Germany

Standard & Poor’s placed Deutsche Postbank and subsidiary BHW Bausparkasse on CreditWatch Positive yesterday (Wednesday) because of Deutsche Bank’s intention to launch a public takeover bid for Deutsche Postbank.

At least three issuers are understood to be preparing to launch sizeable new covered bonds this week despite no deals being live on the first morning of a working week for the first time since the benchmark market reopened in August. Meanwhile, Dexia has announced spreads on three new benchmarks it is offering as part of an exchange.

Italy’s UBI Banca is today (Monday) following through with a seven year benchmark covered bond that it postponed in early summer, while the UK’s Nationwide Building Society is preparing to return to the market for the first time in three years and Deutsche Kreditbank has priced a Eu500m five year issue.

Banesto sized a five year cédulas hipotecarias at Eu600m yesterday (Thursday), taking Eu500m-plus covered bond issuance over the past five working days to Eu6.9bn. The Spanish issuer told The Cover that it was happy to have been able to issue successfully given how tricky the market has been.

Banesto showed the breadth of the covered bond market’s post-holiday reopening today (Thursday) with a Eu500m minimum five year cédulas hipotecarias. Meanwhile, Berlin Hyp priced a Eu500m issue in the face of low yields and spreads, while Bawag PSK finally emerged after announcing plans for a new issue back in May.

Covered bond supply eased today (Wednesday) after some Eu5.3bn of supply in the past three working days, with no new deals officially live and only DnB Nor, Erste and CRH wrapping up issuance yesterday afternoon.

Several foreign banks are closely investigating the possibility of opening a bank in Germany as a prelude to being able to issue Pfandbriefe, an endeavour that has become more attractive as a result of a funding advantage that the German covered bond product has gained over the past several years, Jens Tolckmitt, chief executive of the Association of German Pfandbrief Banks, told The Cover.

Fitch affirmed public sector-backed Pfandbriefe of Düsseldorfer Hypothekenbank at AAA yesterday (Tuesday), and removed them from Rating Watch Negative, following an annual review of the programme.

Issuers of six out of eight German mortgage Pfandbrief programmes that Fitch has had on negative review have provided detailed information about commercial mortgages in their cover pools that the rating agency requested, while two have not yet done so.

Bayerische Landesbank this (Wednesday) morning increased a 2014 public sector-backed Pfandbrief by Eu125m, becoming the second German issuer this week to price a tap through mid-swaps.

Münchener Hypothekenbank today (Monday) priced a Eu125m tap of a June 2015 benchmark mortgage Pfandbrief through mid-swaps.

Standard & Poor’s affirmed at AA+, on stable outlook, its rating of Deutsche Pfandbriefbank’s public sector-backed covered bonds on Friday and removed them from CreditWatch developing, where it had placed the covered bonds on 16 April after cutting them from AAA to AA+.