UBS

Ronshine China Holdings has raised HK$1.2bn ($155.6m) after a selling a chunk of shares through a top-up placement, according to a filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on Monday morning.

Razer started taking orders on Monday for a Hong Kong IPO that could be worth as much as HK$4.3bn ($545.0m). About a third of the book has already been covered by cornerstone investors, even though some bankers think the valuation looks stretched.

China Minmetals Corporation is sounding out investors for its inaugural perpetual offshore bond. It will meet with fixed income accounts early next week.

Equity volatility has threatened a comeback in the past week as markets prepared for the European Central Bank meeting on Thursday. But after the ECB performed within market expectations, announcing a 50% reduction in its bond buying programme, fear gauges settled down once again.

The $1.5bn flotation of EN+, the aluminium and power company controlled by Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, in London and Moscow is coming during a hot time for the aluminium market and will help to seal a partnership between Russian producer Rusal and Glencore.

The growth in passive asset management has been one of the biggest trends in equity markets over the past decade. Savers are constantly told passive funds are a much cheaper way to buy the market than active asset managers, who try to beat the market. The logic of that is questionable, but as Jon Hay reports, new research from UBS suggests active managers are outperforming — in Europe, at least.

ABH Financial, the holding company of Russian issuer Alfa Bank, returned to the Swiss franc market on Tuesday, with a refinancing of a Sfr85m ($85.6m) January 2018 that almost doubled the size of the original issue. The transaction came just days after Russian investment company 01 Properties pulled a debut deal after finding insufficient support for a four year bond.

Shares in Bawag, the Austrian banking group, closed below their offer price on Wednesday after the company priced its €1.68bn IPO at €48 a share, near the bottom of the initial €47 to €52 range.

One of the biggest IPOs in London this year was revealed on Monday when Arqiva, the UK’s largest operator of TV and radio broadcast towers, launched an IPO with a projected valuation of about £5.5bn.

En+ Group, the Russian power and metals company controlled by Oleg Deripaska, has opened the books for its $1.5bn IPO in London and Moscow, which may value it at up to $8.5bn if the deal is priced at the top of its price range.

China-based Rise Education has wrapped up a Nasdaq IPO worth $159.5m after pricing the stock above the initial guidance range, according to a source close to the deal.

With asset prices inflated to levels that would have seemed impossible a few years ago, capital market participants are looking forward to the European Central Bank’s (ECB’s) eventual exit from its quantitative easing (QE) programme with a mix of hope and dread, writes Lewis McLellan.