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Rating: Aaa/AAA Amount: $2.5bn

Joint mandated arrangers Nordea and Commerzbank have launched a Eu125m facility for manufacturing company Uponor into the market. A bank meeting was held this week. The borrower previously tapped the market in April 1998 with a Eu127m five year revolver arranged through Danske Bank, Merita Bank and Postipankki. That loan paid a margin of 22.5bp of Libor and the proceeds were used for general corporate purposes.

EuroWeek hears that BC Partners, which sold Elis to PAI in a secondary buy-out at the end of July, has re-invested in the company. This shows that BC still sees upside in the business that it has just exited. The Eu1.2bn of senior and subordinated debt facilities backing the buy-out of Elis is in senior syndication via arrangers CIBC and Crédit Agricole Indosuez.

The five sub-underwriters that joined the Eu545m of senior debt facilities supporting the Doughty Hanson-led buy-out of auto parts company Auto Teile Unger (ATU) are assessing documentation and will be signed into the deal on August 19. Arrangers HypoVereinsbank and Mizuho confirm that the fully underwritten Eu150m mezzanine tranche is almost fully subscribed with commitments from seven funds.

Rating: A3/A Amount: Eu25m Constant Maturity Florax issue

Guarantor: GMAC Rating: A2/BBB+

Barclays Bank (facility agent) and Standard Chartered (joint bookrunner) will today (Friday) launch a $320m receivables backed pre-export financing for Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod). Commerzbank, Crédit Lyonnais (joint bookrunner), DZ Bank, Ghana International Bank (collection agent), ING, Natexis Banques Populaires, Rabobank, Royal Bank of Scotland and UFJ Bank have joined as arrangers.

The Greek state announced this week that it had mandated Alpha Bank, Deutsche Bank, National Bank of Greece and UBS Warburg to lead a Eu500m sale in Public Power Corporation, the Hellenic Republic's electricity utility. The highly anticipated sale comes just nine months after PPC's disappointing Eu463m debut on the Greek stock exchange in December last year. The deal failed to fire investors' enthusiasm and the shares slumped 8% in their first week of trading from the Eu12.7 issue price.

Mandated arrangers ING (joint arrangers), LB Kiel and RZB (joint bookrunner) have closed syndication of the Eu30m five year facility for Abanka. Signing is due to take place on August 21. Five banks have joined the deal: Baden-Württemberg Bank, NordLB, Hungarian Foreign Trade Bank (MKB), Bank Austria and Banca Nazionale del Lavoro. The deal carries a margin of 50bp over Libor. The borrower last tapped the market in October 2001 with a Eu20m loan arranged through LB Kiel and RZB.

The closing date for syndication of the $100m one year dual currency term loan for Investec South Africa has been extended to next week. Banks are scheduled to be signed in at the beginning of September.

Banks will be signed into the Eu2bn debt facility for Baa2/BBB-rated Hidroeléctrica del Cantábrico by the end of next week. However, arrangers, which have admitted that the deal has been a tough sell, will accommodate late joiners.

The credit concerns that have dominated the swap markets for the last couple of weeks alleviated this week, and swap spreads contracted in both euros and dollars. Once again, however, it was an extremely quiet week in the debt markets so swaps were robbed of flow from this source. Yesterday (Thursday), it was announced that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had approved a $30bn loan to Brazil, which is the largest in the history of the organisation. Brazilian stocks, bonds and the currency surged as a result of this action and it is hoped that default will now be evaded.