UK Sovereign

It’s the moment you have all been waiting for. More hotly anticipated than the reopening of the Russian loan market, GlobalCapital has opened the poll to decide the winners of its Syndicated Loans & Leveraged Finance Awards.

UK challenger bank Virgin Money has received enough demand from investors to list in London next week, only a day after the start of bookbuilding.

British media and events firm UBM is set to raise about £565m through a rights issue that will part fund its acquisition of a peer, Advanstar.

High yield investors are becoming fussier, after a year when weakly covenanted deals have proliferated.

Ontex, the Belgian nappy maker, priced on Wednesday its €250m high yield bond at par with a 4.75% coupon, as part of a debt restructuring that made Moody’s upgrade its rating one notch to Ba3.

Virgin Money set terms on its IPO on Wednesday, a day after resurrecting the flotation. It was pulled in mid-October amid plunging markets and regulatory worries.

Turkish port operator Global Liman İşletmeleri (Global Ports) on Thursday reduced its debut bond issue by $25m to $250m and priced it at with an 8.125% coupon at a reoffer price of 99.345.

The Bank of England's unveiling of plans to look into providing Shariah liquidity facilities for UK Islamic banks was one of the highlights at last week’s World Islamic Economic Forum in Dubai. It’s a great idea, but there’s just one problem – this should have been done ages ago.

European companies from beleaguered industries, new to the market or under investor pressure had better think twice before they enter a high yield market willing to teach them a lesson before the year ends.

UK challenger bank Virgin Money today restarted its planned London IPO, after having put the deal on hold last month, as a keenly awaited decision from the Bank of England reassured the issuer.

Asset managers River and Mercantile launched an IPO of a new fund on Tuesday, which will invest in micro cap firms.

Fever-Tree, a British firm that makes high end tonics for drinks, completed an IPO on London's AIM on Tuesday.