Norway

Norwegian covered bonds could be in line for a ratings bump following implementation of the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive (BRRD) said Standard and Poor’s. Separately, tighter Norwegian mortgage lending criteria should dampen house price inflation but it still remains unsustainably high, said Fitch.

DNB Boligkreditt got the Nordic covered bond market off to a blistering start on Wednesday with a €2bn five year deal that leads were able to tighten by 5bp from initial guidance.

Tonight, Nordic Nanovector, the Norwegian developer of radio-immunotherapeutics for haematological cancers, is raising Nkr527m ($63m) to finance clinical trials, by placing new shares with institutional investors.

In a volatile year for European equity capital markets, with issuance down sharply, the Nordic region has been a bright spot, enjoying its second biggest ever year for issuance. Bankers believe that momentum will carry into 2017.

Arcus, the Norwegian distiller owned by private equity group Ratos, made its debut on the Nasdaq Oslo on Thursday after its Nkr1.7bn (€196m) IPO that was multiple times covered.

Kommunalbanken raised A$40m ($29.7m) from an Australian dollar tap on Tuesday after sole-arranger Daiwa found two more Japanese life insurers to take an earlier reverse enquiry above the Norwegian agency's minimum size of A$30m.

In another sign of the cautious mood gripping the IPO market in Western Europe, Varta AG, the German microbatteries maker, has called off its €150m Frankfurt IPO. Yet the Nordic market continues to show its resilience, as three successful flotations reach their conclusion this week.

Kommunalbanken added a A$40m ($29.8m) tap to its December 2026 Kangaroo bond on Tuesday, responding to a Japanese life insurer's request.

The IPO of Arcus, the Norwegian distiller owned by private equity group Ratos, is multiple times covered within its revised price range.

The busy equity block trade action, widely predicted by ECM bankers when the US presidential election produced a bounce in share prices, has continued this week with a string of sales totalling over $1.5bn.

Oslo Bors is to change the last trading day of its equity derivative contracts to the third Friday of the month, as the exchange looks to line up with other markets.

One of the last two substantial European IPOs of 2016 looks set to be completed on Friday, when RussNeft, one of Russia’s 10 largest oil companies, floats in Moscow for at least $495m.