Comment EM and The Cover

UniCredit paid a hefty price for hitting the market this week, but it will also stand to reap the rewards.

Some Latin American DCM bankers think the year is over for new issuance, and several are indeed wishing it already were. Though much of what put the brakes on in Lat Am this year will continue to affect the market in 2019, bond bankers should find reasons to believe January will be better.

It is sometimes said that bondholders are treated like second class citizens at the expense of equity holders. But this week equity holders in Volkswagen should be knocking on its treasurer’s door, asking how investors in the latest bond deal were able to command such a premium for buying new debt.

The main point of a government issuing green bonds is to communicate a message — just like with other special bond formats. But are these messages reaching the right audience?

Stablecoins are a curiosity unique to the cryptocurrency market and, despite the placid sounding name, have been embroiled in some of the hairiest controversies in the market. And they aren’t even stable.

It was a good week for Netflix as its stock jumped by almost 10% after it released its third quarter results, but the company’s business model and overvalued stock makes it seem like a bubble trade.

Natixis favours alliances over organic growth as it looks to balance prudence with international expansion, writes David Rothnie

CYBG’s move to an internal ratings based (IRB) approach highlights how the UK’s largest lenders enjoy a substantial competitive benefit over the challengers.

Tuesday’s intervention by the Bank of England into the debate on the future of euro clearing is another welcome move from regulators. The debate has been too long dominated by political noisemaking.

There is no question that Portugal is one of the success stories to come out of the eurozone sovereign debt crisis. Its 10 year yield, for instance, has recovered from above 16% at the peak of the crisis in 2012 to around 2% today. Amid the current pressures in the eurozone, precipitated by Italy's budget fiasco, Portugal has remained resilient. But rightly or wrongly, an escalation of matters there, or indeed elsewhere in the eurozone periphery, would bring extra pressure to bear.

A recent court ruling in Spain could help to set a precedent for what information must be made public when a bank fails, as claims about the need for confidentiality start to wear thin.

Dancing and Abba aside, Theresa May impressed with her speech at the Conservative Party conference earlier this week. Her decision to lift the cap on local authority borrowing so that councils can start to build houses again is to be applauded.