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The Conservative Party’s strong win in Thursday’s general election is thrilling the UK’s financial sector and business world on Friday. Shares in UK banks and house builders — the very domestic sectors seen as most at risk of a hard Brexit or weak UK economy — have soared by 10% and more, while bond yields, especially for banks, have tightened sharply.

Capital markets are set for a surge of adrenalin on Friday after Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party secured a thumping majority in the UK’s general election, removing a huge weight of uncertainty about Brexit. With hopes also leaping of a US-China trade deal, government bonds, equities and sterling will all move in a risk-on direction on Friday — the only question is how far.

In this round-up, US president Donald Trump reportedly signed the phase one trade deal on Thursday, China concluded the Central Economic Work Conference and the Mainland government is set to turn Macau into a financial hub with new policies.

In this round-up, surging pork price drove China’s consumer price index (CPI) up again, new loans growth beats market expectation and the Mainland has revealed plans to shake up the country’s natural gas market.

In 2019, public sector borrowers led the way in the implementation of the new risk-free rates, with Sonia becoming a mainstream product. The question is whether Sofr and €STR can become as widely adopted as financial markets prepare for the end of Libor. Burhan Khadbai reports

With the resumption of the ECB’s quantitative easing programme, any hopes of a normalisation of European monetary policy receded further into the distance. With “lower for longer” firmly established as the consensus call, SSA borrowers and investors will have to settle in and learn to love the world they inhabit

The mighty dollar has lost its position as the default borrowing currency of the SSA market, and with a presidential election in 2020, that is unlikely to be reversed next year. However, that doesn’t mean that SSA borrowers can ignore it. Lewis McLellan reports

Sterling is set to take a bigger slice of the socially responsible bond market as a result of a number of initiatives, including reforms that are putting the pressure on UK pension funds to focus on environmental, social or governance (ESG) factors in their investments. Burhan Khadbai reports

The Swiss franc bond market has been able to withstand — just — the destructive forces of negative rates and yields and is looking forward to a new year in which green structures are set to blossom. Philip Moore reports

For public sector issuers, niche currency deals have offered attractive opportunities for arbitrage funding, with spreads into euros and dollars spurring on demand this year. Meanwhile, strong investor appetite for green paper has seen niche shoots blossom throughout 2019. Frank Jackman reports

Specialisation could define MTNs in 2020 as the market looks to differentiate itself from public markets where borrowers are easily executing large, cheap, liquid benchmarks. MTN dealers’ change of focus is shaking up the league tables. Frank Jackman reports

Reflecting on 2019, market participants may be surprised to see how things panned out. They went into the year expecting to ride out the end of QE and instead got a new purchase programme, funding scheme and rate cuts from the European Central Bank. This backdrop has given banks and insurers another good opportunity to move towards meeting their regulatory debt requirements, while testing new lows for their costs of funding and capital. GlobalCapital wanted to reward the deals that achieved stand-out results for issuers, in terms of pricing, execution and timing. The winners are presented here.