South America

Argentina presented investors with a pricing conundrum on Wednesday when the sovereign came to market with its first euro-denominated deal since its 2001 default.

After a slow start to the week, emerging market investors were offered a smorgasbord of options as borrowers from four continents and across the credit spectrum launched bonds in dollars and euros.

NN Investment Partners has added two new hires to its emerging market debt teams in New York and the Netherlands.

Colombia’s dollar bonds slumped on Monday despite a rally in oil after the country shocked observers and pollsters by voting to reject a proposed peace accord between the government and Farc guerrillas.

There are signs of resistance from bondholders struggling to see the value in primary bond deals, but Latin America’s new issue market marched on this week with three corporates issuing on Thursday.

Peru took advantages of renewed enthusiasm for its economy and highly favourable market conditions to sell PEN10.252bn ($3.02bn) of 12 year sol-denominated bonds as part of a liability management exercise on Wednesday and Thursday.

Peru continued to chip away at its dollar debt on Wednesday with a nuevo sol-denominated 12 year bond, the new money component of which will be used to finance a cash tender for dollar bonds.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch has hired former Credit Suisse fixed income sales banker Jose Hernandez-Ortiz as senior vice-president on its EM Lat Am solutions desk, GlobalCapital understands.

Venezuelan state oil giant PDVSA is considering sweetening its exchange offer to bondholders in an effort to push out debt maturities, after last week’s debt swap proposal received little traction.

Brazilian cement company Votorantim Cimentos (VotoCim) began meeting fixed income investors on Thursday ahead of a potential bond issue that will be used to buy back one or two existing euro-denominated notes.

The Republic of Argentina is set to continue its huge year of bond issuance with its first euro-denominated trade since its 2001 default. The announcement comes after the finance ministry said it would need to raise up to $15bn of international debt next year.

New funding possibilities in the Swiss franc bond market for lower rated issuers have been opened up by a ground-breaking Sfr300m issue for YPF, the Argentine state oil company, writes Silas Brown.