Poland

mBank priced a new four year euro denominated bond through its existing curve on Wednesday as investors shrugged off concerns over Polish bank risk.

Poland’s mBank saw strong demand for a new euro-denominated four year senior unsecured benchmark after initial price thoughts were released early Wednesday.

Russian issuers dominated the first half of the week in emerging market bonds but the attention is now on Polish financial mBank which has braved coming on the same day as the US Federal Reserve announces its interest rate decision.

Poland’s mBank will hit the road next week for its first euro senior deal since November 2014. The bank did plan a roadshow for a euro bond in 2015 but decided not to go ahead with the meetings as the issuer did not like the levels available, according to an EM banker.

Poland became the first European country to issue a Panda bond on Thursday, printing a landmark Rmb3bn ($451m) deal. The depreciating renminbi was not enough to put off foreign investors, while the yield pick-up over other sovereign bonds helped ensure a strong order book. Addison Gong reports.

The Republic of Poland will open books on Thursday on the first Panda bond from a CEEMEA issuer and is looking to print with a 3% handle, according to a banker at one of its leads.

The Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Poland has mandated Bank of China and HSBC as joint lead underwriters to work on the sovereign’s upcoming Panda bond.

Two block trades by UniCredit this week, totalling €1.08bn, offered further confirmation that the equity capital market is functioning well, and that there is ample demand for good European stocks, including from US long-only investors.

UniCredit’s new CEO, Jean-Pierre Mustier, has sent strong signals to the market this week that he will be determined about reshaping the bank, which by last week had lost 75% of its market value in the past year.

UniCredit used similar tactics on its accelerated bookbuild sale of 10% of Bank Pekao on Tuesday night to those it had used for Monday’s sale of FinecoBank — and achieved a similar result: multiple times oversubscription, led by one very large anchor order.

UniCredit has dominated the headlines again this week, but this time for a better reason. Italy’s largest bank has also been its biggest loser of shareholder value, its shares falling 75% since last summer, as investors have lost trust in the sector.

A day after selling 10% of its Italian online retail investment service Fineco Bank for €328m, UniCredit has this evening launched an accelerated bookbuild of 10% of Bank Pekao, the Polish bank of which it owns 50.3%.