The Netherlands

Two deals were priced this week in the European corporate bond market, and next week already looks busier. With a roadshow under way and four others coming up, the window before September’s European Central Bank meeting looks full.

The two new issues that were priced in the European corporate bond market this week have both tightened from their reoffer spreads. The success of these deals has accelerated the thinking of some issuers and two more roadshows were announced on Thursday.

Aegon became the first financial institution to price a fixed-rate senior trade with a negative yield this week, attracting strong demand from European money market funds for the €500m one year senior deal.

Nederlandse Waterschapsbank brought some supply to the sparse long end of the SRI market on Tuesday, printing a trade that alongside Rentenbank was part of a strong re-emergence of euro supply after the summer.

The euro market for public sector borrowers appears to be fully reopening after the summer break, with a pair of issuers bringing mandates in very different tenors. Both trades are likely to benefit from the lack of supply over the last few weeks, said bankers.

Rabobank’s global head of long term funding, Sjaak-Jan Baars speaks to GlobalCapital about the benefits of covered bond funding, the bank’s expected frequency in the market, the outlook for spreads and prospects for green bonds.

Nederlandse Waterschapsbank on Thursday became the latest issuer to tap into a hot summer market for dollars, increasing a tap from its initial size while printing flat to its curve.

Aegon, the insurance firm, said on Thursday that it would raise senior debt in the third quarter of 2017 to pre-fund a €1bn capital injection into its Dutch unit.

Aegon has agreed to sell the independent financial advisory group Unirobe Meeùs Groep (UMG), boosting its Solvency II ratio by six percentage points ahead of announcing a “comprehensive plan” for its capital position in the Netherlands this week.

Public sector issuers are taking advantage of strong summer conditions in the dollar market to bring green and arbitrage-style deals, with more issuance expected next week.

The dollar market is grinding on throughout the summer, with public sector borrowers pushing out deals at the short end, although none have been in benchmark size this week. Two issuers launched transactions on Tuesday with a third slated to follow on Wednesday.

Senior bonds issued by Vivat, the Dutch insurer, attracted buying interest this week following fresh reports about the firm’s China-based parent company.