April 2007
all page content
all page content
Main body page content
LATEST ARTICLES
-
The financial supply chain is an important concept for CFOs and treasurers to understand. However, it is one that they might be unfamiliar with, and certainly it is unlikely to be at the top of their agenda.
-
The inflation-linked bond market has grown dramatically in size and sophistication. What is driving its expansion, and just how far can the market develop?
-
As the deal between US-based Lyondell Chemical and Saudi Arabia’s National Titanium Dioxide (Cristal) closes so Saudi Arabian merger and acquisition activity looks set to increase further, and to cover more types of business, in 2007.
-
Investors worry about lack of outside experience, lack of star quality and the temporary prefix.
-
Revenues at Instinet’s Asian business grew by an impressive 50% last year, double the growth in regional trading volumes. The electronic broker has ambitious plans to expand throughout the region this year, opening an office in Singapore, becoming the first remote member of the Australian Stock Exchange, and establishing a partnership in India to offer electronic direct market access. However, it is in its new adopted home of Japan that the broker is making its boldest moves.
-
The fourth CLO designed to free up risk capital for reinvestment in the PFI market has been launched. Roger James reports.
-
Anxiety rippled through the UK credit market when the UK’s top non-conformist mortgage lender, Kensington Group, said it was considering a sale to a US bank. Roger James explains why.
-
House painter Miguel Hernández has dreamed for years of buying a house and a car for his wife and three children. However, as one of the millions of Mexicans without a bank account, he has always been denied credit. But his luck could change in June when US-owned superstore Wal-Mart de Mexico opens banking services, joining a growing roster of local retailers moving into banking for low-income earners. "I’ve shopped at Wal-Mart for years, they know me and I hope they’ll let me open an account. It would change everything," says Hernández.
-
For most of this decade the majority of US investment banks have scorned covered bonds. Not any longer. So if it's true that they no longer believe it to be an unprofitable backwater of the European capital markets, what factors are at work? Philip Moore discovers.
-
The influence of Basle II is starting to be felt in UK mortgage lenders’ funding plans.
-
The launch of LCDX and release of Isda documentation in Europe could revolutionize risk transfer.
-
Structured covered bond may be repeated by other German issuers.
-
But move would boost liquidity when volumes are falling.
-
A wobble in China, a rapid sell-off in global equities, a flight to the safe haven of government bonds and the unwinding of carry trades were all evidence of a change in investors’ risk appetite starting in February and going through into March. The moves showed many things, including the interdependence not only of various currencies but also different asset classes. For a brief period, the path of global equity markets seemed to be dictated by what was going on in an intraday basis in spot sterling/yen.
-
There was a flurry of activity in the FX employment market in March as those market participants who got bonuses banked their cheques.
-
According to Highland Capital, there are at least 13 new managers poised to bring their first CLO deals in Europe this year. Twenty-two new managers joined the market last year, doubling the size of the market in just 12 months. If the market keeps growing at this pace there will inevitably be some form of consolidation since competition for assets is already acute. Spanish savings bank Caja Madrid is currently marketing its first self-managed CLO, Neptuno. The US market continues to boom – 16 deals a month closed last year and so far in 2007 17 have been announced and 44 are ramping.
-
Hysterical headlines and wild index swings have disguised what is really going on in the world of home equity loan securitization.
-
SG CIB takes its cue from collateralized loan obligation securitization.
-
Let Hoteloc be a warning on the risks in short tail period.
-
In December 2006, Mizuho unveiled Alexander Rekeda, Doug Munson, Jim Shepard, Bill Budd and several others as part of its new structured credit and debt capital markets team in New York. The bankers had formerly worked at Calyon, covering various areas of structured finance and debt.
-
Goldman Sachs has been fined what some might call a rather lenient amount, $2 million, for selling short an IPO pre-sale.
-
Appointment shows growing importance of Asia for business and for career growth.
-
With growth surging ahead and inflation high, some analysts have voiced their concerns that the Egyptian economy is getting ahead of itself.
-
Success in investment banking has always depended on relationships and connections, as well as expertise.
-
The foundation on which Ferrovial built its acquisition of BAA was its securitization exit. But nearly a year after the buyout, the refinancing is nowhere to be seen. Louise Bowman finds out what’s happening.
-
Alan Patterson, head of the financial institutions group at Citi, is moving on from origination to a new role of capital management advisory. He will report to Valentin Ehmer, who runs the fixed income and derivatives product group.
-
The regulatory framework of Europe’s single payments system is effectively in place. But the details of implementation by banks and corporates are still a matter of debate.
-
The recent sell-off in global stock markets will not be a repeat of last May – a short correction leading to new highs. There is now more to worry about in the global economy and the liquidity cycle is at a turning point.
-
Hats off to the financial institutions team at a US investment bank who made a highly amusing Bollywood movie using an online service.
-
The excitement of the inaugural Euromoney US covered bond conference clearly got to some delegates in New York last month. Not least Dr Louis Hagan, executive director of the VdP – otherwise known as the Association of German Pfandbrief Banks.
