UNCRY - European lenders' covered bond issuance hits highest since pandemic onset - WSJ

In an effort to get ahead of the European Central Bank's potential shifts to a less accommodative monetary stance next year, Euro lenders, including France-based Société Générale (OTCPK:SCGLF), Amsterdam-based ING Groep (NYSE:ING) and UniCredit (OTCPK:UNCFF) (OTCPK:UNCRY), are issuing covered bonds at levels not seen since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Wall Street Journal reports. Covered bonds - debt securities that are collateralized against a pool of assets - are being issued at historically low borrowing costs. Banks sold 20.8B euros' worth ($23.5B) in September and 13.6B euros in October; November's issuance is usually slow, though banks still sold more than last year, the WSJ highlights. Nonetheless, through the ECB's targeted long-term refinancing operations, banks took in trillions of euros earlier in the pandemic, and there's now 1.6M euros of loans still outstanding, the WSJ notes. Special conditions under the TLTRO are expected to close in June. As a

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European lenders' covered bond issuance hits highest since pandemic onset - WSJ