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Hopes are rising that sustainable finance could blossom in the US if Joe Biden wins the presidency in November, replacing Donald Trump’s climate-sceptic administration with a new government, committed to the most ambitious set of environmental policies ever.

The Euro Short Term Rate may be running into the first real problem of its short life. The benchmark was designed to provide a reflection of wholesale euro overnight borrowing costs based on real transaction data. But what if there aren’t enough transactions?

Signs are growing that Western companies may be on the verge of a wave of moving manufacturing from China to other emerging markets and ‘re-shoring’ them to the home country, a trend that could have profound implications for markets and international politics.

The European Commission has reached out to the European Covered Bond Council (ECBC) to make the case for reinvigorating the market for European Secured Notes. ESNs could improve access to crucial funding for Europe’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which are struggling to recover following lockdowns imposed to contain the spread of Covid-19.

A sudden dip in the volume of €STR transactions and the number of banks submitting data has led to market participants voicing concerns about the rate.

Singapore fintech BondEvalue launched BondbloX Bond Exchange this week, which claims to be the first blockchain-based exchange in the world, with the maiden trade executed on a bond from commodities giant Olam.

As investment bankers got used to working from home in the first half of the year, many more whistleblowing cases were opened by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority. Meanwhile, challenges around monitoring staff and forging a bank’s internal culture have not gone away just because the workforce is outside of the office.

Deutsche Bank has had an impressive run in the European investment grade corporate bond market this year, leaping from sixth to second year-to-date. GlobalCapital spoke to Frazer Ross, Deutsche’s head of investment grade syndicate for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, to find out the reasons behind its success.

Société Générale and Natixis have purged their senior ranks following second-quarter losses and to prepare for strategic revamps, but David Rothnie thinks the future will remain challenging for both.

Citi has taken market share from other banks in the past year to become one of only four that account for 60% of all secondary market covered bond volume traded on Bloomberg so far this year, thanks to a combination of devoting balance sheet to trading and having the appetite to take risk.

ABN Amro plans to quit corporate banking outside Europe, except for clearing, and also exit trade and commodity finance in a shake-out of its corporate and investment banking activities.

A temporary forum created by the European Central Bank to discuss the proposed European Distribution of Debt Instruments (EDDI) project will hold its first meeting in September.