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THE SUPPLY of new and secondary equity from Swiss corporates will boom this year as a result of new mood of openness to foreign investors among the country's corporates. Companies are changing as they have realised that they can attract a far higher valuation on their stock by widening their shareholdings to international investors.

TAFISA, a Spanish wood processor, offered domestic investors a rare taste of corporate risk this week, with the launch of a Pta5bn issue. Lead managed by Banker's Trust, the seven year floater pays a spread of 75bp over Mibor, the highest spread ever paid by a corporate borrower in Spain.

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THE GROWING turmoil in Asia and consequent spread widening across the dollar curve has revived memories of October 1997s stockmarket crash. Underwriters' inventories were overloaded at that time and the retail bid for paper had disappeared.

THE TURKISH authorities have invited eight international investment banks to bid for the top slot in the sale of the national carrier, Turkish Airlines. The move follows fast on the heels of last week's offering for Isbank, the success of which is widely expected to speed up a privatisation programme that had languished in neutral for a number of years.

UK AND international institutional investors, who for months have bemoaned the fact that UK new issue calendar for 1998 holds very few candidates for flotation, were cheered this week by that announcement that Tetley, the world's second largest maker of teabags, will list its shares on the London stock exchange in the summer. Following the successful sale of stock in Thomson which was completed this week, there will now be a much healthier supply from UK corporates. Before Tetley begins its flotation, Goldman Sachs will complete the sale of stock in Computacenter, the information technology distributing and services group, later this month.

* Countrywide Home Loans Inc Guarantor: Countrywide Credit Industries Inc

WestLB (facility agent) and Den Danske (documentation agent) have received strong interest in their £150m seven year revolving credit for the Derbyshire Building Society. The loan, which was launched into general syndication two weeks ago, carries a margin of 15bp over Libor and a commitment fee of 6.5bp. Arrangers are hoping for an oversubscription.

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LEHMAN Brothers is planning to break into the crowded European principal finance market. The bank's global asset based lending group (GABL) has carved out a niche in the US by offering highly leveraged secured loans to small and medium sized businesses. GABL has now begun to originate deals in Europe. "We will aim to provide companies with a complete range of financing alternatives, including equity, mezzanine debt, working capital, senior secured warehouse lines and securitisation," said Atul Bajpai, managing director of mortgage and asset backed finance at Lehman in London, who is heading the push.