Loans and High Yield

UK Prime Minister Theresa May may have rebuked her International trade secretary Liam Fox for his suggestion the chances of no-deal Brexit were now 60-40, but bookmakers Boyle Sports has exactly those odds for those who want to put any money on it. If that is the likely outcome now, what will it mean for the execution of bond deals?

BMC Software was set to print $2bn of triple-C rated bonds this week, as it changes sponsor hands from Bain and Golden Gate to KKR. The new owner was also pushing for some of the loosest covenants in the market.

Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam has closed an offshore borrowing worth $150m. After the company deciding not to exercise a greenshoe option, lenders faced a large scale-back.

Tsinghua University Science Park, or Tuspark, raised $350m from its bond sale on Wednesday, notably helped by 14 bookrunners.

Buyers of speculative grade debt in Europe have entered August with renewed confidence and the hope that spreads can hold their recent widening during the second half of the year.

August is traditionally a slow month in the corporate bond market as the common perception is that many market participants are away from their desks enjoying their summer holidays. But recent deals have shown that investors are around, and are willing and able to buy.

Credit Suisse and Standard Chartered are providing a $1.1bn loan to back the delisting of Indian metal and mining company Vedanta Resources from the London Stock Exchange.

High yield property company Intiland Development flopped in the offshore market on Tuesday, failing to price what would have been its debut dollar deal.

Debt syndicate banker Angie Li has joined DBS from Guotai Junan International after two years at the Chinese firm.

Tesla’s only high yield bond traded at its highest level since mid-March on Tuesday, after CEO Elon Musk said he was considering a take-private deal that led investors to consider the bond’s attractive change of control provision.

After suffering the slowest month in a decade in July, the US high yield pipeline burst into life this week with two new deals on Tuesday and a further $5bn in the pipeline for the rest of the week.

Speculative grade debt buyers believe borrowers will keep deleveraging, according to an August credit investor survey by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. But fund managers also think the market is failing to price leverage correctly.