Kepler Cheuvreux has appointed Frederic Meron as chief executive and Christophe Leblanc as his deputy.

Citigroup is expecting a solid first quarter for investment banking and trading despite current geopolitical uncertainties.

Investors scrambling to protect themselves against rising bond yields sent interest rate derivatives volumes surging to all-time highs last week, as the prospect of a protracted conflict in the Middle East reignited fears over inflation.

HSBC Holdings said it remains confident in the Gulf states' long-term strength and resilience, as markets assess the economic impact on the Middle East from the war between the US/Israel and Iran.

Salesforce is leading the way in another busy day for the US high-grade bond market as the software company prepares a US$25bn eight-part bond deal to buy back billions of dollars in stock following an AI-induced selloff in its shares last month. 

Issuers continued to breathe life into the covered bond market on Wednesday, with Lloyds Bank executing the largest sterling covered bond out of the UK in over three years, a £1.5bn three-year that exceeded size expectations.

Polish refiner Orlen proved that deals by CEEMEA issuers can get done despite a difficult market backdrop due to the war in the Middle East.

Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Sandoz brought a dual-tranche bond transaction to market on Tuesday, printing a total of SFr550m (US$706m) evenly split between six and 10-year portions.

As the broader credit market reopened, securitisation took off on Tuesday, with eight deals moving through the market: three fresh announcements of new issues and five releasing initial price thought details. 

A consortium of US housing industry groups on Tuesday urged US lawmakers to drop a provision in a bill that would force developers to sell so-called "build to rent" homes in seven years, a move that analysts say would likely decrease funding in the securitization market for these types of properties. 

Confidence returned reasonably quickly in the securitisation market in Europe last week after a war-induced shaky start when a few structured deals that had been lined up for Monday were pushed back.

The collapse of Market Financial Solutions is offering fresh evidence that the “cockroaches” JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon warned of last year are not confined to the US, as a clearer picture emerges of the lending various banks provided to the failed UK mortgage lender. 

British International Investment, the UK’s national development finance institution, and emerging markets private credit investor ILX have inaugurated a US$500m impact financing partnership with their long-awaited first joint deal.

While the US-led war in Iran is reinforcing the importance of energy security and strengthening the strategic rationale for the energy transition, implementation could be delayed by governments' changing spending priorities and strategic sustainable finance deals could be postponed in the short-term. 

Swiss private bank and wealth management firm Union Bancaire Privee's Positive Impact Emerging Equity strategy is facing the happy problem of how to invest potential inflows as early investments in the energy transition are paying off amid a steep rally in emerging markets. 

Finnish steelmaker Outokumpu is positioning itself as a sector leader in energy transition as a low-carbon "green steel" manufacturer and is using an internal carbon price to assess all decarbonisation investments. 

SoftBank-backed Japanese fintech PayPay has priced its Nasdaq IPO at US$16 each, below the indicative price range, to raise US$880m.

Shares in Saudi construction materials business Saleh Abdulaziz Al Rashed & Sons Company rose on debut on Wednesday, marking a positive data point as the first debut in the region since the start of the conflict in Iran.

While market volatility has increased in recent weeks, bankers started 2026 with a broadly positive outlook for European ECM, as shown by Queens Lane Advisory's survey of 59 ECM practitioners across 42 banks, law and accounting firms and stock exchanges.

Duke Energy raised an upsized US$1.3bn late Monday from a new convertible bond to repay an existing issue that is maturing in a month's time.

SoftBank Group is in talks with relationship banks for a mammoth bridge financing of up to US$40bn to fund a new investment in OpenAI, in what could become its largest loan yet and one of the biggest ever from Asia Pacific. 

News and entertainment company Nexstar Media Group is seeking to raise a US$2.75bn senior secured term loan B that, alongside other financing, will fund its US$6.2bn acquisition of local news broadcast business Tegna.

AirTrunk has completed a ¥191.6bn (US$1.21bn) green loan for refinancing and continued development of its data centre in Tokyo, marking the largest financing from the sector in Japan.

Banks underwriting roughly US$57.5bn of debt backing Paramount Skydance’s US$110bn acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery are expected to tap global credit markets to place one of the largest takeover financings ever arranged. 

The collapse of Market Financial Solutions follows a familiar and concerning pattern. According to documents submitted to London’s High Court at the commencement of its administration process, MFS may have double-pledged assets, potentially leaving a collateral shortfall of £930m. Loans to MFS totalled £1.16bn, and there was only £230m of “true value” available in the collateral accounts.

It is unbecoming to say “I told you so”, but when it comes to Meta Platforms’ US$27.3bn project bond to fund its Hyperion data centre via private credit shop Blue Owl Capital (and SPV Beignet Investor) the temptation is strong. I wrote in late 2025 that Meta’s decision not to consolidate the debt on its balance sheet sits uneasily with the economic risk that investors have assumed they are taking when they bought the deal in October. And now Meta’s auditor, EY, clearly feels this same tension.

Full-year earnings from European banks – Barclays, BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, Societe Generale and UBS – showed them broadly holding market share in the markets’ business, but struggling to capitalise on the upswing in investment banking. 

The repo market is the heartbeat of bond markets. Like a real heartbeat, when all is well, there is nothing more boring. But when things go wrong … watch out.