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THE LONG running saga of Lion Bioscience's Eu201m Nasdaq and Neuer Markt IPO came to an end yesterday (Thursday), when the deal priced at the top of the Eu37-Eu42 range with a 58 times oversubscription. The Deutsche Bank and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter-led deal will begin trading today (Friday), having been held up for more than two weeks by SEC complications similar to those that recently delayed deals by VimpelCom and Clearwave.

Hungarian telecoms company Matav has invited about 30 banks to bid on a Eu600m five year revolver to help fund the acquisition of mobile phone assets from Deutsche Telekom. The borrower, one of the top names in Hungary, already owns 51% of the mobile companies Westel 450 and Westel Mobile Telecommunications, and is set to acquire the remaining 49% for $885m. The balance will be raised from a Eurobond issue likely to be launched early next year.

THE TREND of big-ticket European buy-outs gathered pace earlier this week when Cinven, through special purpose purchasing vehicle BlueAzure, agreed with the management of McKechnie to buy out the aerospace and engineering group for £434m. Backing the leveraged transaction is £410m of senior debt arranged and underwritten by Morgan Stanley Dean Witter (bookrunner), Deutsche Bank and UBS Warburg. There is also a £40m mezzanine tranche.

THE TREND of big-ticket European buy-outs gathered pace earlier this week when Cinven, through special purpose purchasing vehicle BlueAzure, agreed with the management of McKechnie to buy out the aerospace and engineering group for £434m. Backing the leveraged transaction is £410m of senior debt arranged and underwritten by Morgan Stanley Dean Witter (bookrunner), Deutsche Bank and UBS Warburg. There is also a £40m mezzanine tranche.

Egypt

Neuer Markt IPOs still being marketed are facing increasing difficulty as investors take their customary August break. The turbulent conditions and heavy issuance calendar of the last few months has resulted in some deals being forced to wait until the summer to launch. Observers - notably those without deals in the market - have questioned the logic of selling new issues at this time.

Nestle has raised the ceiling off its debt issuance programme from euro2 billion ($1.83 billion) to euro4 billion.

Germany Optical technologies specialist Linos is scheduled to list on the Neuer Markt on September 4. The company will issue 1.54m shares, representing 31% of its assets. Of these shares, 1.245m will be capital increase, 155,000 will be secondary and 140,000 will make up the greenshoe.

Hungary Matav, the Hungarian telecoms operator, has appointed Schroder Salomon Smith Barney as its ratings adviser for a bond issue likely to be launched early next year.

* Cregem Finance NV

Brazil stole the limelight in the international equity markets yesterday (Thursday) with the $4bn sale of 180m shares in its oil concern Petroleo Brasileiro SA (Petrobras) - the largest global share offering from Latin America. International demand for the deal was so strong that over 60% of the offering was sold to international investors, and the ADRs, priced at $24, surged more than 12% in afternoon trading on the NYSE to $27.3125. Petrobras was the most actively traded issue of the day, with more than 27.17m shares traded.