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* Landesbank Rheinland-Pfalz Girozentrale Rating: Aa1/AA/AAA

Norway EuroWeek hears that Citibank/SSSB is underwriting a Eu1bn five year loan facility to support Norsk Hydro's acquisition of E.ON's aluminium unit, VAW. The sale was recently completed for a total consideration of Eu3.1bn including assumed debt. Few details of the loan have yet been disclosed.

Publicis, the French advertising company, rook advantage of strong investor momentum in the equity-linked markets this week to sell Eu600m of convertible bonds via BNP Paribas and Deutsche Bank. There was no shortage of appetite in the market as investors clamoured for the bonds. One banker close to the deal said that the only thing that would disappoint investors would be the size of their allocations.

Schneider Electric has upped the size of its euro1.25 billion ($1.11 billion) Euro-MTN programme to euro2.95 billion. The facility has $386.76million outstanding off one trade.

Scottish Power has increased the ceiling off its $4 billion debt issuance programme to $7 billion. Merrill Lynch has been dropped as a dealer and Commerzbank and Schroder Salomon Smith Barney have been added to the dealer panel. The facility has $2.93 billion outstanding off 41 issues.

ING (co-ordinating bookrunner) and SG (co-bookrunner and facility agent) have won the mandate to arrange a $175m 3-1/2 year pre-export financing for Sibneft, the Siberian exploration and production company. This is the third deal the company has done through these two banks in recent times and the third to feature the same offtaker - Vitol. However, this time Stasco, part of the Shell group, is also involved.

SG this week appointed Richard Hopkin as managing director and deputy head of European securitisation, based in London. SG has a strong securitisation franchise in France and Spain but is keen to broaden this into other markets where it has been active more sporadically.

* DaimlerChrysler (UK) Holding plc Guarantor: DaimlerChrysler AG

Den norske Bank will become the fourth biggest asset manager in the Nordic area with its acquisition of Skandia's asset management operations. Under the deal, which was announced on Tuesday, DnB will increase its assets under management from Nkr95bn (Eu11.9bn) to Nkr335bn (Eu42m). DnB will pay Skr3.2bn (Eu345m) to Skandia, the Swedish insurer, for the assets.

* Landesbank Rheinland-Pfalz Girozentrale Rating: Aa1/AA/AAA

* Transco plc Rating: A2/A/A

Standard Chartered Bank has signed a $2 billion structured note programme. No arranger has been named and there are no dealers on the programme. The IPA is Deutsche Bank. It will complement the issuer's existing $6 billion debt issuance programme, arranged by JPMorgan, that has $2.67 billion outstanding off nine trades. This programme has issued several different kinds of notes, including fixed-rate, floating-rate, step-up FRNs, a yield-linked perpetual note and a Pro Asia Investment note-linked note. The new programme will be focused on structured trades, and will help fund the issuer's future plans. These include building new core markets in Taiwan and Thailand and building its businesses in the Middle East, South Asia and Africa.