Covered Bonds

Washington Mutual has criticised Moody’s for a lack of understanding of the FDIC receivership process in its comment letter to the regulator regarding the planned US covered bond policy statement.

In brief: Bilbao Bizkaia Kutxa (BBK) has mandated leads for its debut euro covered bond.

Attendees of the US Treasury’s covered bond meeting yesterday (Tuesday) described the get-together of market participants and regulators as both unprecedented and productive.

Deutsche Apotheker- und Ärztebank (apoBank) failed to reach its stated ambition yesterday (Tuesday), when it was forced to price a sub-benchmark sized deal despite targeting a jumbo debut. Market participants were split on whether this and other recent struggles have been caused by bad luck or bad advice.

Fitch has assigned an expected B+ rating to a planned Hr70m (Eu9.85m) three year covered bond for Ukraine’s Khreschatyk Bank. The rating is believed to be the first assigned by an international agency to a Ukrainian covered bond, although the market was opened early last year.

In brief: Moody’s has upgraded the public sector Pfandbriefe of Bayerische Hypo- und Vereinsbank (HVB) from Aa1 to Aaa.

Deutsche Apotheker und Ärztebank (apoBank), Germany’s largest primary co-operative bank, opened books on its debut mortgage Pfandbrief this (Tuesday) morning. Bookbuilding was proving to be a drawn out process, with several factors said to be working against apoBank.

The US Treasury is holding a meeting today (Tuesday) bringing together regulators and market participants to further the development of the covered bond market in the States.

Mauricio Noé has been appointed global head of covered bonds at Royal Bank of Scotland, retaining the position he held at ABN Amro.