The first full week of March saw a slight increase in corporate bond issuance activity over the previous week. A$2.1 billion worth of bonds was issued compared with just over A$1.0 billion the week before.Kommunalbanken (rated AAA) was the first to market, with a A$100 million addition to its July 2022 line. This was its third addition to the line since opening it last July, but the total outstanding remains a relatively modest A$550 million. This latest top-up was priced at 133 basis points over Commonwealth bonds, to yield 4.595 per cent per annum.The Sydney branch of Bank of China (rated A) returned to the market for the first time since making its debut just over a year ago. And, like this first time, the bank sold A$600 million of three-year floating rate notes, but this time the FRNs were priced at 98 bps over bank bills rather than 170 bps.AMP Bank ( rated A) has the same rating, from S&P, as Bank of China but had to pay 10 bps more to sell A$500 million of three-year FRNs.KfW (AAA) added A$400 million to the July 2018 line that it opened in January. The increase was priced at 89.5 bps over Commonwealth bonds and takes outstandings to A$1.4 billion.On Friday, GE Capital Australia Funding (rated AA+) and the Sydney branch of Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ (rated A+) both launched and priced new deals. GE Capital added A$200 million to the A$100 million August 2022 line that it opened last July. The top-up was priced at 160 bps over swap, which is not a whole lot cheaper than the 185 bps paid originally.Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ made its market debut exactly one year ago, with a A$300 million, three-year FRN priced at 135 bps over bank bills. On Friday, it repeated the exercise with another A$300 million, three-year FRN priced at 78 bps over bank bills. In other domestic news, Westpac advised the ASX that it had bought back more of its March 2014 Commonwealth government guaranteed FRNs. There had been as many as A$1.55 billion of the FRNs outstanding but now the total is down to A$547 million. No details were provided of the buyback price. In New Zealand, Rentenbank (rated AAA) returned to the Kauri market for the first time in almost a year and sold NZ$175 million of 19 September 2017 bonds. The bonds were priced at 78.5 bps over New Zealand government bonds, to yield 3.885 per cent per annum.