Norway

Songa Offshore, the Norwegian oil drilling company, has made a strong start to its attempt to raise $125m of new money with a convertible bond, as part of a distressed debt restructuring.

Norske Skog, the Norwegian producer of publishing paper, has told GlobalCapital that its plan to ensure its long term funding is going ahead, although Moody’s has warned of a default looming.

Two borrowers from Denmark and Norway launched their first euro denominated covered bonds this week, expanding the number of issuers to a new record.

North Energy, the Norwegian oil and gas exploration company, signed a Nkr950m($112m) exploration financing agreement on Tuesday with two banks.

John Fredriksen, the Norwegian shipping magnate, sold a Nkr4.4bn ($510m) block of shares in seafood firm Marine Harvest on Tuesday evening — a rare liquidity event in one of the few Norwegian stocks not exposed to oil.

Three covered bond issuers launched euro benchmarks on Wednesday with the inaugural transaction from United Overseas Bank of Singapore proving the main attraction. Sparebank 1 Boligkreditt and Belfius Bank also launched deals, with strong demand for the Belgian deal allowing the issuer to pay an extraordinarily tight new issue concession of 1bp.

Kommunalbanken on Wednesday sold the first five year dollar benchmark from an SSA in three weeks, printing a $1bn no-grow bond.

Aurora Shipping has signed a €200m credit facility with two lenders to finance four new-build vessels.

Daimler Canada Finance, a subsidiary of Daimler, made a rare outing in Norwegian kroner on Wednesday, printing a five year bond.

Prosafe, which provides offshore accommodation for oil rigs, announced on Tuesday that it had negotiated changes to the terms of loans signed less than 12 months ago.

Lloyds issued the first sterling covered bond of the year and was quickly followed by two overseas issuers who priced deals at successively wider levels.

Eleven covered bonds were priced in the first week of 2016 despite the onset of European holidays and US non-farm payroll data.