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Austria Mandated lead arranger RZB launched syndication of the Eu127m eight year loan for Voest-Alpine this week.

Bruce Wasserstein has persuaded his former Wasserstein Perella colleague Charles Ward to join Lazard as president. Ward's newly created role will be mainly concerned with Lazard operations and management. He will have less contact with clients than the deputy chairmen, Marcus Agius, Gerardo Braggiotti, Kenneth Jacob, Georges Ralli and Jeffrey Rosen. He will not have a fixed base, but will move between offices as clients demand.

Global bonds for the Republic of Italy ($2bn), the EIB ($3bn) and Fannie Mae ($6bn) dominated the dollar sector this week. Both the Italian and EIB transactions are to be priced today (Friday) and have benefited from the developing trend among investors to diversify away from US agency debt. Italy has provided the dollar market with its first non-agency benchmark in the 10 year sector, while the EIB is targeting the more widely sought-after five year maturity.

Xstrata yesterday (Thursday) provided a much needed boost to the equity capital markets when it announced a £650m equity offering to finance the $2.5bn acquisition of coal assets from Glencore, the Swiss mineral resources trader. The deal will be the first big-ticket marketed offering in Europe this year, and is a coup for JP Morgan, which is financial adviser to Xstrata, global co-ordinator and bookrunner for the equity offering, and a lead arranger and bookrunner on a $2bn loan facility.

Xstrata yesterday (Thursday) provided a much needed boost to the equity capital markets when it announced a £650m equity offering to finance the $2.5bn acquisition of coal assets from Glencore, the Swiss mineral resources trader. The deal will be the first big-ticket marketed offering in Europe this year, and is a coup for JP Morgan, which is financial adviser to Xstrata, global co-ordinator and bookrunner for the equity offering, and a lead arranger and bookrunner on a $2bn loan facility.

Svensk Exportkredit announced its biggest yen note of 2002 on Friday. The ¥9.05 billion ($68.22 million) trade goes out to February 2007 and has an initial fixed coupon of 3.5%. Morgan Stanley was championing the eighteen-month floating rate note again, leading a ¥1.5 billion deal with that structure for Dapo Bank. It pays the 3m ¥Libor flat rate. Morgan Stanley also led a ¥1.5 billion zero-coupon deal for Unibail. It also has a tenor of 18 months. Credit Lyonnais Finance (Guernsey) announced four deals all around the ¥50 million mark. They all go out to June this year. Kommunalbanken went for two ¥500 million trades that go out to March 2022 and March 2032. KBC Financial Products did its fifth yen note of the year. It was a ¥98.8 million three-month deal.

* Japan Finance Corp for Municipal Enterprises Guarantor: Japan

On the day that MTNWare recorded its 100,000th trade, the yen market announced 30. Triple-As were the mainstay of the sector as usual, with World Bank doing the day's two biggest deals. The ¥5 billion ($37.69 million) and ¥3 billion notes both go out to March 2032. Kommunalbanken announced a ¥1 billion note and a ¥600 million note. Both have tenors of 30 years and were done with Kokusai as bookrunner. Kokusai also led a trade for Kommuninvest I Sverige. The ¥100 million trade goes out to March 2022 and after an initial coupon of 3.5% for a year, is linked to the US dollar-yen exchange rate. It is callable annually. Nederlandse Waterschapsbank went for a ¥1 billion 15-year deal via Salomon Smith Barney and a ¥1 billon 30-year note via Mizuho. And while Rabobank Nederland also used Mizuho to place a ¥1 billion 20-year deal, several other issuers, including Banque PSA Finance, CDC IXIS Capital markets, KfW International Finance and Toyota Motor Finance Netherlands, used Salomon Smith Barney to get their paper placed. Compagnie de Financement Foncier announced its first yen deal of the year with a ¥1 billion 20-year trade.

Thursday's yen trades were dominated by German issuers, including some rare deals from a couple of corporates. Volkswagen announced a ¥2 billion 18-month trade and Volvo Treasury did a ¥1.5 billion 18-month note via Morgan Stanley. Morgan Stanley led a handful of ¥1.5 billion 18-month trades in fact, including deals for Linde Finance and Renault Credit International Banque. If past issuance is anything to go by these notes have floating rate coupons linked to the 3m ¥Libor rate. Stadtsparkasse Koln also went for a floater with Dekabank as dealer. The coupon is linked to the 3m ¥Libor flat rate, and is floored at 0.01%. And KfW International Finance and Kommunalbanken went for their usual clutch of power reverse dual currency notes. The three deals from KfW and the two from Kommunalbanken all have terms of 30 years. Barclays Bank did four deals in yen, taking its tally in the currency this year up to five. One was a ¥1 billion one-year note, the others varied between ¥62.63 million and ¥140 million and between one month and a year in tenor.

Only one issuer rated below single-A by Moody's issued a yen trade yesterday. The ¥500 million ($3.74 million) six-month note was announced by Baa3-rated Toshiba Capital (Asia). Sanwa International and BTM (Curacao) Holdings were the other Japanese-based issuers doing business, with respective ¥50.26 million three-month and ¥800 million 10-year trades. Caixa Geral de Depositos announced a ¥200 million 30-year deal via Mizuho. The Bermuda callable trade pays 10% for the first year and then is linked to the US dollar-yen exchange rate. Mizuho also led a deal for Hypo Alpe-Adria Bank. The ¥500 million note goes out to March 2012 and after a year paying 1.5% is linked to the 10-year yen swap rate minus the two-year yen swap rate, + 55 basis points. It is callable after a year and semi-annually thereafter. KfW International Finance used Commerzbank for a ¥1 billion 30-year trade. It pays 5% for a year and is then linked to the US dollar-yen exchange rate. Nordic Investment Bank went for a ¥1.4 billion note and a ¥1 billion note. Both have terms of 30 years and have initial fixed coupons of 4% and 12% respectively. Vorarlberger Landes- und Hypothekenbank did a ¥500 million 20-year trade that has an initial coupon of 3.5%. Compagnie de Financement Foncier announced its second yen note in two days via Nomura. The ¥30 billion 18-month trade was the biggest of the day and pays a fixed coupon of 0.05%.

Yukos Universal yesterday (Thursday) launched a $147m accelerated sale in Yukos, its 65% owned oil subsidiary. The deal was led by UBS Warburg and Credit Suisse First Boston, and is the latest offering to take advantage of an upturn in sentiment in emerging markets. Two weeks ago Wim-Bill-Dann brought the first Russian IPO since July 2000, after seeing the Russian stock exchange rise by 52% in dollar terms in 2001.

Nigeria The details of the $1bn of project financing facilities for Nigeria LNG are being finalised and the transaction is expected to be launched to the market towards the end of March.