United States

Lyft, the US ride sharing app, has hit the gas on its Nasdaq IPO this week, which promises to be the largest technology listing in New York since Alibaba floated in 2014. The deal is a fee bonanza for Lyft’s banks but it has also reignited the debate about dual class share structures. The LSE and UK regulators should maintain corporate governance standards, and resist competitive pressures to follow New York, Hong Kong and Singapore by allowing them.

The Depository Trust & Clearing Corp has agreed a deal to provide post-trade infrastructure services to enable SEB, the Swedish banking group, to meet its obligations under the Securities Financing Transactions Regulation.

US Solar Fund, the new investment trust focused on US solar power assets, has extended the bookbuilding period for its $250m IPO on the London Stock Exchange, citing political and economic uncertainty caused by the Brexit process in the UK.

The Japanese Financial Services Agency (JFSA) published risk retention rules on Friday that allow Japanese investors to avoid capital charges even if they buy debt from non-risk retention compliant deals.

In this round-up, trade talks between the United States and China continued, the Foreign Investment Law was passed by the National People’s Congress and the US urged Germany to ban Huawei

PepsiCo took one of its rare sips at the euro bond market on Monday, and was rewarded with two bonds, seen as priced flat to and through its curve.

Financial institutions, ranging from Wall Street heavyweights to regional lenders, dominated the dollar bond market this week, offering supply across the size and credit rating spectra.

Dollar borrowers continued to enjoy decent spreads this week but syndicates complained of indigestion as foreign investors scuttled to the sidelines.

The exceptionally strong demand in Europe’s corporate bond market has remained unaffected by the turmoil in the UK’s Parliament, as MPs vote night after night on repeated motions that could determine the country’s future inside or outside Europe. On Thursday, two issuers attracted huge books: Marsh & McLennan Companies, the US insurance and investment services group making its debut in euros, and Incommunities Group, a Leeds-based housing association, in sterling.

Several CLO issuers in the US and Europe have come to depend on Japanese investors to anchor triple-A tranches, but observers say Japan’s banks may no longer be able to soak up foreign paper if a bubbling banking crisis forces banks to clean up their act at home.

Up Fintech, parent of online trading platform Tiger Brokers, has launched bookbuilding for a smaller-than-expected $91m IPO.

Deutsche Telekom became the latest blue chip company to issue a two tranche bond with no new issue concession on Tuesday, making it three deals out of three so far this week that have come without any sweetener for investors, compared with secondary spreads.