Covered Bonds

Note: Two increases this year to Caisse de Refinancement de l’Habitat’s 4.25% October 2014 issue, which had previously been included, have been excluded because they do not meet Dealogic’s criteria for euro jumbo covered bonds.

Denmark’s mortgage banks will be auctioning around Dkr550bn (Eu73bn) of covered bonds over the course of the industry’s annual December auctions, almost twice the amount sold through the auctions last year. But demand is “huge”, said one analyst familiar with the auctions.

Andreas Schenk has been promoted to become head of treasury at Deutsche Pfandbriefbank (pbb), the main issuing subsidiary of the Hypo Real Estate group.

Moody’s has revised its approach to modelling set-off risk in relation to residential mortgages in Dutch covered bond programmes, which may affect the rating of one programme that is already on review for downgrade, the agency announced today (Monday).

UBS is set to price only its second covered bond, after having built an oversubscribed order book this (Monday) morning for a 10 year follow-up to its five year debut of September. And the first Norwegian euro benchmark of the year is expected tomorrow (Tuesday).

The European Central Bank this (Monday) morning reported a Eu110m increase in settled purchases under its Eu60bn covered bond programme as of Friday, taking total buying to Eu24.17bn.

CIF Euromortgage yesterday (Thursday) priced a Eu1.25bn April 2012 obligations foncières issue at 10bp over mid-swaps, matching Compagnie de Financement Foncier in achieving the tightest level for a benchmark covered bond this year. Meanwhile, Caja Murcia’s issuance plans are understood to be on hold.

In brief: Credit Suisse has hired Marcus Schulte to run its financial institutions debt capital market franchise for Germany and Austria.

Alliance & Leicester is no longer among the issuers listed on the Regulated Covered Bonds Register on the UK Financial Services Authority’s website. [Updated to include issuer comment and redemption of outstanding issue.]

Purchases reported under the European Central Bank’s Eu60bn covered bond programme this week totalled Eu1.761bn, the second highest total for a full week since the scheme began.

The covered bond market must integrate further and achieve greater harmonisation, Michel Stubbe, head of division, market operations analysis at the ECB, told delegates at the European Mortgage Federation’s annual conference in Brussels yesterday (Thursday), warning that a business as usual approach would lead to “a bit of a disaster”.

Moody’s yesterday (Thursday) placed on review for possible downgrade the long term debt ratings of Deutsche Bank, Münchener Hypothekenbank and Stadtsparkasse Düsseldorf as part of a recalibration exercise on German bank ratings.