Italy

Greece heads to the polls over the weekend for its second parliamentary election this year, but there is little concern of the plebiscite rocking markets like the earlier vote in January.

Banco Popolare

Spain’s borrowing costs dropped in five years but rose in threes and 10s at an auction on Thursday, as Italy shelved its BTP Italia product for the year.

Italy shunted just over €2bn of redemptions due over the next three years into the next decade, as Portugal sliced several basis points from its short term borrowing costs.

Spain kicked off a busy week for the eurozone periphery with a bill sale where the sovereign’s borrowing costs repeated their pattern for much of this year by bumping around 0%.

The first trades in Italian punto di scambio virtuale (PSV, or virtual trading point) futures contracts have taken place on Intercontinental Exchange’s ICE Endex platform.

Banco Popolare struggled to sell €500m of three year debt on Monday as there is no longer a natural investor base for the product. Spreads must widen or these banks will find their long term funding options limited.

Davide Campari-Milano, the unrated Italian drinks company, began a roadshow in London on Thursday for its first euro bond issue in three years.

Italy’s borrowing costs dropped across the curve at an auction on Friday, although its yields at the longer end are still some distance from the euro-era lows hit earlier this year.

Pillarstone, a non-performing loan and advisory company owned by KKR, has appointed John Davison, former head of the strategic investment group at RBS, as its new chief executive.

Mediobanca has appointed Philippe Dufournier as head of lending and structured finance

Ireland has cut its 15 year borrowing costs at its biggest auction of the tenor this year, as Italy prepares to tempt investors even further out the maturity curve.