Several banks are preparing to set aside misgivings about cryptocurrencies with the launch of their own stablecoins in the weeks ahead as they seek to take advantage of an imminent change of law in the US, which has until now tried to maintain a firebreak between the two worlds.

Ukraine has a trump card to play in restructuring negotiations with holders of its GDP-linked warrants, according to the lawyer who advised Greece in 2012 on its €200bn restructuring.

Top US banks have boosted their dividend payout plans after passing the Federal Reserve’s annual stress test – with quarterly payouts up 20% on average from previous levels and up 48% from three years ago, just after the pandemic.

Banks are on track to report another strong quarter in sales and trading after US president Donald Trump’s chaotic tariff announcements in April rocked financial markets and triggered a flurry of client activity.

Only a week after EDF signed the first part of its exceptional £4.5bn deal with private credit investor Apollo Global Management, and in doing so highlighted the lack of public supply for high-grade corporate investors, the sterling market has roared back to life with unusually high demand for what is often considered a relatively shallow market.

Poland’s return to the green bond market this week after a more than six-year hiatus was welcomed by investors as the sovereign advances its climate commitments.

SoftBank Group's US$4.21bn-equivalent US dollar and euro senior unsecured deal was over four times subscribed at one point on Wednesday, with investors attributing the strength of demand mostly to its low loan-to-value ratio and various sources of liquidity. 

The Asian bond market navigated geopolitical concerns and US Treasury volatility to post a strong first half for deal volume, showing steady growth year on year.

Australian fintech company Zip completed its 10th consumer loans securitisation on Wednesday, the no-grow A$300m (US$195m) Zip Master Trust Series 2025-1, which indicated improved investor confidence in the recently beleaguered buy now, pay later asset class.

With sovereign shareholders continuing to push multilateral development banks towards securitisation and other “originate-to-share” approaches, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the World Bank have moved into the sector’s asset-backed vanguard.

Activity in the European CLO primary market shows no sign of slowing down ahead of the July 9 deadline for tariff deals with the US, as managers tout a range of new issues and resets to investors.

Concord drummed up strong demand for a US$1.65bn refinancing that pushed tenors out beyond five years for the first time in a music royalty deal. 

Ivory Coast has added to momentum in the sovereign sustainability-linked debt market with the launch of a World Bank-assisted framework that could make the cocoa producer the first sub-investment-grade country to issue a bond indexed to its emissions performance.

Poland’s return to the green bond market this week after a more than six-year hiatus was welcomed by investors as the sovereign advances its climate commitments.

Banks are working to combine debt financing for data centre and energy projects in the US, creating multibillion US dollar green debt deals that could debut in the market in the coming months.

The growing sovereign debt swap market has finally thrashed out its first set of voluntary “practice standards”. Market participants have been expecting a set of principles comparable to those for green and other labelled bonds administered by the International Capital Market Association for more than a year .

Spanish gaming company Cirsa looks to have played its cards right, with its €453m IPO multiple times subscribed just an hour into the four-day bookbuild, though caution prevails as the deal follows two recent cancelled listings in Europe that started strongly. 

A burst of activity in Hong Kong and China boosted Asia's equity capital market in the first half, despite uncertainty over geopolitical tensions and the threat of US tariffs.

Six issuers are raising as much as HK$13.3bn (US$1.7bn) from Hong Kong listings, as the city's equity market continues its blazing start to the year.

Saudi delivery company Ninja has reached unicorn status ahead of an IPO expected by 2027.

Walgreens Boots Alliance is premarketing the US$4.25bn-equivalent buyout debt package linked to its international business ahead of the official launch into general syndication this month.

Syndicated lending in EMEA totalled US$608.7bn in the first six months of the year, an increase on the US$598.6bn raised a year previously, according to LPC data, as the threat of tariffs, trade wars and rising geopolitical tensions failed to disrupt the flow of deals.

Bankers have taken heed of the market-stopping tariff-induced volatility from April, cramming a huge number of deals into the European leveraged finance primary and largely clearing the decks before a new tariff deadline on July 9.

New World Development has raised a HK$88.2bn (US$11.24bn) borrowing, completing a crucial refinancing of existing bank debt with a covenant waiver expiring in June.