Southeast Asia

Standard Chartered has appointed Michael Spiegel as global head of transaction banking, succeeding Lisa Robins, who is retiring from the banking industry.

Carlos ‘Sonny’ Dominguez, finance minister of the Philippines, has been forced to swap long-term planning for emergency responses to the coronavirus. He talks to GlobalCapital about what comes next.

Credit Suisse has named Mark Uy as its country manager for the Philippines, effective December 1.

Indonesian instant noodle maker Indofood CBP Sukses Makmur has closed syndication of its $2.05bn-equivalent acquisition loan. The allocations are expected to be out in the next few weeks.

Commodities trading company Glencore Agriculture is making its loan debut in Asia, seeking $300m from the syndication market as a way to establish itself in the region and show its independence from its parent. The thin pricing on offer means only banks keen to build a relationship with the company in the hope of getting ancillary business will jump in, writes Pan Yue.

MUFG Securities Asia has hired Shailesh Venkatraman for a newly-created position leading DCM origination for south and southeast Asia.

A large number of issuers from Asia, the majority Chinese, tapped bond investors on Wednesday for fresh funds.

Formosa Plastics Corp has shortlisted six banks to arrange a multi-tranche financing for its Vietnam business.

Deutsche Bank has grown its environmental, social and governance (ESG) team in Asia Pacific with a new hire.

Hong Kong’s securities watchdog has fined Goldman Sachs $350m for regulatory failures in its work on bonds issued by the scandal-hit Malaysian state investment fund 1MDB, part of a multi-billion-dollar settlement with global regulators.

United Overseas Bank achieved the tightest spread for a five year floating rate bank issue in Australian dollars in over 10 years this week, issuing A$750m ($532.0m) to prove that there is still demand at decade-low levels.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has substantially increased its covered bond issuance limit which had stood at 4% of assets on an issuer’s balance sheet. This, along with very strong market conditions, should help to induce the country’s borrowers, which have not printed in euros for more than two years, to make an appearance before the year is out.