UK

Initial price thoughts have been indicated for TSB’s first UK prime RMBS deal, with the transaction offering a pick up on both the euro and sterling tranches for investors, compared to more established issuers.

Yorkshire Building Society offered a chunky premium for its €500m of seven year covered bond on Tuesday. With only a modest oversubscription, it was not able to tighten pricing.

Standard Chartered moved to shore up its capital ratios on Tuesday, as it launched a long-expected rights issue, totalling £3.3bn ($5.1bn). Bank of America Merrill Lynch and JP Morgan have fully underwritten the deal.

The former chief executive officer of clearing house LCH.Clearnet has become CEO of a risk solutions firm as it launches a platform for margining bilateral non-cleared, over-the-counter derivatives trades

BNP Paribas’ former co-head of fixed income has resurfaced at New York headquartered M&A advisory shop Foros as a senior advisor.

FCE Bank, the UK-based European financing arm of Ford, picked its timing to perfection for its fourth bond issue of the year, on Monday.

Worldpay, the UK payments processing company, on Thursday sold its first bond issue, a €500m deal — in what could be the busiest string of seven trading days since July, with four more deals roadshowing.

Shire, the UK pharmaceutical company, has agreed to acquire US biopharmaceuticals company Dyax for $5.9bn in cash. Deutsche Bank and Morgan Stanley are arranging financing.

Westpac has mandated leads and opened books for a dollar benchmark covered bond, to be priced on Monday. And in euros, Yorkshire Building Society (YBS) has mandated leads for a €500m no-grow seven year benchmark, to be launched on Tuesday.

A poor third quarter for Commerzbank’s investment banking division and the announced retirement of its chief executive has done little to spoil the bank’s overall sense of momentum, as it posted better profits than had been widely expected and revealed it would pay its first dividend in eight years.

Investec Bank signed its third and fourth syndicated loans of the year last Friday, and held a bank meeting this week for its fifth loan. The bank plans to stick to smaller, more regular loans in a volatile environment for emerging markets.

Western Power Distribution, the UK electricity distribution network operator, kept the sterling corporate bond market’s run of form going on Wednesday with a £500m eight year issue.