Santander

Troubled Brazilian shopping centre owner General Shopping Brasil has launched a heavily discounted tender of its 10% senior perpetual notes in an effort to reduce its dollar debt, although Fitch says that a debt restructuring is “likely to occur in the near future”.

Two state owned corporations, La Poste and Adif Alta Velocidad, this week avoided paying the wider new issue premiums that many corporate issuers have been forced to concede.

Troubled Brazilian shopping centre owner General Shopping Brasil has launched a heavily discounted tender of its 10% senior perpetual notes in an effort to reduce its dollar debt, although Fitch says that a debt restructuring is “likely to occur in the near future”.

Adif Alta Velocidad, the Spanish state high speed rail network company, received heavy domestic demand for its €600m bond issue on Tuesday, which enabled it to pay a single digit new issue premium, as La Poste had the day before.

Iberdrola sold its second benchmark deal of the year on Monday, gathering together a heavily oversubscribed order book despite coming head to head with fellow Spanish issuer Telefonica.

The covered bond market showed its value this week as it enabled a wide range of banks to borrow in choppy conditions, across a range of tenors.

Shares in Abengoa, the troubled Spanish renewable energy company, plunged again on Thursday and its credit default swap spread widened sharply, on unconfirmed reports in the Spanish press that banks including Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citigroup and Société Générale had declined to underwrite its rights issue.

UniCredit Bank Austria (Baca) returned to the covered bond market on Tuesday to issue the first Austrian Pfandbrief since the country’s Financial Markets Authority (FMA) announced a debt moratorium on bonds issued by Heta Asset Resolution AG (HAR).

French hotel group Accor showed that demand is strong for even weaker investment grade credits on Thursday, drawing a rush of orders for a new eight year benchmark.

Two French borrowers took advantage of a resurgent corporate bond market on Wednesday, with electrical components manufacturer Schneider Electric and real estate company Icade selling euro debt.

UK energy company SSE opened up the week’s issuance for corporate bonds on Tuesday. While the issuer faced less than ideal market conditions its success presaged a rush of issuance later in the week.

A resurgent Spanish corporate finance market is putting the expansion plans of Spain’s national champions to the test, at home and abroad, writes David Rothnie.