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BANK Labôuchere's pioneering securitisation of share leasing contracts, LABS 1, roared off the books in 20 minutes on Friday, despite coming at an unpopular maturity for Dutch institutions. Lease Assets Backed Securities BV sold Dfl 400m of triple A rated 5% bonds maturing in January 2002. Dutch pension funds and insurance companies bought 70% of the 4 1/4 year paper, even though they normally invest at the seven to 10 year tenor.

* A widening in 10 year Deutschmark bond spreads this week could make the pricing of the Asian Development Bank's forthcoming European currency benchmark global transaction wider than expected. Comparable triple-A spreads moved out by three to four basis points this week, with price talk on the ADB deal moving from 8bp earlier in the week to 12bp yesterday (Thursday).

THE CHINESE government has given permission for the first international bond offering by a pure corporate entity, underlining its commitment to allow state owned industries greater financial autonomy. Bao Shan Iron & Steel, an unlisted company that is one of the PRC's most efficient and high quality steel producers, has mandated JP Morgan for a $300m rule 144a issue.

TAIWAN'S majority state-owned development bank, Chiao Tung is preparing a first subordinated debt offering from the republic. With the international debt markets traditionally seeing very little activity out of the country because of restrictive withholding taxes, bankers said that the prospective US-targeted offering stands to set an important benchmark.

* Asian Infrastructure Fund Advisors Ltd (AIFAL) has appointed Ted Rule as its new managing director. Currently the head of the group's transport portfolio, Rule will assume day-to-day running of the Hong Kong-based office. AIFAL's founding managing director Will Liley will take a more active role in investor relations as company chairman. * Deutsche Morgan Grenfell revealed this week that it is to restructure its Asian equity operations, relocating over a dozen key staff from Singapore to Hong Kong.

CITICORP HAS scooped a second mandate for a novel securitisation by the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Following its success last month with a $225m telecoms-related securitisation for Paktel in association with ABN AMRO, the bank was awarded the mandate this week for a $300m to $500m securitisation of overseas workers' remittances. With Deutsche Morgan Grenfell likely to be brought on board as joint lead, bankers said that the issue will probably emerge in about six months' time and will follow a bridging loan scheduled to be put in place first.

THE KOREAN debt markets received some further measure of relief this week with the completion of a $463m three tranche offering for leading corporate Samsung Electronics. Following recent deals for the Korea Development Bank (KDB) and Export Import Bank of Korea (Kexim), the success of the US targeted deal underscored investors' willingness to pick up Korean paper provided the credit is right and the issuer is prepared to accept market reality.

INDICATIVE terms for the eagerly anticipated credit-enhanced convertible for First International Computers (FIC) will be released today (Friday) by lead manager UBS. Scheduled to be completed on an accelerated basis, the fact that the $200m issue will be the first from Asia backed by a triple-A basis has drawn keen attention. With launch on Monday for final pricing on Thursday, bankers said that the five year premium redemption, zero coupon structure has already drawn very positive pre-marketing feedback.

DEFYING regional currency turmoil and the precipitous drop of the Jakarta stock market, a $471m offering by Gulf Indonesia has been hailed a great success by Asian equity players. Despite widespread grumbling at the use of a pot system to allocate the 24.15m share Goldman Sachs led deal, bankers said that the ability of a Asean-based company to appeal to international equity investors in the current market climate was nothing short of astounding.

SUMITOMO Bank issued the third of three ¥50bn batches of asset backed commercial paper last week from its offshore vehicle Pegasus Funding Corp. The two month issue, together with a three month deal the previous week, were intended to improve the bank's BIS ratio in time for the reporting deadline on September 30, the end of the first fiscal half year. No more paper will be sold from the ¥500bn programme until at least December, when the end of the fiscal year in March begins to come in range of the programme's maximum maturity.

JAPANESE financing company Nichiei Co and lead manager UBS this week broke new ground for corporate Japan with the successful completion of the first bookbuilding aimed exclusively at international investors. The offering of 4.5m shares, with a 500,000 greenshoe, will raise around $470m if the greenshoe is exercised. The offering was priced at ¥11,270, representing a 2% discount to the market price -- the lower end of the indicated 2%-4% discount range. Shares moved up to ¥11,900 in a brisk aftermarket.

THE KOREA Telecom share offering has been delayed, with international roadshows planned for this week cancelled. While the Korean government is hoping that the sale will only be postponed for a couple of weeks, many bankers say the issue may not emerge this year. The delay highlights the woeful state of the Korean stock market, as well as investor caution to deals from the country. Offerings for Dacom and SK Telecom were both recently pulled, compounding the effect of the controversial placement of a KorAm Bank issue. Investors may also be distracted by rival offerings from China Telecom and Telstra.