Complete news archive

  • Kroll adds SF vet

    Kroll Bond Rating Agency (KBRA) has appointed Patrick Welch as chief credit officer. He will report to president and coo Jim Nadler.

    Welch joins from Goldman Sachs, where he spent 19 years and was most recently vp in the credit risk management and advisory department as well as deputy chief credit officer for GS Bank. He covered the structured finance .......

    Job Swaps 11 November 2016

  • Legacy CDOs unwound

    Legal & General Group has unwound four CDOs, held within Legal & General Retirement, totalling over £1bn. The transactions were launched in 2007-2008 and held within an SPV.

    The firm says there were no transaction costs associated with the restructuring and its Solvency 2 capital will reduce by circa £100m as a result. The future interest payments on the unwound .......

    News Round-up 11 November 2016

  • ESMA consults on package orders

    ESMA has opened a public consultation on draft regulatory technical standards (RTS) regarding the treatment of package orders under the amended MiFID II/MIFIR. Asset class-specific criteria have been developed for a few classes, including credit derivatives.

    MIFIR's pre-trade transparency regime requires that trading interest in all non-equity instruments is disclosed, with certain exceptions if there is not a liquid market .......

    News Round-up 11 November 2016

  • US CLOs unmoved

    US CLO secondary spreads remain unmoved despite the election result.

    "It's certainly been interesting," says one trader. "If you'd told me two days ago that we'd have a Trump victory and CLOs would be unchanged I would've said you were crazy, but that's what's happened."

    The trader continues: "A lot of dealers came in in the middle of the night .......

    SCIWire 10 November 2016

  • ILS firm swipes compliance vet

    Markel CATCo has hired John Whiley as chief compliance officer. He previously worked as vp and head of ILS at Prime Management, a division of SS&C GlobeOp.

    Whiley was at Prime Management, an independent service provider in the ILS industry, for 14 years. He then stayed with the firm after it was acquired by SS&C.

    .......

    Job Swaps 10 November 2016

  • APRA issues regulation responses

    The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority has responded to submissions to its November 2015 discussion paper on revising its prudential framework for securitisation (SCI 26 November 2015). It has also issued a final revised Prudential Standard APS 120 and is consulting on its draft revised Prudential Practice Guide APG 120.

    APRA has been working to update its regulatory framework to incorporate .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • GSE RPLs beating private-label

    Re-performing loans (RPLs) owned, guaranteed or securitised by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will continue to outperform private-label RPLs, despite the negative performance impact on GSE loans from increased use of streamlined modifications in the coming years, says Moody's. GSEs will increasingly use streamlined loan modifications once HAMP expires, which is a credit negative because the other mods have looser .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • Dutch arrears 'lowest since 2009'

    Dutch mortgages in late-stage arrears are at the lowest levels since 2009, due to an improved macroeconomic background and proactive servicing, according to Fitch. The agency finds that of its rated RMBS, only 0.38% of mortgage loans were more than three months in arrears in 3Q16, down from 0.69% a year earlier.

    This is partly due to the addition of .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • Euro CLO refis anticipated

    Strong issuance in Q3 of €4.63bn broke the quarterly record for the European CLO 2.0 market. Lower spreads at the top of the stack could incentivise older 2.0 transactions to refinance, which the secondary market should start to price in.

    That previous record quarter was Q2, when €4.56bn was issued. Back in 3Q15, issuance was just €2.5bn.

    Issuance for the .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • Healthcare exposure highlighted

    Moody's reports that the healthcare sector is the largest industry exposure among the European CLO 2.0 deals it rates, accounting for 14% of collateral. While the credit quality of the issuers is slightly lower than for the broader CLO 2.0 universe, the rating agency has a positive outlook for the sector due to a number of market and fundamental factors.

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • BTL lending standards 'credit positive'

    The UK Prudential Regulation Authority's new lending standards should improve the credit quality of UK buy-to-let mortgages, Moody's suggests. The agency says that the rules are credit positive because they reduce the risk of excessive losses in UK RMBS and covered bonds.

