Charles Russell Speechlys has recently advised Arden Partners plc in its role as financial advisor, sponsor and broker to Macfarlane Group plc (“Macfarlane”) in connection with an oversubscribed placing of £8 million of new shares on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange. The Placing was conducted by way of an accelerated bookbuild process.

Macfarlane is a leading specialist UK manufacturer and distributor of protective packaging materials headquartered in Glasgow, Scotland.

Global law firm K&L Gates has advised Tokyo Century Corporation (Tokyo Century) on its agreement to acquire a 20% stake in U.S.-based aircraft-leasing company Aviation Capital Group, a wholly owned affiliate of U.S.-based Pacific Life Insurance Company. The deal is expected to close by year-end.

Cleary Gottlieb represented the underwriters in an offering by BP Capital Markets, a wholly owned subsidiary of BP, of $500 million 1.768 percent notes due 2019, $300 million floating-rate notes due 2022, $700 million 2.520 percent notes due 2022 and $1.5 billion 3.279 percent notes due 2027.

On October 30th, ICBC held a “ring the bell” ceremony in Luxembourg Stock Exchange to celebrate the official listing of its inaugural “Belt and Road” climate bonds successfully issued earlier with a total equivalent of USD 2.15 billion. This issuance of climate bonds has achieved remarkable results in multiple aspects such as structuring, size, pricing, and investor composition, making a milestone transaction as a Chinese issuer in the international capital market.

In another landmark Asia capital markets transaction, Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP advised the underwriters on a $1.3 billion successful initial public offering of 120 million equity shares of SBI Life Insurance, a subsidiary of the country's largest lender, State Bank of India, marking India’s first billion-dollar IPO since 2010, and first US$1 billion IPO in India in seven years. The shares were offered under Regulation S/Rule 144A.

Clifford Chance advised the underwriters on the US$110.5 million initial public offering and listing on The NASDAQ Global Market of American depositary shares of Secoo Holding Limited (NASDAQ: SECO). Secoo is Asia's largest online integrated upscale products and services platform as measured by gross merchandise value in 2016. The underwriters were led by Jefferies LLC, as the sole book-running manager. This is the first US IPO of a Chinese e-commerce company since Alibaba Group Holding's IPO in 2014.

Watson Farley & Williams (“WFW”) has advised HSH Nordbank AG (“HSH Nordbank”) on the financing of the Kappel wind farm in Denmark.

HSH Nordbank provided a long-term financing for the wind farm, which is located on the Danish island of Lolland. The wind farm, which has a total capacity of 25 MW, was built by Danish developer European Energy and acquired by a fund managed by Aquila Capital, the alternative asset management division of the Hamburg-based Aquila Group.

Trowers & Hamlins has advised Bank ABC, acting as coordinator, sole bookrunner, investment agent and documentation bank on behalf of the syndicate of financiers, in relation to a US$101m Shari'ah compliant financing transaction provided to Bahrain Islamic Bank B.S.C..

DLA Piper has advised Germany's Aareal Bank on its financing of London-based investor Henderson Park's debut acquisition in the UK hotel market. The £330 million loan supports Henderson Park's £500 million acquisition of the London and Birmingham Hilton Metropole hotels which completed last week.

White & Case LLP has advised Belfius Bank SA, Credit Agricole CIB, Deutsche Bank AG, Morgan Stanley and Societe Generale CIB, as joint lead managers, on the issuance by Belfius Bank of €750,000,000 Fixed Rate Senior Non-Preferred Notes, the first issuance by a Belgian credit institution of senior non-preferred notes under the new Belgian legal framework.

The transaction settled on September 12, 2017 and the bonds were admitted to trading on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange.