Oracle has pledged to do everything it can to preserve its investment-grade rating, as the cloud computing provider seeks to assuage increasing nervousness over the gargantuan amounts of debt it is taking on to fulfil commitments made to hyperscaler clients such as OpenAI.

Investment banking fees are up 10% from a year ago and set for their second best ever year, thanks to record revenue from debt underwriting and a resurgence in M&A and equity capital markets that picked up pace at the tail of the year to bode well for 2026.

Lebanon will shortly take a crucial step in its long road to recovery, five years after it defaulted, when its cabinet puts forward a proposed law outlining how the roughly US$80bn of losses incurred across its financial sector should be split between its public and private institutions.

Six major banks in the London FX market have succeeded in their appeal against a ruling that said they might have to compensate former currency clients after admitting they had run cartels between 2007 and 2013.

The European Commission has told investors not to worry too much about the near-term impact on its 2026 funding plans of the EU's decision to lend €90bn to Ukraine, saying it will update the market when more details have been confirmed.

Borrowers from Ukraine are sounding out interest from investors as they seek to plot their reentry to the international bond market for the first time since Russia's full invasion of the country in February 2022.

Embattled property developer China Vanke’s failed attempt to extend the maturity of an onshore bond has further dented market sentiment, as investors worry about signs of weakened government support for the sector.  

Lloyds has announced two new hires joining its Frankfurt office, appointing Tanja Gihr as its head of Northern European debt capital markets and sustainability and adding Hugo Bauer as an associate to the DCM team. 

Blackstone has priced its sixth CMBS issue of the year, a £443m transaction backed by logistics assets. Investor sentiment toward the sector remains constructive, as seen when DBMS 2025-1 DAC landed with a weighted-average margin of 172bp over Sonia, matching the tightest spreads seen on a UK CMBS this year.

Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation has completed its first synthetic risk transfer in Asia Pacific, highlighting an instrument that is becoming more relevant to banks in the region.

Europe’s structured finance market is expected to be underpinned by favourable lending conditions across the region in 2026 with a broader mix of issuers and collateral types, after enjoying record volumes this year.

Europe’s securitisation market is closing 2025 at its strongest level since the global financial crisis, with placed issuance estimated at around €160bn, ahead of another busy year expected.

Thames Water has still not published the 2022/23 and 2023/24 impact reports it promised its green bond investors and is also yet to explain how it used the proceeds of its €1.65bn dual-tranche green offering issued in January 2023.

Fashion group Hugo Boss has signed a €600m, five-year revolving credit facility with 11 banks, which replaces the borrower's equally-sized RCF placed in November 2021.

Singaporean multi-modal transport operator ComfortDelGro has obtained two green loans totalling S$160m (US$) from DBS Bank and United Overseas Bank to support the purchase of new electric buses for its operations in the UK.

Germany’s KfW, one of the world’s largest green bond issuers, is ramping up issuance of the use-of-proceeds instrument even as peers fall back. 

A series of high-profile leveraged finance deals from the US combined with an upturn in homegrown deals is providing some much-needed action for the European leveraged finance market. At least €16.5bn of M&A-related issuance is on the way and should help satisfy demand from CLO platforms coming off a record 12 months and set for another year of plenty.

A term loan B of around US$550m for garment label maker Trimco International Holdings being targeted at bank lenders in Asia is drawing a mixed response due to it not having an external credit rating and its covenant-light structure.  

Sizeable direct lenders in Europe have responded to banks winning deals from large-cap issuers by joining the throngs in the crowded mid-market arena, accelerating spread compression for smaller borrowers.

All eyes are on a series of jumbo transactions set to open the US leveraged loan asset class in 2026, after lacklustre M&A volume this year left market participants hungry for more.