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Depfa Bank’s ambition to become the European agency of choice with US investors faltered this week when its debut dollar global bond became the victim of continuing market weakness.

Depfa Bank’s ambition to become the European agency of choice with US investors faltered this week when its debut dollar global bond became the victim of continuing market weakness.

UMCi Pte's $600m five year fundraising arranged by Citibank NA (Taipei) has been closed. The facility was oversubscribed but will not be increased. Lead arrangers are Bank of Taiwan, International Commercial Bank of China, United Overseas Bank, ABN Amro, Chang Hwa Commercial Bank and First Commercial Bank.

The five competitors in the auction for Travelodge and Little Chef, which are being sold by Compass, this week submitted proposals in what is thought to be the second to last round of bidding. From that group of five -which bankers say comprise private equity sponsors Apax, Permira and Cinven and trade buyers Starwood and Sun Group - three final bidders will be chosen.Banks backing the sponsors are Barclays, CIBC, HBOS and Royal Bank of Scotland.

The 21 mandated arrangers will sign banks into the $300m facility for Akbank today (Friday). The deal has been oversubscribed and will be increased to $450m. In total 53 banks joined the deal. Al Bank Al Saudi Al Fransi, Bergen Bank, National City Bank and Union Bank of Norway joined as co-arrangers for takes of $10m for 105bp.

Rating: A2/A+ Tranche 1: $35m

Private equity sponsors and their supporting banks were disappointed this week when the decision on which bidding consortium was close to winning exclusive rights to negotiate the purchase of Vivendi Universal's (VU) subsidiary Vivendi Universal Publishing (VUP), expected on Wednesday September 25, was delayed. Banks and private equity sponsors that have submitted bids - worth anything between Eu2bn and Eu4bn - recognise the potential for a cheap buy of what is essentially a valuable asset and they are eager for the sale to go through quickly.

Vivendi Universal, the embattled French media group, announced this week that it was to accelerate its disposal programme, which it has increased to Eu12bn. On Wednesday Vivendi CEO Jean-René Fourtou finally brought some clarity to the media group's much needed asset disposal plan. Fourtou, who succeeded Jean-Marie Messier as chief executive of the group in July, has laid out plans to sell assets worth Eu12bn, Eu2bn more than previously stated, and to achieve this within 18 months, six months sooner than first indicated.

The equity markets hit new lows this week and there was little respite for the bond markets. The markets rallied on Wednesday and yesterday (Thursday) to end the week on a more positive note, but not before depressing the new issue market, with several deals including EdF, Parmalat and Lafarge being postponed. Depfa Bank will price a reduced $2bn five year covered bond today (Friday) at 10bp-12bp over agencies, but dollar issuance will be light during the next two weeks due to a Chinese holiday.

It has not been a happy month for banking chief executives. Michael Carpenter was pushed aside at Salomon Smith Barney as the Jack Grubman factor threatened to turn into a tidal wave and overwhelm the entire firm. Then Credit Suisse finally summoned up the courage to oust Lukas Mühlemann and we have looked further into developments at CS later in these columns. Now the departure of Leonhard Fischer at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein makes it three CEOs in a row - that certainly confirms the dire state of the industry.