Germany

The IPO of PharmaSGP, the German manufacture of natural drugs and medicines, was a smaller affair than had been originally envisaged by the sellers, after the return of equity market volatility meant that the deal had to be priced at the bottom of the range.

Robert Bosch has joined a rare club to issue €2bn-plus in a single Schuldschein. The A+ rated German car parts supplier re-opened the market with an initial target of €500m. Bankers say the final result is an illustration of the depth of the market for well-rated corporates.

Lenders to Wirecard, the embattled German payments company, will have to decide whether to call in its €1.75bn syndicated loan, after its auditor EY refused to sign off its 2019 accounts, which the company announced on Thursday, sending its share price into a spiral. Markus Braun, the company's CEO, resigned on Friday.

DZ Hyp managed to attract a healthy order book for a €1bn eight year deal issued on Wednesday, a day before a more narrowly subscribed €1bn 10 year from UniCredit’s German subsidiary, HVB.

Deals issued on Thursday by SR Boligkreditt and UniCredit Germany (HVB) illustrated that investor demand is skewed to bonds that offer a pick-up, no matter how small.

Stephan Gimpel is leaving Citi to pursue an opportunity in fintech, after 14 years in the US bank’s debt capital markets business.

The European Investment Bank and the State of Brandenburg have mandated banks to bring euro deals on Thursday, in what has been an extremely thin week for supply with issuers well funded and some weakness in secondaries.

Restructured German ship lender, Hamburg Commercial Bank, has announced a tender offer for covered bonds on Wednesday. At the same time, Berlin Hyp (BHH) announced that it had bought almost €300m Pfandbrief in a recent tender which it plans to refinance with a longer dated deal.

DZ Hyp managed to raise €1bn of eight year Pfandbrief funding flat to its curve on Wednesday. The deal contrasted with one from Axa Banque SFH, which paid a much larger premium for a €500m 15 year, possibly due to far higher French supply this year and confusion with Axa Banque Europe SCF, which has already entered the market four times this year.

Sovereign, supranational and agency bond issuers are mobilising their resources to support the fight against Covid-19. The below table details the bonds they have issued, specifically in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Axa Banque SFH mandated leads on Tuesday for its first deal of the year, a €500m 15 year, while DZ Hyp has appointed leads for a benchmark eight year Pfandbrief.

Kinnevik, the Swedish investment company, sold a 4.4% stake in German e-commerce company Zalando on Monday night with investors pouring into the trade after the US Federal Reserve boosted secondary markets.