Santander

SSE, the UK electricity, gas and telecoms company, brought its inaugural green bond on Wednesday in a deal that was years in the making.

The success of the UK’s ring fencing rules, which one analyst described as “the worst idea the [Financial Conduct Authority] has ever put forward” will rely on the UK’s courts, which will have to agree how to transfer customers and assets for eight UK banks. The court process will start in November and kick into high gear ahead of the final deadline of January 2019.

British American Tobacco set fire to any notion that markets close in August this week with a $20.8bn bond bonanza. It brought a $17.25bn eight tranche deal on Tuesday — the second largest bond transaction of the year in the US — and followed that with a €3.6bn-equivalent four tranche dual currency deal in Europe on Wednesday. Nigel Owen reports.

After bringing the second largest bond transaction of the year in the US on Tuesday, British American Tobacco topped up its borrowing with a €3.6bn-equivalent four tranche dual currency deal on Wednesday.

British American Tobacco is expected to bring the week-long run without any new corporate bond issuance to an end later this week. The UK based tobacco company could issue in dollars, euros and sterling.

Basque telecoms firm Euskaltel gained access to a third market in northern Spain after the acquisition of Telecable from Zegona Communications, which it is funding with loans and equity.

Anglian Water, priced a £250m eight year green bond on Monday. The size and tenor are unremarkable, and in a generation of sustainability and responsibility, a green bond should cause similarly few ripples. However, this was the first sterling-denominated green bond issued by a corporate borrower since 2015.

Forecasts that Europe’s corporate bond market would be all but closed for the summer this week were belied by Unilever on Monday when it launched its biggest-ever euro bond and took some of the tightest corporate pricing ever.

With no new issues pricing on Thursday, and no sign of Superstrada Pedemontana Veneta’s €1.55bn dual tranche deal, it could be left to The Housing Finance Corp (THFC) to save the investment grade corporate bond market from a three day run without any issuance.

The three new issues and one tap that priced in the investment grade corporate bond market this week were all two to three times oversubscribed, but a thinning supply pipeline and the excuse of a Fed meeting meant no deals were launched on Wednesday or Thursday. However, three issuers are looking to issue before the summer break, following meetings with investors.

Santander’s €7bn rights issue finished 8.2 times covered, according to a filing with the CNMV, the Spanish regulator.

The corporate bond deals priced so far this week show a robust market. A US Federal Reserve meeting and a thinning pipeline may have resulted in a maiden over of a Wednesday, but hopes are high of primary business picking up before the end of the week.