Asset Securitization Report articles from September 2008

Asset Securitization Report archives from September 2008

Student Loans:A World of Difference Under the Cap n' Gowns.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Karen Sibayan Although previously regarded as a cookie-cutter asset class, the student loan product is suffering - like all the other major securitization sectors - from a lack of investor confidence. The task is to win these...

DPR Business - Hazy But Not Lazy.(diversified payment rights)(European Investment Bank)
September 8, 2008... Byline: Felipe Ossa The lazy, hazy days of summer didn't fully envelop residents of the DPR world. They weren't exactly lazy, when a handful of DPR deals either closed or ramped up in a market so grim that any cross-border closing is an...

Deal Flow Unchanged Post Labor Day: Market jitters over GSE liquidity problems hinder ABS deal flow.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein The market came off the Labor Day weekend holiday as slow as it went into it. This came as no surprise for traders, who do not expect to see a major pickup in the market given the current liquidity concerns at...

FDIC Loan Mod Plan May Increase Delinquencies.(Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.)
September 8, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein Late last month, in an effort to help delinquent IndyMac Bank borrowers stay in their homes, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) announced a "systematic" loan modification plan. The plan is initially...

Distressed Buyers Hit Roadblocks.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer Much has been said about the emergence of distressed funds taking advantage of buying opportunities in the European market. However, market analysts said that prices must go wider before distressed buying really takes...

Northern Rock Risk Surfaces.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer The now nationalized U.K. bank Northern Rock's Granite master trust is reporting a rising trend of arrears since the end of last year - delinquencies have climbed to 1.52%, which is almost four times the level recorded...

MEFA Launches Student Loan Deal.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein The Massachusetts Educational Financing Authority (MEFA) is issuing $400 million in education loan revenue bonds; it is the first private student loan securitization of the year from the state authority. The deal...

Light Mortgage Volume Starts Off September: Strong mortgage performance was seen in August, but September started on a mediocre note.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Sally A. Runyan/Thomson Reuters As September trading got underway following a long weekend, mortgages got off to a shaky start. Volume started off light, but picked up quickly as Treasurys turned around at mid-morning. Flows...

Central Banks Move to Adjust Liquidity Programs: The potential for abusing the SLS as a liquidity source is being closely examined.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer Both the Bank of England (BoE) and European Central Bank (ECB) board members said last week that they are looking at possible new restrictions on the liquidity facilities they currently have on offer. The changes...

European Primary Market Remains Quiet.
September 8, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer The August pipeline remained quiet, but market sources said that there is some indication that investors are looking to put money to work. The problem is that, at the current spreads, it is unlikely that issuers...

Whispers.(Whispers)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Editorial Staff Falling victim to current difficult market conditions, GSC Group's U.S. CLO team let go of some of its staff last week, sources said. This is part of a broader restructuring of the firm's corporate credit division....

GMAC Mexicana to Introduce Asset Class.(Global)(General Motors Acceptance Corp.)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Felipe Ossa While global markets reel from credit compression, Mexican spreads have edged out. But that has not deterred originators from entering the market with new asset classes. Case in point: GMAC Mexicana is in the pipeline...

BofE to Extend Liquidity Under New Plan.(Global)(The Bank of England)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer The Bank of England (BofE) is looking less likely to extend the terms of its special liquidity scheme (SLS), which is due to end on Oct. 21. The bank reiterated that the program was always meant to be a short-term...

U.K. Govt. Action Will Have Little Impact on Housing Slump.(Global)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer The U.K. government last week announced measures intended to stem house price deflation and mortgage defaults. The measures would also ultimately boost the deteriorating performance in U.K. RMBS. However, market...

The Promise of Islamic Finance: An ASR roundtable looks at this rapidly growing market's development and its future.(Cover Story)(Discussion)(Company overview)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Editorial Staff Islamic finance had its start in the 1960s and 1970s with the influx of petrodollars into the Gulf region. The rapid development of Middle East markets - Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates - has...

