Germany

Deutsche Pfandbriefbank (Pbb) had been spying a chance to tap the sterling market since August for an inaugural senior transaction. The German bank found a good window this week and, even though it attracted only just enough orders to launch the £250m preferred senior bond, a banker on the deal said the trade "ticked all the boxes".

KfW returned to Polish zloty issuance last Friday after a 13 year absence from the market, as it looks to tap new sources of capital.

Shares in CTS Eventim, the German ticketing and live events company, plunged more than 8% on Thursday after Klaus-Peter Schulenberg, its billionaire founder and CEO, sold €218.4m of stock.

KfW’s first €STR bond hit the market on Wednesday. Although the German agency managed a tighter price than EIB’s first note in the format, it was not able to drum up the same level of demand.

Gewobag, the A2/A+ rated German housing company, launched the first Schuldschein with a Euribor floor set below zero last week. Market participants said more will follow in 2020.

Dekabank was quick to launch a preferred senior bond on Thursday, garnering 2.5 times the demand it needed for its €500m print by mid-morning in London. The German lender only ended up paying a small new issue premium to its investors.

Demand for ground-breaking covered bonds issued on Wednesday by Deutsche Bank and Danish Ships Finance was adequate but both required hefty premiums — illustrating a higher degree of investor caution than had been expected.

KfW has mandated banks for its first €STR transaction as it looks to become the third public sector borrower to sell a bond linked to the new euro risk-free rate.

Danish Ships Finance, Natixis Pfandbriefbank and Raiffeisen Bank International will keep the primary market busy with deals and roadshows this week. But the main focus will be on the size and spread that Deutsche Bank achieves for its innovative debut structured conditional pass through (CPT) covered bond that will be launched imminently.

Intesa Sanpaolo and Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen (Helaba) gave investors the chance to put money into preferred senior paper on Tuesday. Both trades attracted chunky order books and gave away a small new issue premium.

HVB, the German subsidiary of UniCredit, on Tuesday attracted one of the highest orders books for a €1bn covered bond from a core European bank in the last six months. It was able to tighten the pricing gap by 4bp to a competing deal issued by OP Mortgage Bank.

The covered bond market was on strong form at the beginning of the week, with Austria’s Volksbank Wien extending its covered bond curve with its second ever trade, which it priced flat to fair value.