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Sol Melia is due to sign a euro1.5 billion ($1.34 billion) Euro-MTN programme in the next few days. The issuer will join seven other Spanish corporates in the market. Deutsche Bank is the arranger. Deutsche Bank will be lead bookrunner off the inaugural issue. Sol Melia, a hotel chain, has not yet set a date for the first note. But it is thought that it will be launched before the end of the year and that the amount will be approximately euro300 million. Sol Melia set the programme up specifically for the funding of its acquisition of Tryp, a Spanish hotel chain with properties in Cuba and Tunisia. The acquisition will make Sol Melia one of the 10 largest hotel companies in the world. Arancha Sanchez-Flor, Sol Melia's director of financial markets, explains why Deutsche Bank was chosen as arranger. She says: "We appointed Deutsche Bank as arranger because it offered the full package of services required for the Tryp transaction." Sanchez-Flor says that the timing of the bond is crucial and Sol Melia will wait for an appropriate time to announce the date. She adds: "The first issue will probably be allocated in Europe, while a relatively small portion will be sold to institutional investors in Spain. We will roadshow in Europe and, if market conditions permit, we will launch the inaugural bond soon after." Funding off the programme will also help Sol Melia buy two hotel properties in addition to the acquisition of Tryp. Deutsche Bank is assisting by supplying two mortgages for the deal. Sol Melia is no stranger to the capital markets and issued a euro200 million convertible bond in September last year. Sanchez-Flor says that the ceiling of the shelf is higher than they are expected to need. She says: "How much we raise in the next year depends on the expansion plans of Sol Melia. Euro1.5 billion is really a generous estimate of how much we will need and we hope not to reach that limit for the following two years." Sol Melia is rated BBB+ by Standard & Poor's. There is only one other hotel chain issuer in the MTN market: Hilton Group, rated BBB. Sanchez-Flor says: "We are very happy with our BBB+ rating, as it is the highest rating in the industry and although we have a negative outlook this is a temporary decision. We will hold the annual meeting with S&P to review our rating in the following weeks." It is rumoured that Lehman Brothers, Golman Sachs, UBS Warburg and Merrill Lynch will be included on the dealer panel.

The Republic of Turkey successfully raised nearly $1bn in prefunding for 2001 with two quickly executed increases of existing bonds, taking the sovereign's international funding this year to over $7bn. Turkey hit its $6bn target for 2000 in July.

* UBS Warburg will price CRH's 5% placing today (Friday), raising around Eu365m for the Dublin-based road building materials company. The firm is listed in Dublin and on Nasdaq but has its main listing on the LSE. The accelerated bookbuild was launched on Tuesday and closed yesterday (Thursday) comfortably covered, according to bankers.

The United Mexican States this week continued the trend of Latin sovereigns buying back expensive debt when it announced an offer to repurchase Sfr280m ($159m) of Swiss franc denominated 30 year Brady bonds. Taking advantage of an 11 year low on the Swiss franc and a strong Mexican peso, the UMS said it would pay Sfr78 per Sfr100 principal, plus any accrued and unpaid interest up to the day before the offer expires on September 26.

RBS has arranged a £22m senior debt facility and a £6.5m mezzanine strip to finance the acquisition of Cygnet Healthcare Limited by Cygnet 2000 Limited, a company formed by RBS and Asset Backed Securities Limited, and the management of Cygnet Healthcare Limited. The acquisition provides an exit for institutional investors 3i, HSBC Private Equity and F&C Ventures. The management team will roll over most of their existing investment into Cygnet 2000.

Commonwealth Bank of Australia this week launched one of the largest ever Australian MBS to an enthusiastic reception from US and Australian investors. The deal offered a $1.1bn global tranche led by Merrill Lynch - its first bookrunning role on a cross-border Australian MBS - and A$427m of domestic bonds placed by CBA.

Allstate Life Funding LLC Rating: AA+

Japanese investors showed signs of emerging market fatigue this week when the United Mexican States launched a ¥50bn four year Samurai deal. The offering, underwritten by Daiwa, carried a 2.25% coupon and was considered fairly priced at 105bp over yen Libor. But although Mexico is one of the most sought after Latin issuers in Japan, some bankers involved in the deal said Japanese investors were beginning to reach saturation point on how much emerging market paper they could absorb.

France SG has been mandated to arrange a Eu610m revolving credit for property firm SFL and is working on forming a co-arranging group.

Having completed European roadshows yesterday (Thursday), Telefónica will begin the US leg of premarketing for its $5bn plus equivalent transaction today (Friday). Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter are expected to launch the issue soon after roadshows end on Tuesday. The deal is not expected to carry a ratings sensitive coupon and should be priced at a slight premium to Deutsche Telekom. Five, 10 and 30 year dollar tranches are expected, along with a Eu1bn five year piece.

Coca-Cola Amatil has increased the ceiling of its $1 billion Euro debt issuance programme to $2 billion. It has raised $106.82 million of seven issues since July.

Thank you to Allen Wheat at CSFB for providing an exciting finale to what was otherwise a relatively quiet August. Wheaty's bid for little DLJ lit a fire under the investment banking sector and fat cat Euromarketeers were able to sit back on their yachts and watch their already substantial private fortunes soar into the pale blue beyond. With our own holdings in DLJ bought at $42 per share and sold (just in case Wheaty changed his mind) at $86.50 plus our Lehman stock crashing through the $140 barrier, we were almost tempted to spend another fortnight in Sotogrande. However, as our friends and our editors have reminded us, five weeks' holiday was already right over the top. But has Allen Wheat made a mistake? The DLJ shareholders certainly do not think so and at the full $90 per share, Joe Roby and John Chalsty must have shares and options in the firm worth $300m each. That is not bad for an organisation which never threatened to darken the front door of the bulge bracket club and always used the tradesmen's entrance. When the original founders, Bill Donaldson, Dan Lufkin and Bill Jenrette publicly floated the company in 1970, no one on Wall Street outside the firm took much notice. If you had suggested that one day it might be bought for $11.5bn, your feet would not have touched the ground before the men in white coats had you in the ambulance.