Brazil

Brazilian airline Azul is looking become the first LatAm carrier to sell senior unsecured bonds since Covid-19 battered the sector last year. The proposed five year benchmark would also be the first triple-C rated new issue from the region since the pandemic began.

Brazilian steel producer CSN and Mexican building materials company Cemex continued a storming week for Latin American high yield issuance with new deals that attracted bumper orders and priced tight to bankers’ expectations — even if comparable deals were not always clear cut.

Brazilian government-owned oil and gas giant Petrobras took advantage of a buoyant market on Wednesday to clean up the long end of its curve, shrugging off political concerns with a new 30 year bond that came well inside fair value and left no doubt about the quality of funding conditions for Latin American issuers.

Brazilian oil and gas company PetroRio accessed bond markets on Wednesday just eight months after it pulled an earlier deal, with observers crediting the company’s success to an improved credit profile, enhanced note structure, higher oil prices and better bond market conditions.

Latin American bond bankers expect several new deals to be announced after the May 31 Memorial Day holiday in the US, as borrowers look to get ahead of potential noise regarding the Federal Reserve tapering its policy stimulus. But investors appeared ambivalent this week about the prospect of a wave of new supply.

Latin America DCM bankers are gearing up for a calmer period in primary bond markets as first quarter earnings blackout periods near, after two companies jumped on an improving tone at the end of last week to sell rare Friday deals.

Brazilian airline Gol on Thursday sold the first public bond deal from a Latin American airline since the coronavirus pandemic began, increasing the size of a tap of its 8% 2026s as hopes grow that the vaccine rollout will accelerate in the region and enable the worst affected industries to recover.

Gol, Brazil’s largest airline, is looking to reopen a private placement sold in December with the aim of making it a public benchmark this week. As it looks to double the size of the 8% June 2026 bond from $200m to $400m, Gol told investors at its roadshow presentation that it expected the yield on the tap to be around 8%.

Latin America’s sustainability-linked bond (SLB) market is taking on a life of its own as issuers warm to the structure and tailor it to their own needs. Brazilian cosmetics company Natura was one such company to do just that this week, veering away from the standard 25bp coupon step-up on its SLB debut.

Brazilian cement maker Votorantim Cimentos’ CFO said that the company would prioritise sustainability-linked structures in its future fundraising, after it sold a domestic SLB in March that used linked the call price — rather than the coupon — to key performance indicators (KPIs).

The world’s largest wheel manufacturer, Iochpe-Maxion, on Tuesday became the fourth Latin American issuer in four business days to issue a sustainability-linked bond (SLB). The Brazilian issuer sold a $400m seven year deal with an apparently more ambitious greenhouse gas emissions reduction target than the one set by Mexican car parts supplier Metalsa on its own SLB last week.

Brazilian cosmetics group Natura sold a sustainability-linked bond (SLB) on Monday offering an exceptionally high coupon step-up of 65bp if it does not meet sustainability targets. Though the greater increase was to compensate for the shorter time between the potential step-up and maturity than on most SLBs, it succeeded in grabbing the attention of EM bond buyers.