JP Morgan

Leveraged loan investors have recently started to win victories on deal terms, but on Thursday French engineering firm Socotec brought confirmation that market conditions are still in favour of borrowers. However, another of this week’s deals underlined the fact that investors can sometimes succeed in getting better terms.

Fixed income dollar accounts will soon have the opportunity to buy new names from China’s financial sector and southeast Asia's coal mining industry, with three debut issuers set to roadshow in Asia, Europe and the US next week.

In one of the liveliest weeks for Polish IPOs for years, Raiffeisen Polska’s flotation was pulled, debt collector GetBack priced its listing at the bottom of the range, and Play Communications, the mobile phone company, achieved a covered book on the market’s biggest IPO for five years.

Italian toll road operator, Atlantia, was the only issuer in the euro corporate bond market on Thursday. The €1bn 10 year deal could be used to finance Atlantia’s proposed acquisition of its Spanish rival Abertis.

The IPO of Play Communications, Poland’s second largest mobile network operator, is covered at its base size, three working days into the bookbuild.

Annington Homes, the Terra Firma-owned group that owns the UK Ministry of Defence’s estate for accommodating service families, dazzled the corporate bond market with the second largest sterling issue by a company ever on Wednesday, despite the complexity of its financing story. Nigel Owen reports.

Lotte Chemical Titan sealed the largest Malaysian IPO in nearly five years this week, raising MR3.8bn ($884.0m). But the deal was anything but pretty. After a bungled first attempt at building a book, the issuer was forced to return with a smaller offering and lower price range. Jonathan Breen and John Loh report.

Zhongyuan Bank’s HK$8.34bn ($1.1bn) IPO in Hong Kong was well covered as of Thursday morning, according to a banker at one of the leads.

Two firms from China’s new economy sector, which are backed by technology companies Alibaba and Tencent, plan to tap equity investors for over $2bn in their Hong Kong IPOs.

Two Chinese banks sold dual tranche floating rate dollar bonds this week, taking advantage of the market’s enthusiasm to raise a combined $1.8bn. But the eagerness for the format appears to be waning.

Gazprom will return to Switzerland next week for roadshows in Geneva and Zurich. And, as retail taste for sub-investment grade credit grows, the bookrunners are confident the Russian gas firm will attract demand.

While the US enjoyed its Independence Day holiday on Tuesday, European corporate bond markets were jump started by AA Bond Co. The UK motoring organisation announced a £250m ($324.33m) no-grow six year deal as part of plans to reduce overall borrowings and associated interest costs.