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GLOBAL co-ordinator Salomon Smith Barney will next week launch the sale of stock in Christiania Bank in a deal that will raise around Nkr2.8bn ($350m). The deal will be the first of this year's large bank stock sales from the Nordic region. The region's markets were due to host several such divestments last year, but many were put on hold as international investors re-rated financial stocks in the light of the global financial crisis.

The Republic of Colombia turned its back on difficult euro markets this week and instead went to the US bond market to raise $500m. The deal, led by JP Morgan (books), Chase and Merrill Lynch, was a five year structured issue with a one year option to exchange par for par the new 2004s for a new bond maturing in 2028 that will be issued next year.

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Corporate issuers stepped up their assault on the euro market this week as investors' appetite for corporate paper overcame concerns over market volatility. With a range of diverse credits queuing up to tap European investors' new-found taste for risk, the deal flow should maintain a heady pace. But a hastily prepared and difficult Eu1bn 10 year transaction for Elf Aquitaine showed the dangers of taking the corporate bid for granted. Carrefour followed a more thorough route for a similarly dated and sized issue, and was rewarded with attractive funding and a warm reception.

The diversity of credits issuing in the euro bond markets continues to amaze investment bankers, as the pipeline of new issues in the booming new currency sector - which for the first two months of the year has overshadowed the dollar bond markets - reaches full to overflowing. Successful issues are no longer the certainty they sometimes appeared to be in previous weeks. Swap spreads have come in by 10bp to 15bp, and credit spreads by similar margins.

Croatia The debut deal for around $100m for telecoms company VIP-net from Croatia is being arranged and lead managed by the Vienna branch of Creditanstalt. The proceeds will be used to expand the company's network. VIP-net's main shareholder is Austrian telecoms company Mobilkom.

The European Investment Bank demonstrated its intention to be bracketed in the same class as Europe's leading sovereign borrowers this week when it launched its Euro Area Reference Notes (EARNs) programme for issuance of its benchmark euro denominated transactions. As revealed last week in Euroweek, the EARNs facility - arranged by ABN Amro and Paribas - will attempt to mirror the borrowing programmes of EU governments.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) has launched the first issue off its newly established Ck30bn domestic MTN programme. Lead managed by Commerzbank Capital Markets (Eastern Europe), which also arranged the programme, the Ck3bn 10 year bond yielded the equivalent of 40bp through Pribor.

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Brazil * Banco ABN Amro SA

THE CITY of Prague has invited banks to submit bids for a Eu200m loan with the mandate to be awarded by the end of March. The city is the highest rated municipality in eastern Europe, standing at A- from Standard and Poor's. The deal is an important development for the region because there has been little activity so far this year.

* Santander International Ltd Guarantor: Banco de Santander SA de Crédito