Online articles

• Australian Unity MCI to help it expand and deliver on purpose

  Australian Unity issued Australia’s first-ever mutual capital instrument (MCI) on 24 December 2020. The A$120 million (US$93 million) perpetual security came nearly two years after enabling legislation passed in federal parliament. Adam Vise, the issuer’s Melbourne-based group treasurer, discusses the impetus for and mechanics of the transaction.

• Activity review: a year for the record books

  Transaction data from the KangaNews deal database highlight a year of many firsts in the Australasian debt market. From skyrocketing sovereign and semi-government issuance to major banks’ absence from the senior-unsecured space and a strong rebound for corporate issuance – 2020 was a year like no other.

• Australian credit changes shape

  The Australian dollar credit market has been reshaped in the wake of COVID-19, largely as a consequence of Reserve Bank of Australia market intervention. A supply-demand imbalance is evident and could potentially bring risk, but fund managers express a degree of comfort on the basis that their approach to allocation has not yet needed to change dramatically.

• Australian market continues to orbit the RBA’s sun

  KangaNews hosted its annual roundtable discussion for Australia’s leading bank fixed-income strategists in February – just as a new round of market speculation on the path of Reserve Bank of Australia stimulus was kicking off. The strategists remain convinced that Australian QE is set for some time, however – and that the market will continue to revolve around the gravitational pull of the central bank.

• ESG takes an equal role at Nikko

  Nikko Asset Management has revamped its environmental, social and governance (ESG) process by splitting it out of the credit function. Each corporate and bank issuer the investor looks at must now satisfy separately assessed ESG and credit criteria rather than having the decision tied up in a central area.

• KangaNews Awards 2020: institution and deal winners announced

  KangaNews is proud to announce the winners of the institutional and deal categories in the KangaNews Awards 2020. At the end of a tumultuous year in the Australian and New Zealand capital markets, KangaNews received votes from hundreds of market participants keen to recognise the achievements of 2020's most outstanding performers.

• New Zealand debt market gets back on track

  In December 2020, the KangaNews New Zealand Debt Capital Market Summit took place as an in-person event in Auckland, bringing the local industry together for the first time since the COVID-19 crisis. There was no shortage of talking points at the event, which for the first time added international perspectives via videoconference to the traditionally strong domestic agenda.

• Red flags

  Australia and New Zealand are not yet out of the pandemic woods, but the health and economic situation is looking good on a relative and, increasingly, an outright basis. We would do well to avoid too much back slapping, though – and not just as an ongoing social-distancing precaution. The tectonic pressure of economic inequality has only been intensified by COVID-19.

• USPP support stands up despite quieter Australasian year

  The US private placement market has long been a happy home for Australasian issuers. The annual USPP roundtable hosted by KangaNews and MUFG found that lower issuance in 2020 had nothing to do with lack of support from the investor base and that hopes remain high for future primary supply. USPP investors also share perspectives on the rapid growth in significance of environmental, social and governance analysis in...