Green

MünchenerHyp became the first issuer to have sold both green and social covered bonds on Tuesday, with the launch of a EUR500m “Ecological ESG” deal that should be the first of annual issues, according to its head of debt IR, although plans for social bonds may take some time to come to fruition.

Finland’s OP Financial Group has established a green bond framework taking in sectors such as renewable energy, energy efficiency and sustainable land use.

Four years after launching the first ever sustainable covered bond, MünchenerHyp is preparing to launch a benchmark Ecological ESG Pfandbrief, with a green retail loan it launched in 2015 enabling it to be the first German issuer to include residential mortgages in its use of proceeds.

Commerzbank attracted as much as EUR1.25bn of orders from over 100 investors to its first green bond yesterday (Tuesday), a EUR500m five year senior non-preferred benchmark with proceeds earmarked for renewable energy financing.

Berlin Hyp achieved its highest ever foreign distribution with a EUR500m seven year green Pfandbrief on Friday, after having waited out an “awful” market on Thursday to then attract EUR950m of orders at a level reflecting the “new world”, according to Bodo Winkler, its head of funding and investor relations.

DZ Bank sold its first green bond on 25 September, a EUR250m five year deal with proceeds earmarked for German onshore windfarms that marked a rare appearance in the public markets for the German issuer in senior format, and which is the first green bond from a bank to have an S&P Green Evaluation.

Support is being sought from the European Commission for a “market activation framework” to take the Energy Efficient Mortgages Initiative into its next stage, an EMF-ECBC official told an ECBC plenary, which also heard positive noises, with caveats, on sustainable finance from the German Ministry of Finance and BaFin.

Deutsche Hypo sold a EUR500m green Pfandbrief issue last Monday, its second such benchmark, and officials at the issuer described the deal’s “dynamic” book as being a positive statement of green investor’s trust.