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HSBC entered Europe’s top three in the equity-linked league tables in 2019, capping a multi-year rise with a series of firsts and eye-catching deals.

In this round-up, China will block foreigners from entering the country starting Saturday, residents of Hubei are allowed to leave the province after two months of being under lockdown and the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission is setting up a holding company to manage state-owned asset management companies.

For years, the best sovereign issuers in the emerging markets would boast that their latest bond deal showed how much the mystical “international financial community” supported the current administration’s macroeconomic management. And EM investors would pretend that buying the stuff was to have the map to Treasure Island.

‘Corona bonds’ have been talked up so much that the EU risks underwhelming the market by failing to act. It has become a question of political solidarity within the region, not simply one of debt management.

Dear reader, These are extraordinary times for global capital markets as the world reels from the spread of Covid-19.

Chinese bond issuers are confronting a chaotic market at the moment: onshore yields for state-owned enterprises have fallen to historic lows, offshore yields have ballooned and more than 50 issuers have been forced to cancel deals this month. Rebecca Feng and Addison Gong report.

Life as we know it in Hong Kong is over.

US president Donald Trump looks unable to lead a global response to the health and economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, but the dollar is unchallenged as the global safe haven in times of crisis. This contradiction is destabilising.

Short selling bans in several European countries have led to fears that regulators may move to shut down stock markets altogether if the turbulence caused by the spread of Covid-19 worsens further, but this would be a serious mistake.

There is a plan to rescue the US economy with a $500bn corporate bailout. At the time of writing, that plan is held up in the US Senate. While the country's president Donald Trump is griping about the delay, it’s a fight worth having. The Republican Party's proposal is woefully short on oversight.

Extraordinary support measures from central banks across the world include an element of corporate lending, but all the schemes announced so far target SMEs, and companies rated BBB- and above. That leaves a gaping hole in the rescue net, which the authorities must fill.

These are testing times for corporations around the world as they find ways to navigate the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on their businesses and debt profiles. Now more than ever, transparency from borrowers is absolutely key.