Mexico

BBVA is the latest large European bank to have suffered a ratings downgrade during the Covid-19 pandemic, with Fitch having moved the issuer’s debt ratings down by a notch blaming a weaker operating environment in Mexico and Spain.

Mexican conglomerate Fomento Económico Mexicano (Femsa) turned to international bond markets for the third time this year20 on Monday, clinching its tightest dollar funding of the year despite wider spreads.

Generals, and financial regulators, are always fighting the last war. So it proved when the coronavirus slammed into international markets in mid-March. Many of the tools developed in the 2008 financial crisis were deployed to great effect by central banks. The corners of the financial markets that propagated weakness in 2008 passed the test of 2020. But new risks were thrown up, forcing a new round of improvisation. What lessons will be drawn from the Covid-19 crisis?

Latin American bond bankers were hopeful that Cemex’s blowout bond issue on Tuesday could cajole other issuers into the market after the Mexican cement producer navigated volatile secondary market and a rating downgrade to notch a hefty order on the way to a $1bn seven-year bond.

Mexican cement maker Cemex is likely to announce a new dollar bond first thing on Tuesday after holding investor calls on the same day Fitch downgraded the borrower and placed it on negative outlook.

After nearly two months of persuasion, Mexican petrochemicals company Grupo Idesa received the approval of its bondholders to push out some $300m of international bonds by six years and give major relief to its liquidity situation.

A supranational and a Nordic bank paid rare visits to the Swiss franc market this week. The North American Development Bank (NADB) printed its first deal in two years — its second green bond — while Nordea returned after a five year absence.

The top tier of emerging market companies and sovereigns are funding themselves at near pre-coronavirus levels, but there is stark inequality in the market. The vast majority of EM corporates will have to sit out a while longer as funding costs remain prohibitively high for triple- and double-B rated issuers, writes Oliver West.

Telecoms giant América Móvil on Monday became the first private sector non-financial company from Latin America to issue a bond since the coronavirus pandemic battered emerging market bond markets in March. But the company’s unique appeal to non-EM buyers means few conclusions can be drawn about appetite for genuine Lat Am companies.

After releasing first quarter results that one credit analyst said showed “limited to no impact” from the coronavirus pandemic, Mexican payroll lender Crédito Real said on Monday that it had established a $1.5bn MTN programme that would give it “access to a wide array of debt securities in various international markets, currencies and maturities”.

Mexico proved its capital market prowess with a highly oversubscribed $6bn bond this week, despite facing a wave of downgrades, concerns about the contingent liability represented by Pemex, and investor fears that the government is reacting too slowly to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Mexico’s deputy finance minister told GlobalCapital that proceeds from Wednesday’s $6bn blow-out bond would not be used to help state oil giant Pemex, despite several investors believing the government needed to issue more to prop up the debt-laden company with oil price having crashed in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.