This report provides a comprehensive data source with updated statistics on the Government bond primary and secondary markets in Europe (EU28).
Report highlights include:
- Average daily trading volumes of European government bonds increased 13% YoY during 2Q19, driven by a significant increase in trading of French (37% YoY), Finnish (27% YoY) and Portuguese (22% YoY) bonds.
- European Government bond and bills gross issuance totalled €590.8 bn in 2Q19, an increase of 0.7% from the volume issued in 2Q18 (€586.9 bn) and 14% below the volume issued in 1Q19 (€686 bn).
- During 2Q19 there were 4 long-term credit rating upgrades for EU countries (following 5 in 1Q19) and no downgrades, bringing the year to date total to 9 upgrades and no downgrades
- The average bid-cover ratio (demand/amount allocated) was 2.33 in 2Q19, an increase of 17bps from 2Q18 and also from 1Q19. This is the highest average bid-cover ratio recorded in Europe since Q3 2014.
- A total of €8 bn in sovereign green bonds were issued in 2Q19, the greatest quarterly change to date. This was driven by a re-opening of a green bond in France and a €6 bn green bond issued by the government of the Netherlands, increasing the total outstanding amount of EU sovereign green bonds to €36 bn.