-
The bizarre decision by Moody’s to grant Aaa status to a rag-tag assortment of obscure Nordic credits has put the raters in the spotlight. The relationship between the rating agencies and the big investment banks should also come under scrutiny.
-
The good times might be back in Asia’s markets for foreign investment banks. Alas, though, the feel-good factor does not appear to have reached French bank BNP Paribas.
-
The Euromoney investment banking champions league game table is taking shape, and after a bloody back and forth at the top, Citi has put daylight between itself and its nearest competitor, BNP Paribas.
-
"He’d been my client for 30 years, and he invited me down to see him at his home in Florida. When I got there he had assembled his entire family – wife, children, grandkids, the lot. I sat down. He handed me a letter and asked me to read it out loud to the room. It said simply: ‘Dear Bob, In the event that I should pass away, please tell my wife exactly what she needs to do, and ensure that she does it’"
-
"Japan’s companies had better make use of the advantage of being in the Asian region. The urgent task for them is to promote localization in Asia, in order to secure from European and US firms the fruits that this prospering economy brings forth"
-
Energy development and production have vast and growing capital needs that offer opportunities for investment banks. Add in commodity risk management as well as carbon trading and the prospects look even more glittering. Peter Koh reports, while a new survey shows which banks are leading the way.
-
In March, Morgan Stanley became the latest bulge-bracket firm to enter the increasingly crowded Vietnam securities market.
-
ABN merger may give global scale, but at what cost to the businesses that have driven the UK bank forward?
-
Relics of a troubled past are soon going to be put behind Mexican glass company Vitro, which has just completed a total debt refinancing. Chloe Hayward speaks to CFO Alvaro Rodríguez about his company’s rocky past and shiny future.
-
"Actually, I just pitched one of those today," says a debt capital markets banker when asked whether he detected developing interest among emerging market clients in toggle notes.
-
According to a survey by Tiger 21, a US group for high net-worth investors, the wealthy wouldn’t have been too hard hit by the sharp slide in public equity markets last month as they had already cashed out and moved money to alternative investments. Tiger 21’s 115 members, who have $7 billion in assets, reduced their public equity exposure in 2006 by 30% in anticipation of a correction. They doubled their exposure to alternative assets to 9.5% over the year.
-
Recent setbacks will not hold back the world’s second-largest economy’s growing globalization.
-
Capitalizing on the surge of private equity funds to list on stock markets, in March Standard & Poor’s launched its S&P Listed Private Equity Index.
-
Cynics might argue that the US and Russia are leading villains in the global warming piece. But financial Realpolitik suggests that the world’s biggest polluter and Europe’s most polluted country have key roles to play in the fight to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
-
Asia’s debt markets have soared and spreads over US and European markets have all but disappeared. Meanwhile, risk appetite continues to rise as new products become increasingly marginal. Asia’s debt bankers have much to ponder. Chris Leahy reports.
-
Dubai’s Emaar Properties has announced that it has struck a shares-for-land agreement with Dubai Holding, a state-owned conglomerate.
-
Stock markets keep on rising as the country celebrates the onset of the Year of the Pig. But market participants expect a correction soon and the regulators are eager to ensure that it is a controlled one that does not see off foreign capital. Elliot Wilson reports.
-
"Chávez is the ideological leader of the guerrillas in Colombia"
-
One man not joining the cult of Chávez is Latin America’s richest man, Carlos Slim.
-
BTA Ipoteka became the first Kazakh bank to issue a securitization of residential mortgage loans in the international public markets.
-
-
Citadel Investment Group is reportedly set to market its middle-office and back-office hedge fund expertise to its peers from May, and is aiming at becoming one of the top 10 administrators within five years. Citadel Solutions was set up as a subsidiary earlier this year. According to news website Chicago Business, the business has the capacity to execute two to three times the 20 million trades that Citadel handles each quarter.
-
Press reports that hedge funds will be the hardest hit by the sub-prime mortgages free fall in the US have been proved wrong by Paulson and Co. According to sources, the $7 billion merger arbitrage and event-driven hedge fund has produced 100% net returns year to date, and 60% in February alone on the back of sub-prime bets.
-
JPMorgan has overtaken Goldman Sachs as the largest manager of hedge fund assets globally.
-
Armeconombank is looking to chart new territory for Armenian banks with an international equity offering.
-
Focus should be on monetary and wage policy, says Redrado.
-
Ukraine is the latest emerging market in which asset-backed securities are being issued, with both international and domestic transactions appearing in recent weeks.
-
Richard Price is moving from UBS to Dresdner Kleinwort to take on the role of head of equity sales, based in London. He has spent 18 years at UBS in a variety of roles including head of institutional sales for Australasia, head of pan-European equity sales North America and, most recently, head of pan-European sales into the UK.
-
Despite encouraging news from Bank of America, most US mortgage providers have so far remained aloof despite investor enthusiasm for covered bonds. Jethro Wookey reports.
-
Long overdue fiscal prudence and a rising economic tide have presented the Philippines with its best chance in decades for sustainable economic growth. Chris Leahy reports.