Loans and High Yield

One month after failing to attract high yield investors for a sterling offering, UK telecom services supplier Daisy Group has successfully placed a PIK note with one lender.

The European Central Bank has laid out its plans to regulate leveraged lending at banks it supervises, a move that could curb aggressive deal structures and give banks a way to resist pressure for low lending standards from their private equity clients.

Baltic consumer loan provider 4Finance on Wednesday printed an add-on of its old 2021 bonds in a high yield market that is coming to a halt four weeks ahead of the Christmas break.

New issues are coming at a relentless pace in the European corporate bond market, despite an increasingly uncertain medium term outlook for rates and spreads. Issuers are hitting the market with the same force as during the bull run between March and September.

Ping An Real Estate raised $300m in its debut deal, relying on the security of anchor investors before opening its trade on Tuesday morning.

Studio City Company, which runs a gambling and entertainment resort in Macau, hit the jackpot on Tuesday as US investors poured money into both tranches of the company’s new bond.

Chinese issuers stormed the primary debt market on Wednesday with Export-Import Bank of China, China Aluminum International Engineering Corp (Chalieco) and Changsha Pilot Investment Holdings Co among the borrowers attracting bids.

Shareholders of Abengoa on Tuesday endorsed a landmark debt restructuring for the renewable energy company — and averted the largest corporate bankruptcy in Spain’s modern history.

Several slated buyout transactions now have loans in the market, yet few investors are upbeat on the immediate prospects for a return to higher yields and fairer values.

Syndicated loans bankers in Asia had braced themselves for a rough 2016, hurt by clients’ preference for cheaper, local currency options. But as the year wraps up, adversity has pushed loans houses to innovate by finding opportunities outside their comfort zones and tapping into new sources of liquidity.

Michael Sherwood, co-CEO of Goldman Sachs International since 2005 and probably the most senior and highest profile investment banker in London, announced his retirement from the firm on Monday, after 30 years at the bank.

The repricing trend in the leveraged loan market is continuing, undisturbed by the onset of new money offerings, with many of the latest deals cutting costs and underpinning large dividend recapitalisations.