    "The rules will reduce the risk of excessive losses and help prevent a weakening in mortgage credit quality. .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • Spanish RPL correlation examined

    Default driver analysis for Spanish re-performing (RPL) loans shows a positive correlation between the probability of default (PD) and the loan-to-value (LTV) ratio upon renegotiation, says Moody's. Foreign residents and those with homes on Spain's coast represent higher mortgage default risk.

    "Foreign residents are twice as likely to default on their mortgage loans upon restructuring. A default by a foreign .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • Reporting conventions compared

    Moody's has published a study examining how auto ABS performance is reported the UK, German, Chinese and Australian markets. The agency notes that while central banks play a significant role in driving disclosure harmonisation in each of these markets with their specific reporting requirements, local peculiarities remain.

    "There are many commonalities characterising ABS transactions across these four jurisdictions, yet performance .......

    News Round-up 10 November 2016

  • KKR targets shipping loans

    Pillarstone, the platform set up by KKR to buy non-core and underperforming assets in Europe, seems set to take on underperforming shipping loans following the recruitment of former Frontline Management ceo Jens Martin Jensen. Indeed, the firm recently confirmed its involvement in a shipping-related securitisation.

    Underperforming loans in the shipping sector have skyrocketed since 2008, as shipping operators have been .......

    News 10 November 2016

  • Euro secondary stable

    The European securitisation secondary market remains stable despite wider market volatility.

    The continuation of the buying bias and positive tone seen in secondary ABS/MBS in recent weeks ensured all sectors remained insulated from the big moves seen in equities and broader credit yesterday. Consequently, spreads were unchanged on the day and have stayed the same into this morning's open.

    Inevitably .......

    SCIWire 10 November 2016

  • Uncertain intentions

    Valuers assess US election implications

    The US has had its 'Brexit moment', according to a panel of valuations experts at a Duff & Phelps press briefing in London yesterday (9 November). However, while the timing of the Brexit vote gave funds but a matter of days to reflect the impact on asset valuations, the timing of the unexpected US election result should provide valuers more .......

    Talking Point 10 November 2016

  • Start-up nabs derivatives expert

    Axoni has hired Stephen Sandberg as director of client services. He will manage client engagements and oversee large-scale deployments of technologies at the blockchain start-up.

    Sandberg last worked at Deloitte as senior manager working on sales and execution with financial institutions related to the impact of derivative regulations on trading technologies and business processes and also founded the Deloitte Advisory Blockchain .......

    Job Swaps 9 November 2016

  • Simultaneous servicer ratings action

    Fitch has simultaneously affirmed and withdrawn Seneca's US RMBS servicer ratings. It has affirmed the rating of RPS3 on the prime product for the US primary servicer, and RSS3 for the primary special servicer.

    At the same time, the agency has withdrawn Seneca's ratings due to the lack of information to support the ratings and the completed sale of Seneca's .......

    News Round-up 9 November 2016

  • Manager makes double grab

    ZAIS Group has hired Ahrash Daneshvar and Iris Arrington to its London office. Daneshvar takes up the role of md and Arrington, vp of client relations.

    In his new role, Daneshvar will work on ZAIS's credit derivatives and quantitative trading strategies. He brings nearly two decades of structured credit and derivatives experience to the firm, after spending ten years at .......

    Job Swaps 9 November 2016

  • Ocwen rankings affirmed

    Moody's has affirmed its master servicer assessment and servicer quality (SQ) assessments for Ocwen Loan Servicing at SQ3, as a primary servicer of prime, subprime, second lien and special servicer of residential mortgage loans. The agency says that the company has continued to demonstrate above average performance metrics across its operational areas, including collections and loss mitigation.

    Moody's notes that .......

    News Round-up 9 November 2016

  • Reperforming loan bid wins

    Towd Point Master Funding (Cerberus) has been confirmed as the winning bidder on two pools of reperforming loans sold by Fannie Mae. The pools consisted of 3,500 loans totalling US$789.2m in unpaid principal balance.

    The loans were marketed to potential bidders from 11 October (SCI 12 October). The eventual cover bid price for the two pools was 88.15% of unpaid .......

    News Round-up 9 November 2016
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