Lafarge: the need for good timing

Hope, fear and wonder as a new market opens

The good, the bad and the illiquid

Saint-Gobain: no opportunism

Repsol: Argentine ambitions

North West Water: a steady earnings stream

Schneider plugs into a wider market

Ford: seeking benchmark status

For Jean Marc Doucet, long-term funding manager at French building materials group Lafarge, timing is one of the main secrets of Eurobond issuance. “I think it is always better to issue in the first part of the year,” he says.