Germany

Patrick Steeg is stepping up to be head of debt capital markets at Landesbank Baden-Württemberg, with Günter Gleumes moving to be head of corporate sales and securitisation, The Cover understands.

Berlin Hypothekenbank (BHH) struggled to sell a €1bn mortgage Pfandbrief at its target spread after opening books at the wide end of initial price thoughts, at 1bp through mid-swaps, on Monday. The tight level surprised bankers, due to the recent decreasing bid for core names offering slim yields and even slimmer premiums.

Excellent funding conditions drew more covered bond issuers from core Europe to the market this week, with impressive deals done at aggressive spread levels. But bankers cautioned that new issue premiums may have to rise with juicy spreads from peripheral Europe drawing investors’ gaze.

Deutsche Pfandbriefbank (Pbb) was back in more familiar territory on Wednesday as it launched its first Pfandbrief of 2013, having been busy setting up a new senior unsecured curve in recent months.

Deutsche Genossenschafts-Hypothekenbank was in the Pfandbrief market for the first time in more than six years on Tuesday, selling a €500m seven year that followed other German deals this month in hugging the mid-swaps level.

Deutsche Genossenschafts-Hypothekenbank has hired banks for a mortgage Pfandbrief, which is pencilled in for Tuesday. It may have company from Commerzbank, which The Cover understands is also eyeing Tuesday for Europe’s first ever SME structured covered bond.

Deutsche Hypothekenbank was set to price a €500m five year mortgage backed Pfandbrief early on Tuesday afternoon from an order book of close to €600m. The deal was modestly oversubscribed, compared with Aareal Bank’s five year on Monday, but it was an improvement on Deutsche Hypo’s previous outing last September.

Aareal Bank has issued the first Pfandbrief of the year, attracting a comfortably oversubscribed book and pricing flat to its curve. Despite the appetite for high yielding risk, the deal showed that there is still plenty of appetite for core covered bonds, ­even if they are backed a high proportion of commercial loans from outside Germany.

Time is running out for borrowers yet to make programme changes in advance of Standard & Poor’s new counterparty criteria, which comes into force in early January. The rating agency has placed another six programmes on review for downgrade, and warned there could be others.

After nearly 30 years with Bayerische Landesbank (BayerLB), Peter Mittermayer, head of covered bond syndicate, will retire at the end of this week.

This week Commerzbank unveiled a highly rated SME structured covered bond. It offers tremendous hope for the revival of the European economy, as it suggests banks have a way of financing this crucial sector with capital market funding.

The development of the covered bond market took a leap forward this week when Moody’s and Fitch assigned a provisional double A rating to Commerzbank’s €5bn SME-backed structured covered bond programme.