Europe

Singapore-based aircraft leasing company Avation has obtained a green loan to support its purchase of aircraft.

A veteran equity capital markets banker at ING is stepping down from his role in the equity capital markets division, after two decades at the firm.

NatWest Markets is searching for a new chief executive and chief financial officer, after Chris Marks and Richard Place stepped down from those roles.

Italian football club Juventus has finished its €300m rights issue, which is intended to strengthen its balance sheet after an annual loss in 2018.

Enagas, the Spanish natural gas transmission company, raised €500m of new capital market on Wednesday night to help fund its acquisition of a stake in US firm Tallgrass Energy.

Frank Czichowski, KfW’s treasurer for more than 15 years, will be retiring in 2020. KfW has announced that it will hire the former treasurer of another German agency as his replacement.

Italy and the EU provoked indignation this week, when Italy approved the use of public money to rescue Banca Popolare di Bari, a small regional lender faltering under the weight of bad loans. The decision looks likely to join a long list of cases when European Union rules designed to prevent government bank bail-outs have proved toothless, prompting market participants to think the EU has capitulated.

Southpaw takes a sideways look at some of the big events that defined investment banking in 2019.

Ipreo, whose system is used by banks, especially in Europe, for syndicating new bond issues, has reached out to two potential rivals about possibilities to collaborate. This suggests IHS Markit, which owns Ipreo, believes the alternative platforms could make headway.

The University of York has raised £160m ($209m) to fund student accommodation via US private placements, becoming the fourth university to enter the market this year.

The shine from last week’s Conservative Party win in the UK general election has worn off in the UK Gilts market, due, in part, to fears that the country may crash out the European Union without a trade deal in place.

Equity capital markets are fully firing again at the end of 2019, after a stressful year, but bankers hoping for a more fruitful 2020 are acutely conscious that most of their hopes are riding on the second quarter window, and that an ugly trinity of political risks is threatening the market. Sam Kerr reports.