Greater China

Derivatives exchanges are broadening their reach in China through futures and options and build the H-shares product suite.

The growth of the Panda bond market is being impeded by regulatory and liquidity issues in spite of the asset class’ attractive pricing, according to a report from Fitch.

Korea Development Bank (KDB) sold two tranches of floating rate notes on March 18, in a transaction that was driven by reverse enquiry from Taiwanese banks.

Chinese regional lender Bank of Tianjin has raised HK$7.4bn ($949m) after pricing its Hong Kong IPO near the lower end of guidance, suffering a low turnout from retail investors.

Rici Healthcare Holdings has submitted a preliminary prospectus to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange for a potential $250m IPO slated for the second half of the year.

Daimler has received approval to issue and started marketing its second Panda bond sources close to the deal have said to GlobalRMB.

Hutchison China MediTech (Chi-Med) has pocketed $101.25m from its Nasdaq IPO, debuting on the exchange on Thursday. But it had a lukewarm start, dropping 0.74% at the end of its first trading day.

Chinese e-commerce group Alibaba is understood to have seen a good turnout for a roadshow held on Thursday for its $3bn syndicated loan. Bankers reckon the pricing and the potential use of proceeds contributed to the appeal.

In this round-up, China's cross-border trade settlement fell to a near three-year low in February, CME reports record levels of trading in its offshore RMB futures, RMB spot trading fell but swap trading surged on the Moscow Exchange, Singapore renewed its currency swap line, and Deutsche Bank sets up a the first interbank host-to host platform by a foreign bank in China. Plus, a recap of GlobalRMB's top stories this week.

Deutsche Bank has hired Jason Cox as a co-head of equity capital markets for Asia Pacific, as the bank lays out the management structure for the region.

Yunnan Provincial Investment Holdings Group (YIG) is set to go on the road for a series of investor meetings as it seeks to gauge interest for a possible dollar bond.

The Asian syndication of a jumbo loan to back China National Chemical Corp’s (ChemChina) acquisition of Syngenta is seeing interest from many international lenders in Asia. Banks are weighing the benefits of the borrower’s state ownership against the weakness of its financials on a standalone basis, writes Shruti Chaturvedi.