Taking the Good with the Bad.(Column)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Karen Sibayan The importance of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac not only to the U.S. mortgage market but to the worldwide economy was demonstrated last week when the U.S. Treasury Department put the two GSEs under conservatorship. ...

Headlines Overshadow Consumer ABS: Lehman Brothers news revived market anxiety even after GSE bailout.(ABS)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein The beginning of September was wracked with uncertainty as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac struggled with liquidity issues. That was until the government stepped in with a bailout plan for the GSEs. However, the...

Covered Bond Experts Develop U.S. Paradigm.(ABS)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein As ABS industry participants scour the market for new deals, covered bonds remain a beacon of potential liquidity for the desiccative pipeline. One question, however, remains: Where are these new programs? ...

Morgan Joseph Grows Structured Products Group.(ABS)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein It goes without saying that structured products, particularly in the ABS space, are not the once attractive asset that had investors flocking to the sector. And, with the continued stream of negative headlines,...

MBS Rally Sharply on GSE Takeover: Monday was record-setting due to the GSE conservatorship announcement.(MBS)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Sally A. Runyan/Thomson Reuters Last week's highlight was the government's takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Since the announcement was made on Sept. 7, a Sunday, it led to a sharply higher open in MBS last Monday. It was...

ECB to Shed ABS Overload With Stricter Criteria: The ECB implements stricter guidelines to prevent the abuse of repo liquidity.(Global)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer The European Central Bank (ECB) revealed changes to its repo liquidity program last week. The moves are intended to make the repo liquidity option less appealing for ABS issuers. However, market sources said that...

Khreschatyk Launches Ukraine Covered Bond.(Global)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Felipe Ossa The Ukraine's Bank Khreschatyk has issued its first covered bond, a three-year UAH70 million ($14.7 million) trade governed by local law. Fitch Ratings has given the transaction a aB+' on the global scale and an...

Heavier Taxes Threaten Argentine ABS.(Global)
September 15, 2008... Byline: Felipe Ossa It looks like the Argentine government isn't out to make friends in structured finance. The administration of Cristina Kirchner last August abolished certain tax exemptions for financial trusts. This will cut the...

Whispers.(Whispers)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Editorial Staff South Africa's Standard Bank in London recently hired David McCaig as global head of securitization. McCaig had been at WestLB from July 1998 until the spring of this year. At WestLB, he headed up asset...

With Merrill, BofA Could Return to Emerging Markets.(Feature)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Felipe Ossa In the emerging market space, Bank of America's purchase of Merrill Lynch resonates far and wide. While the commercial bank has been a non-entity in the business since 2003, Merrill has been an active player at least...

Without Federal Backup, More are Likely to Follow Lehman.(Column)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Nora colomer The case of Lehman Brothers proves that the bar for banks has just been raised. Until last week, financial institutions of such size were seen as being in the too-big-to-fail category. Lehman found itself forced...

ABS Market Sidelined With Wall Street Fears: Market goes into a wait-and-see mode as many participants ponder their fate.(ABS)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein The mood in the ABS market was understandably gloomy last week, as traders expressed disbelief and apprehension about the sector, not to mention the financial industry as a whole. While many traders were...

AIG Bailout: Catalyst for Consolidated Authority?(ABS)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Joe Adler and Steven Sloan/American Banker Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and American International Group (AIG) have at least one thing in common: They owned depositories but were not overseen by the Federal Reserve Board. ...

MBS Can't Compete with Financial Crisis: Flight-to-quality trades transpire even with the Fed's AIG bailout.(MBS)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Sally A. Runyan/Thomson Reuters Cataclysmic changes occurred in the financial landscape last week. Lehman Brothers failed to find a buyer and declared Chapter 11, Merrill Lynch was bought for $50 billion by Bank of America in a...

There's Hope for ABCP, But Buyers Remain Wary: Euro issuers still want to bring deals to market despite investor skepticism.(Global)(Annual Asset Backed Commercial Paper)(Conference notes)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer At Information Management Network's first Cross Atlantic ABCP Summit held earlier this month, market panelists remained optimistic that, once the dust settles, investors will come back to the European ABCP market in...

