Best bank
Svenska Handelsbanken Best debt house
Citigroup
Best equities house
Carnegie Investment Bank
Best M&A house
Deutsche Bank
Svenska Handelsbanken wins best bank again this year for its top performance figures and its consistently high level of customer satisfaction. During 2003, the bank had one of the highest return on equity ratios (14.9%) and the lowest cost/income ratios (44%). ?Svenska Handelsbanken is a champion in terms of efficiency,? says Alexandra Sleator, analyst at Moody?s, which upgraded the bank to Aa1 in March for its operating efficiency, the high quality of its client base and its asset quality. This is the highest rating of any of the Swedish banks.
The bank?s operating profit for 2003 was SKr11.6 billion ($1.5 billion) and assets increased to SKr 1,316 billion at the end of March. The bank also retains its dominant market share in lending to corporates, with 32%.
It also has a leading retail market share in deposits, lending, mortgages and new sales of mutual funds.
It is difficult to choose between Citigroup and Barclays Capital for best debt house. Both are strong in sovereigns, BarCap stronger in financials and Citigroup stronger in corporates. However, Citigroup wins for having the highest overall market share for bond market activity.
Citigroup and BarCap were both involved in one of each of the two sovereign issues. They were both also involved in benchmark issues for utility Vattenfall. Citigroup was joint bookrunner on a e500 million issue for the company. At the time, this 15-year issue was the longest-dated euro-denominated issue from a Nordic borrower. BarCap was joint bookrunner on Vattenfall?s 20-year issue. Citigroup was also involved in an innovative loan structure for Ericsson.
The largest primary equity market deal was a secondary placing of Volvo?s B shares in Scania. However this bought deal was criticized for being good for the seller but not for investors. The deal that stands out is therefore the SKr4.5 billion Oriflame IPO. This was the first successful Swedish IPO in almost two years. An attempt to list Dometic at the end of 2003, with Enskilda Securities and Merrill Lynch as bookrunners, was withdrawn.
Carnegie Investment Bank, which takes the best equities house award, and Merrill Lynch, acted as joint global coordinators and joint bookrunners on the Oriflame IPO. The offer was more than 10 times oversubscribed, increased by 15%, priced close to the top of the price range and performed well in the aftermarket, despite difficult market conditions. It was also the largest listing in the Nordic region since Eniro in October 2000.
Carnegie and its analysts are consistently highly ranked and the firm also had the second-highest turnover on Stockholmborsen.
Deutsche Bank wins best M&A house for having the highest market share, including a range of domestic and cross-border deals. The bank advised Perbio Science when it was bought by US company Fisher Scientific International for $717 million.
It also advised Swedish healthcare provider Capio in its acquisition of outstanding shares in UK Healthcare Ltd. When Japanese construction and mining equipment manufacturer Komatsu bought Swedish forest machine manufacturer Partek Forest for e120 million, Deutsche advised Komatsu.
