South Korea

Infrequent issuers are slowly returning to the Swiss franc market. During the past week, Eurofima brought its first Swissies deal in six years, while biotech firm Lonza printed its first bond in any currency since 2017.

The controlling shareholder of South Korean entertainment company Studio Dragon raised W166.1bn ($136.2m) this week after selling a portion of its stake.

Korea Development Bank raised $500m in a floating rate bond on Tuesday, opening the international debt market for other South Korean issuers.

South Korea's Shinhan Bank is hoping to sell a public dollar bond in April, following a virus-linked $50m private placement this month.

A trio of South East Asian issuers have visited the Hong Kong dollar market in the last two weeks, as a move in the basis spurred demand. Among the issuers was Korea’s state-owned mining company Korea Resources Corporation (KORES), which made its debut in the currency and in the MTN format on Monday.

Market participants should be braced for political volatility as the world comes close to experiencing a pandemic.

Big Hit Entertainment, manager of popular K-pop boy band BTS, has mandated four firms to run its IPO, according to a banker working on the deal.

Korea Development Bank raised $1.5bn from the bond market on Monday as investors showed strong support for the Aa2/AA/AA- rated issuer.

Asian issuers found strong response to their dollar bonds on Wednesday, coming to the market after a rough start to the week on the back of the coronavirus-related volatility. As investors show their willingness to take on risk again, debt bankers are optimistic the pressure on the market will be lifted before long, writes Morgan Davis.

The Export-Import Bank of Korea (Kexim) raised $500m from a five year bond on Wednesday, becoming one of the first borrowers to reopen the dollar market after Chinese New Year and the rapid spread of a new virus.

Asia's dollar bond market reopened on Wednesday amid volatility around the rapid spread of the novel coronavirus. But debt bankers in the region are cautiously optimistic about the state of the market.

Korean Housing Finance Corporation (KHFC) issued its first €1bn-sized covered bond and first negative yielding Asian covered bond on Wednesday. The strong reception was in keeping with two German Pfandbriefe also issued this week by Deutsche Apotheker- und Ärztebank (Dapo) and Sparkasse Pforzheim Calw.