In a bumper year for Eurobond issuance, JPMorgan once again demonstrated the unrivalled breadth and depth of its debt capital markets franchise in central and eastern Europe.
Under chief executive Jamie Dimon, the US house easily topped the DCM league table for the region in the awards period, racking up 60 deals for an apportioned value of €14.4 billion, according to Dealogic, well ahead of closest rival Citi’s €12 billion from 42 deals.
A substantial chunk of the volume came from sovereign borrowers, as policymakers rushed to finance Covid support packages. JPMorgan was well positioned to take advantage of this trend, acting for 13 governments in the region, often on multiple transactions. These included regular borrowers, such as Hungary and Turkey, as well as frontier names including Albania, Armenia and Uzbekistan.
Bank capital deals were few and far between – although JPMorgan acted for Turkey’s Yapi Kredi on its market-opening dollar tier-2 in January – while other mandates from the sector included a debut issue for Uzbekistan’s Ipoteka Bank, Credit Bank of Moscow’s first euro-denominated outing and the first fully marketed Czech covered bond from Société Générale subsidiary Komercni Banka.
A swathe of investment grade and high-yield corporate bonds included Wizz Air’s €500 million debut in January, as well as deals for borrowers from Lithuania, Georgia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
JPMorgan also played a leading role in the development of the ESG-labelled bond market in CEE in the 12 months to the end of March. In addition to leading green bonds for repeat borrowers including the Hungarian sovereign, Lithuania’s Ignitis and Czech real estate developer CTP, the US house also helped Georgian Global Utilities make its debut in the market.
JPMorgan also led Sovcombank’s groundbreaking dollar social bond – the first from a CEE borrower – as well as a debut sustainability bond for Turkish state-owned lender Ziraat Bank.
In equity capital markets, JPMorgan was further down the league tables, with only seven transactions to its credit in CEE in the awards period. However, these included five high-profile IPOs.
As well as securing mandates on two of the blockbuster deals from the region – the $3.4 billion listing of Polish parcel locker firm InPost in January and the $1.8 billion transaction from Russian discount retailer Fix Price in March – the US bank acted on three smaller but important deals.
In October, as primary equity markets started to reopen, JPMorgan led listings for Lithuanian energy and utility company Ignitis – five months after acting as bookrunner on a Eurobond for the firm – and Russia’s Sovcomflot. These were followed in February by the IPO of Huuuge, a leading player in Poland’s rapidly growing gaming sector.
