Nordics

Valmet, the Finnish technological services company, has refinanced a €200m facility first signed in May 2013. The company swapped two of the original lenders with new banks.

Kommunalbanken printed its third ever green bond on Wednesday, using the "extra selling point" of the green factor to pull in an impressive book for the four year deal and pricing it through its curve.

The IPO of Ahlsell, the Nordic distributor of plumbing and electrical products, got covered at its maximum size within 24 hours of the launch of its bookbuild on Tuesday afternoon.

Despite an IPO market strewn with casualties, three of the largest European IPOs of the year are progressing through bookbuild.

Kommunalbanken, the Norwegian agency, has selected three banks for a Reg S/144A green bond.

Nets, the Nordic payment processing group whose shares have fallen 13% since their IPO three weeks ago, has reassured shareholders that it will not suffer materially from Nordea’s decision to change its mobile payments joint venture in Denmark and Norway.

A $3.5bn dual-tranche borrowing to back Tencent Holdings' acquisition of a stake in mobile gaming company Supercell, has been allocated. Three Chinese mandated lead arrangers and bookrunners held on to 60% of the loan at the end of general syndication.

A flurry of follow-on equity sales this week, mostly block trades, showed that investors still want stock, sometimes at tight discounts, even while three IPOs had to be abandoned.

The European Stability Mechanism is close to deciding on the format its first dollar benchmark will be printed in, while a deal due this Friday could open up to longer dated tenors what has already been an extremely strong dollar market in the three year part of the curve.

Export Development Canada will on Friday join a rampant dollar benchmark market and could open end up giving issuers more options after choosing a more daring maturity than those executed in the last few weeks.

Norway’s top spot in Nordic high yield annual primary issuance has historically been invulnerable. But with most borrowers linked to the energy sector and oil prices struggling to recover, its reign may be about to change this year.

Sweden on Thursday will bring the second three year dollar benchmark of the week, after a deal on Wednesday in the same tenor from KfW that was the biggest trade in the currency since July.