Germany

Food retailer Jumbo, a privately owned supermarket chain with shops in Belgium and the Netherlands, has launched an inaugural Schuldschein.

Greece and the Flemish Community are preparing to sell syndicated bonds at the long end of the euro curve following a strong reception for France with the sale of its second green OAT on Tuesday.

Europe’s crop of pre-Easter IPOs are moving swiftly thorough the pipeline and investors are engaging with deals after an improvement in risk sentiment in line with recovering secondary markets and several successful block trades last week.

Berlin Hyp’s six year green Pfandbrief and Bawag’s 20 year vanilla covered bond attracted strong demand on Tuesday reflecting the paucity of supply, a steadier rates outlook, the rare tenors on offer and, in Berlin Hyp’s case, the green collateral. At the same time VUB mandated leads for a five year covered bond, the first from Slovakia this year.

Berlin Hyp mandated leads for a rare green Pfandbrief on Monday. The deal has emerged amid a dearth of covered bond supply so far this year and takes advantage of a recent stabilisation in yields at higher levels.

Renault, the French car company, has raised €1.14bn from a sale of shares in German rival Daimler, the parent of Mercedes-Benz. The French firm will use the proceeds to reduce debts.

NRW.Bank became the latest non-UK public sector borrower to hit the sterling market this week, taking advantage of the attractive funding cost in the currency versus euros and US dollars.

The Climate Bonds Initiative has said the evidence for price benefits of green bonds is becoming "increasingly visible". Though proof of a pricing advantage in covered bonds is limited, it was on display this week when Crédit Agricole Italia issued is first green covered bond and more generally, the product attracts a wider investor base.

The secondary Schuldschein market, typically something of a backwater, has become a torrent of activity and is now busier than the product’s primary market, according to several sources, as banks rush to buy assets ahead of an ECB deadline for cheap funding on March 31. However, there are fewer banks deleveraging from their risk-weighted assets, and many more buyers than sellers.

Trading levels given are bid-side spreads versus mid-swaps and/or an underlying benchmark and bid-yields from the close of business on Monday, March 8. The source for secondary trading levels is ICE Data Services.

Oldenburgisch Landesbank priced its debut publicly distributed mortgage Pfandbrief on Tuesday, attracting enough demand to ensure the deal size was increased to the top end of the expected range, even as the spread was tightened. But a deterioration in market conditions was blamed for its low subscription ratio.

Vantage Towers, the telecoms towers division of Vodafone, has announced the price range for its IPO on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and secured cornerstone orders for almost half of the deal size. The deal is smaller than many had expected, as rising bond yields continues to impact wider equity markets.