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The Republic of the Philippines continued to enhance its status as Asia's most sophisticated and prolific borrower with the launch this week of its most ambitious offering to date. With its exchange of Brady debt for new uncollateralised global bonds, the republic should further distance itself from the ranks of stigmatised debtor nations, ease its current fiscal burden and greatly increase the flexibility of its liability management.

The Korean bank recovery story took a turn for the worse this week with the postponement of Korea Exchange Bank's $1bn GDR recapitalisation issue. The Morgan Stanley Dean Witter-led deal had been hanging in the balance since launch following a steep decline in the underlying stock in the wake of the Daewoo Group crisis.

The launch of China Telecom's (CT) combined equity and debt offering has moved closer following the formal announcement this week of its $6.4bn acquisition of three Mainland cellular operators in Fujian, Henan and Hainan provinces. The company confirmed its intention to launch a $500m five year debt issue, with concurrent debt and equity roadshows scheduled to start the week beginning October 18, and pricing of both offerings to be completed by the end of October. Moody's and Standard & Poor's have also released ratings, with the former placing the company two notches lower than the sovereign at Baa2 and S&P in line with its BBB sovereign ceiling.

n General Electric Capital Corp's ambitions to become the first international credit to access Thailand's domestic bond market appears on track despite prolonged regulatory debate over the merits of allowing in offshore borrowers. Having mandated Citicorp for a Bt4bn ($100m) offering and filing it with the Bank of Thailand, the group is hoping to launch the deal before year end. In line with normal practice in other markets, GECC had proposed using its offshore funding arm as the borrowing vehicle, but retaining proceeds in baht to finance its Thai operations.

First time issuer Electronic Data Systems Corporation (EDS) attracted a staggering $9bn of orders this week for its $1.5bn first ever public debt offering as US investors, starved of supply, swamped the few new deals available. The global transaction, led by Merrill Lynch and Salomon Smith Barney, attracted more than 250 investors and was priced very close to the bid side of comparables with launch spreads of 94bp for a $500m five year tranche, 112.5bp for a $700m 10 year offering and 122bp for a $300m 30 year portion.

Market commentary Compiled by Jim Webber,

Crédit Foncier de France this week launched the first ever issue of obligations foncières, opening France’s new Pfandbrief style market and placing the new product closer to the massive German market than any other European mortgage bonds to date.