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The bond markets continued their recovery this week, and with many borrowers joining the new issue pipeline, a return to normality is approaching. Sentiment was lifted by a further 50bp rate cut from the US Federal Reserve. In the dollar market, US oil company Conoco tested appetite for triple-B credits and passed with flying colours, increasing its three tranche fixed rate bond to $3.5bn from $2.5bn. A 30 year tranche was added at the last moment in response to investor feedback, joining five and 10 year tranches.

In a move that prompted speculation about its top level fixed income management, Merrill Lynch's Kelly Martin is to replace Win Smith as head of the international private client group. At the same time, Tom Davis moves from running the corporate and institutional group to run an expanded private equity business. He becomes a vice chairman of Merrill Lynch & Co. Smith, who as well as running the private client side of the business was chairman of Merrill Lynch International, has decided to retire - a decision he took after hearing of Martin's move, and apparently after it was announced.

In a move that prompted speculation about its top level fixed income management, Merrill Lynch's Kelly Martin is to replace Win Smith as head of the international private client group. At the same time, Tom Davis moves from running the corporate and institutional group to run an expanded private equity business. He becomes a vice chairman of Merrill Lynch & Co. Smith, who as well as running the private client side of the business was chairman of Merrill Lynch International, has decided to retire - a decision he took after hearing of Martin's move, and apparently after it was announced.

SBAB has dropped Lehman Brothers and the Industrial Bank of Japan from its $8 billion Euro-MTN programme. Barclays Capital has been added to the dealer panel.

Finland Nordea and SEB have been mandated to arrange a Eu100m five year multi-currency revolver for KCI Konecranes.

Hypothekenbank in Essen has upped its euro10 billion ($9.14 billion) Euro-MTN programme to euro15 billion. The facility, which is arranged by Merrill Lynch and Commerzbank, has $8.84 billion outstanding.

Sri Lanka Sole mandated arranger Standard Chartered has confirmed that syndication of the $75m one year trade financing for Bank of Ceylon is progressing well, but slowly. The deal is expected to close marginally oversubscribed next week.

The City of Moscow kicked off its roadshow in London yesterday (Thursday), headed by the city's phlegmatic debt committee chairman, Sergey Pakhomov. Speaking at a press conference, Pakhomov immodestly pointed to Moscow's credentials as a quasi-sovereign credit. "We are the biggest Russian sub-sovereign entity by population," he said.

The Eu2.4bn credit backing the acquisition of Irish fixed line telephony group Eircom by Valentia Telecommunications was launched late on Tuesday, following the announcement on Monday that Valentia had received acceptances for 84% of Eircom's shares. Mandated arrangers of the loan are Allied Irish Banks, Bank of Ireland, Barclays, Deutsche Bank (joint bookrunner) and Goldman Sachs (joint bookrunner).

Argentine bond spreads gapped out to historic wides this week as the threat of default on the sovereign's $132bn of debt once again gripped the emerging markets. The Argentine composite spread in the EMBI Plus index was trading yesterday (Thursday) at 1802bp, its widest level since the index was created. This compares with 1478bp just before September 11 and 880bp when the sovereign completed its $29.5bn debt swap in early June.

The global repercussions of the terrible events that occurred in the US on September 11 are still becoming apparent. As financial minds attempt to quantify the likelihood of a global recession in the face of lower consumer confidence in the US and elsewhere, supermarket credits have again taken up the mantle and offered investors a defensive option. Vivek Ahuja reports.

The 189 syndicated loans signed in the Euromarket in the July to September period is the lowest number of deals completed in any quarter since 1992, according to figures from Dealogic. Volume has also dropped, from $140.98m in the second quarter to $111.25m in the third quarter of 2001. The quarterly volumes are the lowest recorded since the first quarter of 1999.