Russia

Supply of Russian Eurobonds is expected to remain healthy through to year end, with debt bankers this week mainly dismissing concerns that enhanced US sanctions and changes to local repo eligibility criteria could curb demand after the summer break.

Changes to the list of collateral eligible for repo with the Russian central bank could cause a spike in spreads on local currency bank bonds and push more lenders towards the international markets, analysts said this week.

Bank Saint Petersburg, the Russian regional retail bank, has successfully priced a Rb3.2bn ($53m) equity capital increase, through a multi-day bookbuild that finished on Friday.

Promsvyazbank (PSB) priced an inaugural additional tier one (AT1) dollar deal at 8.75% on Wednesday morning after attracting more than $1.1bn of orders.

Markets reacted with apathy to the news that the US House of Representatives had voted on Tuesday to expand sanctions against Russia.

Markets reacted with apathy to the news that the US House of Representatives had voted on Tuesday to expand sanctions against Russia.

Promsvyazbank priced an inaugural additional tier one dollar deal at 8.75% on Wednesday morning after attracting more than $1.1bn of orders.

Promsvyazbank (PSB) was on track on Tuesday morning to become the third Russian lender to issue additional tier one (AT1) dollar debt this year after releasing price guidance for an inaugural deal in the format.

Russian potash company Uralkali is due to mandate banks for a $750m pre-export finance facility this week, according to a banker close to the deal.

The Moscow Exchange Index Committee this week agreed on changes to the calculation method for the indices that it hosts.

An otherwise quiet week for block trades was interrupted on Thursday night with a large selldown of shares in Norilsk Nickel, the Russian nickel and palladium mining company, by Metalloinvest, the steel maker and miner.

Gazprom printed a further Swiss franc bonds on Thursday. The deal was less reliant on Russian lenders to reach the Sfr500m ($517.9m) capped size than its previous two Swiss bonds, as Gazprom has developed a strong reputation among Swiss, and wider European, retail lenders.