Société Générale

The going was heavy for dollar borrowers as investors demanded extra concessions amid poor performance as CVS Healthcare’s trade from the previous week appeared to re-price the market.

Sanofi, the French pharmaceutical company, this week priced the largest European corporate bond deal of 2018 — an €8bn six-tranche deal. The company used only European banks as global co-ordinators for the sale, as the euro market proved that it is a viable market for jumbo financings.

Spanish telecoms company Telefonica announced the sale of new hybrid issues this week while also tendering for several of its outstanding hybrids. After more than a month since the last benchmark euro hybrid issue, investors contributed to an order book exceeding €4.5bn.

The potential end of eurozone quantitative easing may be leading to sleepless nights for some, but top tier SSAs are welcoming the slow return to historically normal rates. KfW this week sold its first five year euro benchmark with a positive yield in nearly three years, welcoming back investors that had gone elsewhere in search of return — and auguring well for future euro issuance from the sector.

Vonovia, the German housing company, issued €2.1bn of bonds on Thursday to finance its €5.2bn acquisition of Austrian peer Buwog, which was announced in December.

Republic of Côte d'Ivoire was already hitting milestones with its new dual tranche euro trade on Thursday. Its 30 year offering is both the longest ever euro bond from sub-Saharan Africa, and looks set to be one of the highest yielding euro-denominated bonds from any sovereign in recent years.

Société Générale said on Wednesday that Didier Valet, deputy chief executive of the bank and former head of CIB, would be leaving the group — a move driven by US authorities' investigation into the manipulation of Libor.

KfW built a towering book in the five year part of the euro curve on Wednesday with a deal that SSA bankers away from the trade said probably attracted heavy French demand. The agency’s choice of printing just €4bn from a book of over €8bn should ensure a tightening of its curve, they added.

A clean-up trade in shares of Veolia Environnement, the French environmental services company, by Qatari Diar, an arm of Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, failed to clear on Monday night, leaving Société Générale long the stock.

Sanofi, the French pharmaceutical company, priced on Wednesday the largest corporate bond deal so far in 2018, an €8bn six-tranche deal. The company regularly uses a multi-tranche approach to the market, but this was its largest deal so far in any currency.

A unit of Puma Energy is in the loan market, seeking $1.1bn across three tranches, according to a banker who received the invitation.

China’s Tianjin Rail Transit Group Co (TRT) and Chengdu Xingcheng Investment Group Co both dipped into the euro market on Tuesday, with the former printing a green bond.