Market Focuses on CDS Impact Amidst Wall Street Chaos.(Feature)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein Sept. 15 was a day of reckoning for Wall Street as the market said goodbye to two U.S. financial institutions, 158-year old Lehman Brothers, whose parts will be wrapped into Barclays Capital, and 94-year old Merrill...

CMSA Discusses Rising Delinquencies, Offers Assurance.(Feature)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein The Commercial Mortgage Securities Association (CMSA) gathered in New York last week amidst a firestorm of financial distress and a radical shift on Wall Street. On most panelists' minds was the impact that...

Lehman Presence Prevails in European CMBS and RMBS.(Feature)
September 22, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer The Lehman Group Holding Co.'s Chapter 11 filing was followed by its London-based European holding subsidiary being placed in administration. Pricewaterhouse Coopers was appointed administrator to manage the wind-up....

Whispers.(Whispers)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Editorial Staff Tim Nicolle joined Eurokommerz as first deputy chief executive officer. He was previously managing director of emerging markets for Deutsche Bank in London. In his new Moscow-based role, Nicolle will oversee for a...

Lehman Collapse Sends Bad Vibes to Money Market Fund.(Global)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer Lehman Brothers's collapse has set back the recovery in European ABCP, as it gave the already jittery investor base more reason to stay away. "The ABCP market had been one of the first to start to recover from the...

Europe in Better Shape, No Need for a TARP-Like Rescue Yet.(MBS)(Troubled Asset Relief Program)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer As the U.S. works to put together its Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), comments by U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson suggest that similar schemes are being crafted in some non-U.S. countries. Troubled...

Troubled MBS Market to Receive Liquidity - But at what cost?(Cover Story)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein Last week U.S Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson extended the biggest lifeline to the financial markets of all time - and perhaps made the biggest gamble with U.S. taxpayer money - when he announced a plan to...

Cohen's Ricciardi Proposes an Alternative to Paulson's Plan.(Cover Story)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein As Congress battled over the terms of the Treasury bailout plan last week, Christopher Ricciardi, chief executive officer at Cohen & Co. and former managing director of global structured credit products at Merrill...

The Death of the QSPE.(Column)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Karen Sibayan It's fitting that the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) released its proposed changes to Statement 140 and Interpretation 46 (R) the week the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy news broke. These FASB proposals,...

ABS Spreads Wide Despite Govt. Bailout Proposal: ABS market unsteady as TARP details are awaited.(ABS)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Gabrielle Stein The ABS market remained in limbo last week as Congress and the Treasury fleshed out plans for the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). Although investor interest in non-agency MBS was up, actual...

A Fresh Look at Pricing in the Triple-A CLO Market.(ABS)
September 29, 2008... Byline: David Ardini, Alex Yu, and Sam Peng, Floating Rate Debt Group - Institutional Team, Franklin Templeton Fixed Income Par-based investors in the triple-A CLO market may soon have their sense of security tested. Many still apparently...

Jumbo Prime Collateral Faces Increased Losses.(ABS)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Karen Sibayan Despite being backed by borrowers with better credit histories, prime collateral - specifically in jumbos - is facing its own set of problems. However, the deterioration has not been as rapid as that seen in both...

Markets Focus on TARP Hearings: Doubts about the government's rescue plan derail MBS market.(MBS)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Sally A. Runyan/Thomson Reuters The rally from the government's rescue plan to buy troubled assets did not carry over into last week's trading. As the markets opened Monday, uncertainty regarding details of the plan as well as its...

Mexican States & Munis: Not a Hard Sell: But risks in the sector aren't tough to find.(Global)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Felipe Ossa It's taken a while for the pull-back in bank lending across the globe to hit Mexico's states and municipalities. Sub-sovereigns in the country have been fairly active in taking on asset-backed loans this year, with...

Takeover May be Only Option for Last Bank Standing?(Global)
September 29, 2008... Byline: Nora Colomer Lloyds TSB's A[pounds sterling]12 billion ($22.2 billion) takeover of HBOS averted a Northern Rock-style run on the bank and has, at least for now, secured the performance of the troubled bank's securitization deals....