Macquarie is pleased to list the following new warrants over Asia’s two biggest this morning; Asia’s biggest listed commodity trader by sales Noble Group, and Asia’s largest container carrier NOL:

Coincidentally, both stocks closed at $1.37 yesterday. Recent news surrounding the respective companies include:

Noble’s plans for US$1.5bn loan
Last week, Bloomberg reported that Noble was planning for a US$1.5bn loan by offering to pay 290 basis points more than the LIBOR rate on a three-year tranche and 190 basis points on a one-year tranche of the loan.

The report speculated that the loan is expected to be split 40 percent into a one-year maturity and 60 percent into a part that matures in three years with proceeds used for debt-refinancing purposes. It was said that Noble will begin marketing the loan to banks.

While Noble has yet to make an official announcement on this, Bloomberg cited one of Noble’s directors Jeanny Kim that a public announcement will be made in due course.

NOL to begin new alliance in April
Back in December, NOL’s shipping unit APL Ltd announced that it had agreed to form an alliance with Hapag-Lloyd and four other operators on the Asia-Europe trade. The pact seeks to stem falling freight rates amid slowing demand and overcapacity.

The new partnership will create one of the leading networks in the Far East-to-Europe and Far East-to-Mediterranean container shipping markets, deploying more than 90 ships to call on more than 40 ports and provide nine services.

The alliance will also allow them to better compete with industry leaders. Rivals Mediterranean Shipping and CMA CGM SA, the world’s second and third largest shipping lines, had earlier formed a partnership while A.P. Moeller-Maersk (the world’s largest) had merged some of its services on the route in September.

NOL’s new alliance is scheduled to begin operation by April.