It has not always been easy, but the global debt capital markets have grown year-on-year by 4% to US$4.2trn in the first nine months of 2012. Access is a long way from comprehensive, but central bank presidents’ comments – well, one in particular – have helped to open markets further. To view the digital version of this report, please <a href="http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk//launch.aspx?eid=db8b4379-c44b-4c2a-b9c4-1a5ca6606f7e" onclick="window.open(this.href);retur

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. For the year to September 10, total international debt capital market issuance out of Latin America amounted to US$67bn against US$92bn for the whole of last year and US$86bn in 2010, according to data from Thomson Reuters. Brazil is the biggest issuer this year at US$29.66bn (44.3% of the total) against Mexico with US$17.56bn (26.2%) and Chile with US$4.9bn (7.4%). Brazil issued a total of US$36.3bn (39.4%) against Mexico with US$20

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. Brazil’s financial institutions are forecast to issue between US$15bn and US$20bn during the next 12 months and a great proportion of the issuance is expected to count towards Tier 2, according to Fitch. The Brazilian central bank has not yet decided on the cut-off date for Tier 2 issuance but it is widely expected to be some time next year. This year a number of Brazilian banks have already issued Tier 2 bonds. At the start of Augus

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. The records have been tumbling since the beginning of August. Semiconductor and computer technology company Texas Instruments priced a US$750m August 2015 with a 0.45% coupon. A few hours before that Unilever priced a US$450m bond of the same tenor at the same coupon. At the same time the British-Dutch multinational priced a US$550m five-year with a record coupon of 0.85%. The volume shows no sign of abating. This year is set to be a

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. The year started so well. In mid-March, state-owned Development Bank of Mongolia sold a debut US$580m five-year Reg S bond via Deutsche Bank, HSBC and ING. It priced at par to yield 5.75%, comfortably inside initial guidance levels of 6.00%–6.25%; it drew orders totalling US$6.25bn; and attracted more than 300 investors. Even though the bonds carry an unconditional and irrevocable guarantee from the Ministry of Finance on behalf of t

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. The renminbi market remains the local currency market for Asia. Issuance volumes in the renminbi fixed-income market in the year-to-date already stand at Rmb125bn (US$19.7bn) versus a whole year of Rmb150bn in 2011, according to Barclays. “This year renminbi issuance is going to exceed last year’s level. The second quarter was a record quarter in the market,” said Jon Pratt, head of Asia-Pacific DCM for Barclays in Hong Kong. But the

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. Despite declining sentiment around the eurozone and the difficulty of selling paper, some financials have seen the advantages of the Samurai market. For the right names, the Japanese market has been open. The year certainly started well for European names. January saw DNB Bank sell its debut Samurai offering, a ¥65bn (US$837m) five-year bond fixed at Libor plus 140bp via Daiwa Capital Markets, Mizuho and Nomura. In June, Nordea Bank

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. The diminished supply of cross-border credit in the aftermath of the financial crisis has led Asian corporates to rely more and more on domestic capital markets financing for their funding needs. In the past year, an increasing number of Asian issuers have been raising debt in either their own local markets, or in markets like Singapore, which is increasingly becoming a regional hub. To the extent that regulatory changes in the West

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. The European high-yield debt market is still only a fraction of the size of its US counterpart, but it is evolving into an independent, standalone asset class that plays to the increasing need for diversity in European corporate finance. “If you’re looking at figures post the last financial crisis, the European high-yield market has actually had a faster growth rate than the US market,” said Michael Moravec, head of European high-yie

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. A picture may tell a thousand words, but sometimes just a few words can sell a thousand bonds. European Central Bank President Mario Draghi’s vow to do “whatever it takes” to save the single currency, up to and including purchasing all eurozone countries’ short-term bonds – the latter pledge made on September 6 – may be the best thing the ECB president ever does. Overnight it lifted all boats, giving the markets a much-needed late su

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. The regulatory environment is forcing banks to shrink their balance sheets. But from a price perspective, the impact of regulation has probably been largely factored in already, said one DCM banker. Stocks have been punished for regulatory ambiguity far more than bonds have, he said, because regulation is seen to be more of a threat to profitability than solvency. Having said that, banks have not escaped unscathed in the debt markets

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. If I die, President Bill Clinton’s chief strategist James Carville once said, “I want to come back as the bond market. You can intimidate everyone.” Carville’s words, spoken in the early 1990s, still ring true today. Market volatility – the killer of long-term value – has seen investors in recent years flee equities and once rock-steady sovereign debt, eschewing both in favour of investment-grade corporate debt. But soaring demand fo

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. In the first half of 2012, European corporates borrowed more from the bond market than the loan market, the first time this has ever happened. Since the introduction of the euro the split has been about 30/70 for bonds versus loans. In 2012 the split was 50.8%–49.2% in favour of bonds, of a US$679.5bn debt pile, according to Thomson Reuters. The plight of Europe’s sovereigns is making investors less keen to put their money into the t

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. Europe stands on the brink of disintegration in its current form, with the previously unthinkable exit of member states now talked of in the corridors of Brussels in terms of when, not if. What is less clear is by how much the European club will shrink. Among those most interested in this question are investors in high-yield debt. If Spain, one of those most frequently spoken of as a contender for European defenestration, was downgra

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. For much of this year, the leveraged markets in Europe have been filled with gloom. Although the US primary market has remained active, albeit beaten up by concerns about the European debt crisis, in the first half of the year European leveraged loan volume was down a hefty 41%, at €16.3bn, on the same period last year, according to S&P.  But there has been one bright spot. What has saved the leveraged market is the openness of U

To view the digital version of this report, please click here. As UK banks over the recent period looked to improve capital efficiency by shifting financing off balance sheet, and found European investors under punitive levels of regulatory pressure, syndicate desks sought to widen the investor base – first in the US and more recently in Asia. Discreet meetings in Tokyo in mid-2009 were followed by long periods of due diligence, first on the asset class and later individual issuers, with Japanes