Nomura

Syndicate bankers hailed a return to form for senior debt this week, following a string of blowout deals. Given a week with no holidays to disrupt the market, financials reacted with gusto and printed around €12bn of senior debt, with investors stepping up to absorb the tide of issuance.

Citi is set to continue a run of highly oversubscribed 10 year bonds, announcing a self-led trade on Thursday morning. Like deals from BNP Paribas and Crédit Agricole earlier in the week, the deal has drawn a bumper book, even as the 10 year bonds from the two French banks continue to trade wide of initial levels.

Five FIG issuers took to the subordinated markets to take advantage of months of undersupply this week, with the results highlighting not just the feverish grab for yield but also just how far banks have come since the crisis of 2008 in building their capital levels.

Rabobank and Banque Fédérative du Crédit Mutuel are taking full advantage of one of the best windows for subordinated issuance so far this year to print €4.2bn equivalent in tier two capital across three deals, as total European FIG issuance this week surpasses the €10bn mark.

A burst of opportunistic corporate bond issues came to the European bond market on Tuesday, as issuers leapt on near-perfect market conditions after a very strong Monday, led by GDF Suez’s €2.5bn green bond issue.

Tokyo Metropolitan Government came back to the market on Monday with a five year issue. The trade has gotten off to a strong start, with books oversubscribed half an hour after opening.

UK investors are keen for sterling private placements from Asian banks and the demand is expected to bring new issuers to the market. Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation took advantage of the demand to sell its inaugural note in the currency this week.

The yield play sector suffered another blow on May 2 after Lotte Shopping postponed its $1bn Real Estate Investment Trust IPO in Singapore.

The region has the potential to enjoy much more economic growth in the coming quarter century, but governments and business will need to co-operate to conduct the structural changes needed to account for shifting demographics and alarming rises in pollution. Richard Morrow reports.

What will be the key investment themes in Asia over the coming decade?

The CEO of Japan’s largest bank joined Nomura in 1981 as a retail sales­person, and worked his way up to become a manager, overseeing three branches of the bank at different periods. Koji Nagai then moved to investment banking, where he was eventually promoted to run the division, before becoming president of Nomura Securities in April 2012 and group CEO in August of the same year. He tells Asiamoney how Nomura can benefit from Asia’s growing economies.

The yield play sector suffered another blow on Friday after Lotte Shopping announced that it was postponing its $1bn Real Estate investment Trust IPO in Singapore.