France

Six of the nine investment grade corporate new issues in the last week of February were announced with a three letter acronym that, while providing clarity, served to frustrate investors keen to see greater volumes of issuance. WNG stands for “will not grow” and this week told investors that the meagre sized deals would not be increased, irrespective of demand.

Finnish residential property developer Kojamo and French care home operator Orpea added to the geographical diversity of the property company corporate bonds sold this week with a €500m seven year deal, while frequent issuer RCI Banque sold a dual tranche offering

French commercial property company Carmila returned to the investment grade bond market after two years away and received a positive response from investors for its longest maturity to date.

Nexity, the French property developer, increased a convertible bond issue from €180m to €200m on Tuesday after receiving strong demand.

Société Générale has become the third bank to sell a five year non-preferred senior bond in floating rate format this week, but the French bank was unable to replicate the earlier successes of BBVA and Crédit Agricole.

Five new investment grade corporate bond deals were priced on Tuesday and, while pricing was competitive, none of the issuers allowed for any growth in the size of the deals as all five used a no-grow strategy.

Ivanhoé Cambridge, a Canadian property investor, sold a 4.2% stake in the French real estate investment trust Gecina on Monday night through an accelerated bookbuild run by Goldman Sachs.

French electrical equipment manufacturer Legrand used the same no-grow approach as on its previous two deals for the only new issue in the investment grade corporate bond market on Monday.

Assystem Technologies, a French engineering specialist owned by Ardian, is launching an add-on to its term loans to fund its purchase of German peer SQS Software Quality Systems, as merger and acquisition deals gain share in the leveraged loan market.

Investors did not require Crédit Agricole to pay any new issue premium for a €1.25bn offering of floating rate notes on Monday.

French property companies were in vogue this week as Icade sold its fourth corporate bond in two years, further extending its redemption profile, while Mercialys, the firm spun off from supermarkets group Casino, saw its sub-benchmark deal 2.5 times oversubscribed.

French car leasing company ALD printed its largest ever bond deal when it issued an €800m three year floating rate note this week, just three months after it had printed a similar but smaller deal. Chief financial officer Gilles Momper said the success of the deal was helped by the company’s IPO in 2017.