SF Market round-up: Housekeeping expenses — Bank balance sheet CLOs

The recent popularity of bank balance sheet CLOs, ushered in by ABN Amro, HSBC and Barclays Capital at the end of last year, shows no sign of abating. In June alone, RBS, Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas, Commerzbank, Standard Chartered and Sampo were all in the market with deals. These are straightforward balance sheet and regulatory capital management exercises in the run-up to Basle II and as such tend to be large, one-off exercises. Both synthetic, RBS’s Arran Corporate Loans CLO is £3.5 billion equivalent and Deutsche’s London Wall 2006 deal is €3 billion. BNP Paribas’s Global Liberté V is predominantly backed by lending in the US and Canada and is $12 billion while Commerzbank’s CoCo Finance 2006 is a €4.5 billion trade. Standard Chartered’s latest balance sheet CLO references $1.6 billion of loans, and Sampo’s €1 billion Sea Fort Securities is the first CLO from a Finnish bank.