Loans and High Yield

Genertec Universal Medical Group, a Hong Kong-listed healthcare services company, has received strong response during syndication for its latest loan.

Shui On Land became the first Chinese corporate borrower to sell a sustainability-linked bond (SLB) this week — a move that worked to its advantage.

Thailand’s Gulf Energy Development Public Co is seeking a multi-billion loan in dollars and baht to fund the acquisition of telecommunications firm Intouch Holdings, giving banks yet another opportunity to finance a jumbo deal from the southeast Asian country. But there are challenges ahead, writes Pan Yue.

China Oil and Gas Group’s $400m bond proved popular with investors this week as it offered the high yield market an alternative to property deals from the country.

Chinese property company Leading Holdings Group has made its debut in the dollar market with a sub-one year bond.

Virgin Media 02, the joint venture of Virgin Media and O2, has sold £1.13bn-equivalent of sterling and dollar notes, refinancing a set of bank loans signed ahead of the 50:50 merger, which finally closed earlier this month.

Air France-KLM is preparing to return to public funding markets, as the group comes off life support and contemplates its post-pandemic capital structure, bloated by €10bn of state aid measures during 2020. The airline has been marketing a €600m dual tranche three and five year issue, which is set to be priced on Thursday, as it predicts running at over 60%-65% of 2019 capacity during the summer.

Hapag-Lloyd, the German container shipping firm, has signed an $852m syndicated green loan to buy vessels, further solidifying ESG into its capital structure after debuting in green debt this year.

China’s Tongyi Lubricant, which is backed by private equity firm Carlyle Group, has tapped three Taiwanese banks to help it raise $110m from the loan market for a dividend recapitalisation.

Indian software services provider Coforge, previously known as NIIT Technologies, is seeking a loan to fund a dividend recapitalisation, joining a growing list of companies raising debt to pay a special dividend to shareholders.

Singaporean logistics company GLP used a subordinated perpetual bond structure to raise $300m of green funds this week.

Following the launch of as many as 10 transactions this week targeting a total of €4.7bn, the high yield market is close to notching its sixth month of more than €10bn of issuance.