Santander

Adveo — Nidera — Stanbic Uganda

Richmond Housing Partnership, a housing association based in southeast England, issued £140m of bonds with an average life of 30.75 years on Thursday. Its 3.25% coupon was the lowest yet achieved on a 30 year bond issued by a housing association in its own name, according to the issuer.

Adveo, the Spanish stationery supplier, has secured a €115m five year loan. The deal went ahead smoothly despite any concerns over eurozone politics, a spokesperson for the company said.

The bookbuild began today for the Spanish government's flotation of 49% of Aena, one of the largest airport operators in the world, in a deal that could top €4bn at the top end of the price range.

Enagás, the Spanish gas grid operator, priced a €600m 10 year bond last Friday. A strong bid for corporate bonds, fuelled by news of the eurozone quantitative easing scheme, helped the issuer to achieve very tight pricing.

Five covered bond borrowers issued benchmark deals in the first half of this week, fearing potential volatility from Thursday's European Central Bank announcement on its sovereign quantitative easing programme.

Richmond Housing Partnership has mandated two banks for a roadshow that could lead to the second debut bond from a UK housing association this year.

Snam, the Italian natural gas transmission company, tapped its April 2023 bond for €250m on Wednesday. The new notes were priced with a very small pick-up, putting some investors off, but the transaction was still more than three times subscribed.

Isolux Corsán, the Spanish energy and construction firm, plans to float on Spain’s main stock markets in a deal that could be worth €600m.

Santander raised €7.5bn of new equity capital last week — an important deal under any circumstances. But most significantly, the deal was done as an accelerated bookbuild or block trade — something that had never been attempted on this scale outside the US. Equity bankers were impressed — and other issuers will be emboldened by Santander’s example.

Telecom Italia, Italy’s largest telecommunications operator, on Monday brought to the high yield market the first €1bn issue of the year, as part of a plan to repay slices of four other bonds.

A week before the European Central Bank is expected to announce a programme of quantitative easing and Greece elects its next president, investors are loading up on senior unsecured paper from top names in FIG, and being paid big new issue premiums. Investors are demanding more in part because of fears of volatility in coming weeks stemming from the ECB and Greece, bankers said.