Portugal

Euronext is looking for a chief executive officer for its Lisbon office, after Maria João Carioca answered a call from the Portuguese government to re-join Caixa Geral de Depósitos.

Chinese conglomerate Fosun has agreed to invest €174.6m of capital in Banco Comercial Português (BCP), but it is unclear whether or not the funds will go towards repaying the Portuguese bank’s contingent convertible bonds next year.

Portugal is set to round off its funding for the year by auctioning €500m-€750m of its April 2021 line on Wednesday.

Equity block trade business came back to life this week, as sellers hastened to monetise stakes before the US presidential election.

Portugal’s bond yields fell to levels last seen in early September, as investor worries eased over a vital ratings review of the sovereign by DBRS this Friday.

CaixaBank, the Barcelona-based retail bank, has launched a €1.3bn accelerated bookbuild this evening to sell a 9.9% stake in itself, as part of its move to take over Banco BPI of Portugal. The deal is one of four block trades in the European market this evening.

Showing flexibility over Caixa Geral de Depósitos latest recapitalisation may not have been such a bad decision, but by using logic inconsistent with other cases the European Commission risks making its state aid rules appear arbitrary and meaningless.

A pair of eurozone periphery sovereigns have deals in the pipeline — but could face problems bringing the trades, bankers warned this week.

Amid much turmoil over whether Portugal will lose the one investment grade rating that is keeping it on the European Central Bank’s shopping list, no one is asking a vital question.

Hemso Fastighets and Galp Gas Natural Distribuiçao on Thursday mandated banks to issue bonds during the first two weeks of September.

Grupos Isolux Corsán Finance has triggered a bankruptcy credit event, the International Swaps and Derivatives Association’s EMEA Determinations Committee has ruled.

The Bank of Portugal is now expected to decide in September whether it will sell Novo Banco to a private bidder, or place its shares with a wider group of institutional investors.