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Mexico is being pressed to issue a five year Eu500m-Eu1bn offering following the success of a spate of small short dated Latin euro deals. The strength of retail investor demand for short dated emerging market euro deals was demonstrated this week when two of the more difficult Latin credits -Jamaica and Argentina's Banco Hipotecario - followed last week's lead of the Province of Buenos Aires and tapped the short end of the curve. Jamaica issued a Eu125m 3-1/2 year 10.5% bond at 625bp over Bunds via Deutsche Bank, and Hipotecario became the first Argentine corporate issuer of uninsured bonds since last October last with an Eu150m offering of 10.75% three year paper at 99.59, or 640bp over Bunds.

Two Swiss franc deals were done yesterday, one by Sigma Finance Corp (Sigma): a Sfr89 million ($54.42 million) fixed rate note. It pays a coupon of 3.21% and goes out to January 2002. The last time the issuer went for Swiss francs was in March last year, but Philippa Sharpe, treasury dealer at Sigma, says the currency is offering good levels at the moment. She says: "Last year was a difficult time for us because we couldn't get the swaps we wanted out of Japan. This year we'll be looking to push for issuance especially in fixed-rate notes in dollar and Swiss francs." And Carrefour did a Sfr250 million syndicated trade via BNP Paribas. The six-year note pays a fixed coupon of 3.5% on an annual basis. It is the second Swiss franc note the borrower has issued.

SNS Bank has continued its penchant for euro with a five-year euro20 million ($19.04 million) note that pays a single final coupon of 5.25%. The note will be issued on 19 January 2001. Since October 2000 the issuer has been responsible for 20 trades and 15 of these have been issued in euro. The pattern was last broken on 15 December 2000 when the bank issued two three-year sterling floating rate notes which paid libor and libor + 0.09%.

Sonera Corp has added Dresdner Bank and JP Morgan Chase as dealers off its euro500 million ($467.12 million) Euro-CP programme.

Market report Compiled by Vusi Mhlanzi, RBC DS Global Markets, London

* BOC Group plc Rating: A2/A+/A

British Telecommunications this week demonstrated overwhelmingly that the euro market is well on its way to rivalling the dollar market in terms of size and liquidity by absorbing Eu8bn of the UK telcos’ debt in various maturities. The overall size of the transaction was boosted to Eu9.7bn equivalent by £1.1bn raised in the sterling market in two tranches — a £400m five year and a £700m 15 year. The original intention had been to raise Eu5bn equivalent in the two markets.

British Telecommunications this week demonstrated overwhelmingly that the euro market is well on its way to rivalling the dollar market in terms of size and liquidity by absorbing Eu8bn of the UK telcos’ debt in various maturities. The overall size of the transaction was boosted to Eu9.7bn equivalent by £1.1bn raised in the sterling market in two tranches — a £400m five year and a £700m 15 year. The original intention had been to raise Eu5bn equivalent in the two markets.

The best performer on France's Second Marché, Pinguely-Haulotte, the European leader of boom and platform trucks for lifting material, is shaping up to tap the market with a Eu80m capital increase. Crédit Agricole Indosuez and Deutsche Bank will lead the 10% capital increase along with HSBC-CCF, which will act as co-lead manager.

* Carrefour SA Rating: Aa3/AA-

* General Electric Capital Corp Rating: Aaa/AAA/AAA

Kingdom of Belgium launched its Eu5bn 10 year benchmark OLO on Monday via lead managers ABN Amro, Fortis and Goldman Sachs. The book closed with the deal four to five times oversubscribed. On the back of strong demand, the paper tightened slightly from initial spread talk in the low 40s over Bunds to 40bp at launch, which syndicate managers saw as an attractive level for the sovereign.