North America

Equities have made a stirring recovery since the record coronavirus sell-off in March. Corporates, looking to raise cash by any means necessary to survive the crisis and lower their risk, have taken advantage of the uplift, selling non-core equity holdings. Now, more are being urged to get in on the trade while it lasts, as there are fears that stock markets will plummet again if lockdowns or infections worsen with the pandemic far from over, writes Sam Kerr.

Deutsche Bank has regained its number one spot in its home market, but it was its traditional investment banking business that shone rather than investments made as part of the firm’s new Germany-focused strategy, writes David Rothnie.

The European Investment Bank achieved its biggest ever order book in euros on Tuesday, as it sold its first seven year benchmark of the year.

Beijing Enterprises Clean Energy Group (BECE) has returned with a three year renminbi-denominated puttable bond, bringing yet another green transaction to the Panda market.

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”.

China's Ebang International Holdings, a cryptocurrency mining hardware maker, is planning a US IPO that could raise up to $100m. It follows in the footsteps of Canaan Creative, which listed last November but has since seen its stock price tumble about 53%.

After years of being in the shade of their high yield colleagues, equity-linked bankers are emerging from the Covid-19 global pandemic as some of the biggest fee earners in the capital markets amid an issuance boom, particularly in the US, as embattled corporates scramble to raise liquidity.

Swedbank was paying less than fair value for a new euro senior deal on Friday, according to market participants, with the bank raising funding a day after publishing its first quarter results.

In this round-up, international investors dumped Rmb208.4bn ($29.4bn) of Chinese stocks in March, and state-owned enterprises recorded a huge revenue drop in the first quarter of the year.

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.

April is set to be the second busiest month ever in the US corporate bond market (after March), as companies pile up funding to build up their financial resilience to Covid-19, despite continuing volatility and waves of bad news.

Debt investors are distinguishing between strong and weak risks in the oil and gas sector, as huge oversupply threatens to weigh on oil prices, already at multi-decade lows — and for the time being, market participants also expect that worries about energy won't tarnish the whole high yield market.