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BANCO Santander will next week launch the sale of stock in Spain's leading brewer and wine-maker, Bodegas Paternina, in a key test of the Spanish market's receptiveness to new issues. The deal will be the first to emerge since the recent global market turmoil erupted and its fate may set the stage for the many other deals in the wings.

Dale Somerville has joined Paribas' loan syndications team in Paris. Somerville joins from Crédit Lyonnais's Paris loans team and will cover French multinationals and local authorities, Emmanual Bresson has also been hired for the Paribas loans team. Bresson will cover project finance and media and joins from Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi in Paris.

WHILE INSURANCE securities issued as bonds have enjoyed the limelight, a market in derivative structures offering exposure to insurance risk is quietly flourishing in the shadows. At the end of June, Paribas and AXA arranged a catastrophe option to provide reinsurance against a Californian earthquake for an undisclosed US insurance company.

ARRANGERS of the £700m facility for Railtrack -- Barclays, Deutsche, HSBC and JP Morgan -- have priced the transaction, Euroweek can exclusively reveal. The loan carries a margin of 45bp, stepping up to 55bp. However, the four banks are unlikely to launch the financing until October.

SPECULATION that Chase Manhattan's £1.5bn five year revolving credit for Royal & Sun Alliance was failing to attract enough banks at the co-arranging level was rife this week. However, the deal's supporters also rallied round and struck out against the deal's detractors. When the deal was made public, many bankers were taken aback by the margin -- a punchy 22.5bp over Libor. Many saw it as too skinny and unsympathetic to market conditions. Others confidently predicted that the deal would crash as a result of lack of market appetite.

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THE RUSSIAN loan market, after collapsing last week, was pronounced dead this week by the international syndicated loan market. In the short term, there can be no return for Russian borrowers, be they banks, corporates or local authorities -- despite losses on loans expected to be minimal compared to losses on trading and hedging contracts. Even trade and pre-export financings -- usually the two techniques impervious to market conditions -- have been dropped by lenders. While Russia remains the main talking point among loan market players many bankers are beginning to focus on the impact that the crisis is having on the rest of central and eastern Europe.

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POLITICAL upheaval overshadowed the economic turmoil in Russia this week after the Russian parliament rejected Viktor Chernomyrdin's candidacy for prime minister in the first round of voting on Monday. A second vote will be held today (Friday), with most observers convinced that president Yeltsin's candidate will again be rejected by the left-dominated lower house.

LONDON bankers will shortly pitch to lead managers Robert Fleming and Dresdner Kleinwort Benson for syndicate slots in the demutualisation of the South African life assurance group, SanLam. Earlier this year the company announced its intention to float on the Johannesburg stockmarket and, until recent turbulence in world equity markets, the deal was expected to play well to an audience including international buyers. Despite the tough market conditions the group still plans to list locally and to complete its demutualisation before the end of the year.

Denmark ABN Amro, Citibank and Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi have launched the co-arranging phase of the $500m credit facility for Borealis, the Danish petrochemicals company.

Market commentary Compiled by Tawanda Nyandoro, RBC DS Global Markets, London. Tel: +44 171-653 4870