Greater China

The State Administration of Foreign Exchange (Safe) reports rise in foreign reserves, China Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC) chief is under investigation over misconduct, and no formal agreement emerges following Xi Jinping’s meeting with Donald Trump.

Road King Infrastructure (RKI) is spinning off its expressway business in Hong Kong via an IPO that could fetch $500m in the third quarter, said sources close to the deal.

Mainland authorities have promised that the China-Hong Kong Bond Connect will launch this year. But several questions remain on how the scheme will handle price discovery and clearing, according to post-trade services provider DTCC, which is working with CFETS on its own onshore-offshore link.

Regal Hotels International Holdings locked in $225m on Thursday from a fixed-for-life perpetual non call five on the back of over $1bn of demand at its peak. While the issuer timed its deal well, it was not everyone’s cup of tea, said bankers.

China Jinmao Holdings is coming to the Panda bond market for the first time with Rmb2.5bn ($362.7m) worth of three year medium term notes, the company said in an April 6 announcement.

The renminbi fell on Friday at the Asia open as US president Donald Trump holds talks with China counterpart Xi Jinping, State Administration of Foreign Exchange (Safe) claims Mainland’s FX market is stable, and Stock Connect saw a 56% jump in turnover on the northbound channel in March.

Yanzhou Coal Mining Company saw a very different outcome to its perpetual bond this week, managing to price through its theoretical fair value. In comparison, the borrower paid up three years ago for its last perp outing.

Everbright Financial Leasing Co is seeking a $200m three year facility through a single mandated lead arranger and bookrunner.

The precise scope of the Belt and Road initiative (BRI) remains a bit of a mystery, but there are those arguing the scheme is important to the next phase of RMB internationalisation (RMBi). Yet, the beneficial impact on RMB usage for trade and investment is yet to be seen.

Every year, our sister publication Asiamoney carries out an Offshore RMB Poll. As part of that process, the magazine asks the market for its thoughts on important renminbi topics. In this third year, we received around 2,300 valid responses, up 3% on a year ago. The ten questions included a new one on the inclusion of onshore RMB assets in global indices. Here we present the answers to the first five questions.

Ant Financial subsidiary Alipay (Hong Kong) Holding has launched a $3bn debut syndication via a nine-member bookrunner group. The strong showing at the top is driven by opportunities to cross-sell higher fee-generating products such as private banking, equity advisory and underwriting services to the Alibaba Group-affiliated borrower, reports Shruti Chaturvedi.

Two groups of vendors exited their holdings in two Asian firms this week, with block trades in Hong Kong-listed Imax China Holding and South Korea’s Kakao Corp raising a combined $278.1m.