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Canadian corporates Brascan and Potash jumped into the Yankee bond market this week, eager not to miss an opportunity to raise funds at record low rates. Brascan, a Baa3/A- diversified conglomerate, issued $200m of seven year bonds to yield 5.825bp, or 255bp over Treasuries, as well as $250m of its first ever 30 year bonds at a yield of 7.547%, or 283bp over Treasuries.

Rating: Aa3/A+ Amount: $100m (fungible with $600m issue launched 10/01/03)

Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) has increased the size of its EuroMTN programme from $6bn to $10bn and has dropped Merrill Lynch as arranger. "We are planning to do longer term issues," said CIBC's vice president of treasury financing David Dickenson. "For that we will need more capacity and this seems like the obvious step to take."

The $60m five year credit for PFG (Kunshan) Co, arranged by Citigroup/SSB, will be closed today (Friday).

Amount: Eu1.1bn Rating: Aa3/A1+

Amount: Sfr250m Maturity: March 25, 2015

One of the worst weeks in the corporate market since the autumn of last year began with Thyssenkrupp's downgrade to junk on Friday and the admission by Ahold of a $500m accounting irregularity on Monday. A string of high profile corporates remain under pressure, most notably Bayer, Suez and Olivetti.

Switzerland's largest chemicals group Clariant has admitted it may need to raise up to Sfr600m in equity to strengthen its balance sheet. The company made an Sfr890m writedown, mainly from its unsuccessful acquisition of UK chemicals group BTP in 2000, and posted a net loss of Sfr648m last fiscal year.

Rating: A2 Amount: Eu100m tier one capital

Mandated arrangers Bank Austria Creditanstalt, BayernLB and Sumitomo closed syndication of the Eu150m five year term loan for Privredna banka Zagreb (PBZ) on Wednesday. The deal has been oversubscribed but the borrower has not yet decided if the increase will be accepted.

Credit Suisse Group this week revealed a net loss of Sfr3.3bn for the full year 2002 and with it confirmed that it would be cutting a further 1,250 jobs. The results were, however, a surprise to some analysts who were predicting an even greater loss for the group. After a disastrous third quarter which saw the Credit Suisse Group report a record net loss of Sfr2.1bn, the Swiss financial group recovered in the final quarter to report a loss of Sfr940m. Merrill Lynch's analysts had been expecting a net loss in the region of Sfr1.2bn for the fourth quarter.

Guarantor: DaimlerChrysler AG Rating: A3/BBB+