed insurance and reinsurance company, is exploring the idea of raising equity to combat uncertainty surrounding the impact of the coronavirus as premiums, particularly in the US, harden.

The ECB has, despite an early gaffe, decided that it is its job to close spreads after all — and for the most part, it is excelling in its task. But its attention is focused on the bond market and, as a result, those who rely on the money markets for short term funding are suffering.