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PARIBAS is pre-marketing a $150m share offering for Thai pay-TV company United Broadcasting Company. Despite gloomy predictions about the likely fate of new issues this quarter, bankers are confident a deal can be completed by early July. The sale is the result of a merger between International Broadcasting Corporation and United Broadcasting Company which created the market leader in pay-TV in Thailand. In 1997, the combined company had 350,000 subscribers and it forecasts that number to grow to 1.1m by 2005.

Hong Kong Coreasia, a maker of eel food, has lowered its issue price due to difficult market conditions. Co-lead managers, NSC Securities and Tai Fook Securities set the price at HK$1, HK$0.13 less than previously. A total of 70m new shares are being issued.

MOODY'S placed Malaysia's A2 long term senior rating on review for possible downgrade last Friday. The agency rates Malaysia one notch higher than Standard & Poor's, and said that its decision was prompted by the prolonged financial crisis in the region and its effect on Malaysia's financial markets and economy.

IT WAS a busy week in the Hong Kong dollar market, with seven new issues launched. US agency Fannie Mae led the way on Tuesday with its second Hong Kong dollar deal of the year, a HK$300m global offering via JP Morgan. Priced at par, the five year deal had a semi-annual coupon of 10.10% compared with the 10.5% coupon achieved in January via a similar HK$300m five year issue via Deutsche Morgan Grenfell.

THERE was little consensus among bankers and analysts last week on which of the 12 candidates for sale by the Indonesian government will be first off the blocks. Bankers unhappy with the results of the mandate process noted the close relationships of the advisory victors Goldman Sachs and Lehman Brothers to local firms involved in the selection process.

IBJ LEASING returned to the Euromarkets this week with a $200m equipment lease securitisation, lead managed by IBJ International and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. Amethyst Funding Corp II offered a single tranche of bonds rated triple-A by Moody's and Standard & Poor's. The notes pay 33bp over one month Libor, with an average life of 1.9 years and expected maturity in December 2003.

BANKERS at lead managers Credit Suisse First Boston, Goldman Sachs and Lehman Brothers breathed a sigh of relief this week as PTT Exploration and Production completed its Bt9.75bn ($231m) share offer despite the worst conditions yet seen during 10 months of turmoil in Asia. Bankers connected to the deal were euphoric, if tired, after a marathon roadshow and plenty of late night encouragement to persuade investors to step up to the plate.

THE PHILIPPINE government is poised to announce an extensive privatisation plan as part of its 'first 100 days in office' programme, a move that could help the country shed its reputation for bureaucratic inertia on privatisation. The only firm candidate for sale so far is Philippine National Bank (PNB), although rumours last week that George Soros was bidding for the government's 45.5% stake in the bank have proved unfounded. "It may have been just a ruse to attract interest to the bank," said one banker.

THE BELEAGUERED Latin new issue market received a welcome boost this week when the Republic of Argentina launched a DM1bn 12 year step-up coupon transaction. The deal, led by Deutsche Bank, was the only Latin offering in the Eurobond markets in yet another week of Russian and Asian-induced spread widening among Latin benchmark bonds.

IMPSAT, the Argentine-based satellite telecommunications company, will today (Friday) try to succeed where Brazilian telecom company Americel failed last week, by launching a $175m 10 year/non-call five year bond in the US high yield market. Impsat, led by Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, announced its price talk on Thursday at 12.00% to 12.25% and plans to go ahead with pricing today, even though Americel (joint led by Citibank and Merrill Lynch) had to pull its $300m eight/non-call four year deal last week as a result of the unsettled market conditions.

POLAND is set to be the source of a number of debut Eurobond transactions over the next month, as issuers and lead managers seek to capitalise on the booming economic conditions in the country. Merrill Lynch is to roadshow an unrated $75m five year debut Eurobond for Polish steelmaker Huta Imienia Tadeusz Sendzimira (HTS) in Europe next week, with launch provisionally scheduled for the following week.

BRAZIL this week set a $11.7bn (R$13.47bn) minimum price tag on the shares it is selling in Telebras, the public telephone company due to be auctioned on July 29. The minimum price on the government's 20% stake in Telebras was within market expectations.