Europe’s debt market is accelerating on two fronts: refinancing has overtaken corporate debt by volume, while the forward pipeline is rotating toward project finance to support AI, hyperscaler and broader infrastructure development. Capital is having to flex with the market, moving earlier in the cycle, absorbing greater construction, counterparty and execution risk. The challenge is no longer simply finding enough debt, but allocating risk to the right capital while preserving takeout optionality. As banks approach sector and counterparty limits, sponsors are combining construction facilities with private credit, preferred equity, holdco and mezzanine debt and securitisations. The session will explore:

• Can the current breadth of bank appetite be sustained as the pipeline grows?
• Which recent financings offer the strongest evidence that the market can successfully absorb development risk and structural complexities?
• What is the optimal route from construction debt to permanent capital? And to whom should each layer of risk be apportioned along the way?
• What terms and protections must be designed into a construction facility to preserve ABS, bond, insurance or private placement optionality?
• Where can private credit, pref equity, HoldCo and mezz debt solve for risks that senior bank capital cannot?
• Which risks are currently mispriced, and where is repricing likely to happen first?
• Will risk-transfer trades become a genuine source of new lending capacity?