Euroblog

What is it with issuers of corporate megabonds? First Electricité de France and its banks get nervous about speaking to the press for its record-breaking €6.2bn hybrid capital extravaganza — at least until the deal was truly over and the dust had settled, when we were granted a nice interview. But for a while, we had to make up our own expletives — sorry, superlatives.

“Business at the front, party at the back” was how UBS’s FIG DCM head Rob Ellison had originally described the hirsute look he was planning on sporting for 2013 — better known as a mullet.

There must be something afoot in core sovereign debt management circles. First Carl Heinz Daube of Germany’s Finanzagentur steps down to be replaced by Tammo Diemer — possibly thinking there’s no better time to bow out than when investors are paying you to borrow their money.

The capital markets artist formerly known as a ropey Leonardo DiCaprio is now in line to take on the moniker of the banker currently known as a youthful Rod Stewart. Yes, that’s right, UBS’s FIG DCM head, Rob Ellison, has a mullet in the making.

Blog is pleased to report that some teams went above and beyond for their Christmas celebrations. Not content with the traditional knees up, JP Morgan’s frequent borrowers desk managed to honour not one, but two, cultural phenomena.

Euroblog was delighted to be invited to Ralph Berlowitz’s farewell-to-Deutsche-drinks on Tuesday where we managed, through the tears at the sad departure of such an important member of the SSA world, to consume a vatful of vodka and suffer a hangover of epic proportions.

Euroblog had the very great pleasure of lunch with members of Citi’s SSA DCM and syndicate teams at The Gun last week. It being Christmas time only enhanced the pleasure, and what could put you in the festive spirit better than the compulsory wearing of Christmas hats? At. All. Times.

Vivendi is clearly feeling confident. The French telecoms and media company has a new CEO since August. It has managed to damp down – for now – investor expectations of a break-up of its varied assets. And last week it issued a €700m seven year bond at just 130bp over mid-swaps – little more than half the spread it paid on its deal in January.

Many of the great and the good of the SSA market turned out last Wednesday evening to Kommunalbanken’s annual bash at the Norwegian ambassador’s residence. Several had the stamina to make an appearance at the afterparty at The Collection on Brompton Road.

Conrad Baker has taken a rather topsy turvy approach to the upcoming Yuletide festivities. The former Deutsche Bank MTNs impresario, who is heading to Nomura to join its SSA syndicate, is planning a pretty big treat for himself between Christmas and New Year — starting his new job.

Working remotely got a whole new twist to it last week, when Lloyds’ Ed Short dialled into the funding team’s 24 hour cycling challenge from California. Not content with emailing updates to the boss about the trip, the funding official also kept to his promise to participate in the treasury team’s charity cycling fundraiser. Ed jumped on a bike for an hour, sending the photographic evidence back to HQ after the workout, Euroblog hears.

In a climate as tough as it is at the moment, the wave of newly redundant UBS employees are going to have to get pretty innovative in their search for something to occupy their time. But with enough creative thinking, there's little you can't do.