Norway

Borr Drilling, a Bermuda-registered, Oslo-headquartered offshore oil drilling company, has raised $650m with a 51% capital increase that was placed in an accelerated way on Friday evening.

On Monday, Statnett, the Norwegian state electricity grid company, mandated banks for its debut benchmark bond issue in euros. This followed German power utility RWE announcing the results of its recent tender offer on Friday.

Norsk Hydro completed its buyout of fellow Norwegian aluminium producer Sapa, valued at Nkr27bn ($3.38bn) on Monday, drawing in part on its existing five year revolving credit facility.

The debt restructuring saga at Norwegian paper company Norske Skog took a sharp turn this week wherein a breakthrough with senior investors was quickly waylaid by a group, claiming to represent more than half of the company’s unsecured creditors, rejecting the latest proposal.

The subscription ratio of a seven year covered bond issued by SR Boligkreditt this week was higher than any Norwegian deal issued in at least six years.

The strength of the demand for equity block trades in Europe was highlighted once again on Wednesday evening by Telenor when it covered an effective cleanup trade in Veon, the New York-listed Russian telecoms company formerly known as VimpleCom, in half an hour.

Steven Jensen is leaving his loan syndication sales position at Nordic bank SEB in London to join Norwegian bank DNB.

Rating: Aaa/AAA

Public sector issuers navigated a choppy start to the week to print strong dollar trades, but some SSA bankers worry that the problems that brought that early volatility are far from resolved.

Kommunalbanken made what bankers away from the trade described as an “excellent” choice of tenor with a dollar benchmark on Wednesday as it tightened pricing from guidance — something that not every issuer has been able to achieve in the currency over the last two weeks. Meanwhile, a Japanese issuer mandated for a trade that bankers expect to go well despite geopolitical tensions in Asia.

Kommunalbanken will bring a dollar benchmark in a defensive tenor on Wednesday, which a banker on the deal said is the perfect product for investors amid rising geopolitical tensions. The trade also offers an attractive spread over US Treasuries, the banker added, despite a tightening in swap spreads — although other bankers said that tightening meant larger issuers should consider longer dated deals.

Low-cost telecoms firm Lebara broke a two week silence in the euro high yield market with its first bond.