The European Commission has successfully launched its first syndicated bond transaction of 2026, raising €11 billion from international investors and underscoring strong market

confidence in EU debt.

The dual-tranche deal comprised a new €6 billion EU-Bond maturing on 12 July 2029 and a €5 billion tap of the long-dated EU-Bond maturing on 12 October 2055. Investor demand was robust, with total orders exceeding €160 billion across the two tranches, translating into oversubscription rates of around 11 times for the 3-year bond and 19 times for the 30-year bond.

The newly issued 3-year bond carries a coupon of 2.375% and was priced at 99.839%, resulting in a re-offer yield of 2.426%. The bond priced at a spread of 3 basis points over mid-swaps, equivalent to 16.6 basis points above the comparable German Bund and 8.6 basis points below the French OAT maturing in May 2029. The final order book topped €65 billion.

Meanwhile, the 30-year bond tap, with a coupon of 4.000%, was priced at 98.934% for a re-offer yield of 4.061%. It came at a spread of 90 basis points over mid-swaps, corresponding to 59.1 basis points over the German Bund due August 2056 and 39.0 basis points below the French OAT due May 2055. Orders for the long-dated tranche exceeded €97 billion.

BNP Paribas, Bank of America, Crédit Agricole CIB, Nomura and Santander acted as joint lead managers for the transaction.

Proceeds from the issuance will be used to finance key EU policy priorities, most notably programmes under NextGenerationEU, as well as continued financial support for Ukraine.

With this transaction, the European Commission has completed €11 billion of its planned €90 billion funding target for the first half of 2026. The next operation on the EU’s indicative issuance calendar is an EU-Bill auction scheduled for 21 January 2026.

A long-standing issuer

The European Commission has been an active borrower in international capital markets for more than four decades, issuing exclusively euro-denominated debt backed by the EU budget. All borrowing is guaranteed by the unconditional legal commitment of EU Member States under the EU Treaties.

Since January 2023, the EU has operated under a unified funding approach, issuing single-branded EU-Bonds rather than programme-specific securities. This framework builds on the diversified funding strategy introduced for NextGenerationEU in 2021 and has since been extended to other EU policy programmes.

Issuance is guided by semi-annual funding plans and pre-announced windows, supported by a primary dealer framework and liquidity-enhancing tools such as an EU-Bond repurchase facility, introduced in October 2024.

Following today’s deal, total outstanding EU-Bonds under the unified funding approach stand at €575.98 billion. Of this, more than €377 billion has been disbursed to Member States through the NextGenerationEU Recovery and Resilience Facility, with an additional €75.88 billion allocated to other EU programmes. Significant portions of EU borrowing are also being used to finance assistance to Ukraine and neighbouring countries.

Overall, the EU’s total debt outstanding now amounts to approximately €747.07 billion, including €33.96 billion in short-term EU-Bills.