Evolution forges ahead with debt capital market launch
BROKER Evolution Securities expects to complete its debut debt capital markets deal before the middle of the year, as it pushes forward with the launch of its new small to mid cap corporate bond trading business to capitalise on the funding gap left by decreasing lending from larger banks.
Evolution’s head of fixed income Guy Cornelius said activity would pick up strongly over the next three to five years as firms shun bank financing in favour of the debt market.
“Most of the companies we will be focusing on will be debut issuers,” he said. “We started in October and it usually takes around nine months to bring the first deal – we are on track to deliver that.”
But he added the firm does not expect a “flood” of deals this year due to the lag in persuading companies to change their attitude towards the corporate bond market.
Evolution Securities said in September it had appointed Morton Llewellyn to launch the debt capital markets desk. Llewellyn was formerly head of high yield capital markets and leveraged finance at Dutch financial services firm ING Group.