UK

UK media company Entertainment One has tapped its outstanding 6.875% bonds due 2022 for £70m ($97.6m), as the company looks to snap up the remaining stake in the television studio Mark Gordon Company that it does not already own.

Deutsche Bank plans to put up to 40 bankers at director level and above in its EMEA investment banking division at risk of redundancy, including the bank's co-head of FIG DCM, GlobalCapital understands. Several of those put at risk were based in Birmingham, including the bank’s head of Europe-US private placements.

Entertainment One, the UK media company, has tapped its 6.875% bond due 2022 for a further £70m, as it seeks to snap up the remaining stake in television studio Mark Gordon Co that it does not already own.

United Utilities became the third UK corporate issuer to sell a sterling bond in 2018, when it printed a seven year deal 24 hours later than initially planned. The company held an investor call on Monday, but then paused for a day due to global markets' volatility, before launching the deal on Wednesday.

Anglo-Dutch consumer goods company Unilever has become known in the corporate bond markets for its multiple tranche deals. Its latest deal is its third such trade in the last three years, and investors showed they still have plenty of appetite for the name, helping the company print its largest ever deal, despite market turmoil in the US.

Global stock markets have suffered from volatility in recent trading sessions but European primary leveraged finance markets had already slowed down as investor pressure grew around a €1.4bn deal for storage firm Algeco Scotsman and the worrying performance of UK retailer New Look.

TalkTalk Telecom Group, the UK provider of telecoms and broadband services, raised £200m on Thursday from an intra-day capital increase after issuing a profit warning.

United Utilities became the third corporate issuer to sell a sterling bond in 2018, when it printed a seven year deal 24 hours later than initially planned. The company held an investor call on Monday, but then paused for a day due to global markets' volatility, before launching the deal on Wednesday.

Panda bond issuance has so far been dominated by overseas-incorporated Chinese names. That bolsters volumes, but it does little to help the market fulfil its role of boosting RMB internationalisation. Policymakers have the chance to fix it — but only if they are bold enough to let markets play a bigger role.

The UK Debt Management Office drew praise on Tuesday as it priced the final syndication of its 2017-18 financial year at the tight end of a tiny guidance range. Bankers said that result, coupled with the behaviour of the UK’s outstanding curve over the course of the deal, was particularly impressive given a turbulent backdrop in the wider financial markets.

Ocado, the UK online grocer, raised £143m of fresh equity on Tuesday morning in an early day accelerated bookbuild led by Goldman Sachs and Numis Securities that finished “a few times covered”, according to a banker involved.

After a year of predictions that a bear market is coming off the back of monetary policy normalisation, people shouldn’t be surprised that investors are a little jumpy.