UniCredit

BPER Banca opened books for its inaugural sale of senior debt on Wednesday, giving investors their first chance to buy into a new issue from a second tier Italian bank during the Covid-19 pandemic.

UniCredit is only the second Italian bank to have accessed public primary bond markets during the coronavirus pandemic, but other lenders from the periphery of the eurozone are now lining up to bring deals of their own.

Hella, the German car parts maker, has signed a €500m syndicated revolving credit facility, as lenders highlight the sector as one of the most likely to feel long-term economic damage from the coronavirus pandemic.

La Banque Postale and Société Générale took advantage of favourable conditions in the financial institutions bond market on Monday to launch non-preferred senior deals in euros and make progress towards completing their 2020 funding plans.

Three European companies, one of them a high yield issuer, jumped into the corporate bond market on Friday, the first to test the waters after the European Central Bank's promise the previous day to top them up with another €600bn of liquidity through its Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme (Pepp). They found overwhelming demand, leading to fast sales, an increase and deeply negative new issue premiums.

Europe’s high grade corporate bond market saw a steady stream of trades this week, with the bigger than expected fresh wave of bond buying announced by the European Central Bank forecast to keep the rally in corporate credit going.

Crédit Mutuel Arkéa, Deutsche Bank and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group this week sourced environmental, social and governance senior funding in euros, amid a shortage of supply in the format.

Engie, the French electricity and gas company, braved the markets alone as the European Central Bank met on Thursday, with the bigger than expected fresh wave of bond buying announced forecast to keep the rally in corporate credit going.

Crédit Mutuel Arkéa has joined a fast-growing list of banks marketing Covid-19 response funding in the bond market, raising €750m in non-preferred senior format on Thursday to finance projects through its social bond framework that tackle the effects of the pandemic

Italy once again asserted its market access on Wednesday, raising a staggering €14bn — its biggest single tranche bond ever. The new issue was timed just ahead of Thursday’s ECB meeting, at which the governing council is expected to expand its Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme (Pepp).

Italy and the European Union will reboot the euro public sector bond market on Wednesday after announcing syndications of new 10 and 15 year bonds, respectively. The deals will come ahead of the European Central Bank’s meeting on Thursday, in which it is widely expected to increase the size of its Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme (Pepp).

Airbus, the European aircraft manufacturer, flattened its curve on Tuesday with a €3.5bn three tranche bond issue that commanded €15.1bn of demand. But European syndicate bankers said it offered no read-across for whether airlines might return to the bond market soon and that their chances of doing a deal were distant.