Société Générale

Société Générale’s revamp of its investment bank, first announced in April, will refocus the bank’s financing efforts around sponsor-driven business, as corporate clients are not steering enough fees towards the bank to pay for its balance sheet commitments.

An undersupplied sterling bond market was on Wednesday given two new corporate deals to chew on: a £350m three year from carmaker BMW and a £250m no-grow eight year from UK retailer Marks & Spencer. Abertis Infraestructuras, the Spanish roll road operator, also offered a €1.3bn six and 10 year deal.

Société Générale has begun its planned round of redundancies and the first name GlobalCapital has associated with the cuts has been with the bank for over a decade.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia printed its debut bond in euros on Tuesday. The deal was widely hailed a success, sold with a minimal new issue premium, final order books of over €14.5bn and trading up well in the secondary.

Signs of weakness have crept into the FIG secondary market in recent days, but market participants expect that banks will carry on piling into the market ahead of blackout periods and an expected summer slowdown.

KfW and Bpifrance hit screens with taps of existing debt on Tuesday, with levels so tight that the sovereign, supranational and agency market’s best rated names are finding it trickier to get traction from investors.

Belgium’s Cofinimmo has amended and restated its revolving credit facility, with the real estate investment company ramping up the size of its bank line to €400m.

US-based energy trading firm Castleton Commodities International has signed $2.775bn of loan facilities, with European banks making up a large part of the group.

With emerging markets loan volumes half of what they were by this time last year, syndicate staff are facing job cuts and increased pressure to find ways to compete for what scraps of business there are. The battlegrounds will be pricing and covenants.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has tightened guidance for its dual tranche debut in the euro market, offering a 10bp new issue premium for its eight year and a 5bp concession for its 20 year, according to a syndicate official away from the deal. Combined books are over €10bn, including €1.5bn of joint lead manager interest.

A renewed appetite for risk was felt in Europe's corporate bond market this week, after US president Donald Trump appeared to have made overtures to the leaders of China and North Korea. Two issuers took advantage: Merck of Germany, with an acquisition financing, and ArcelorMittal, with a modest tap.

Saudi Arabia hit screens on Monday to announce its first ever euro benchmark — a dual tranche with eight year and 20 year tenors.