WestLB has launched its first equity-linked retail investment product in the U.K. The structure, called Performance Seeker, gives investors exposure to the FTSE100, Standard & Poor's 500 and Nikkei225. Investors will get 100% capital protection plus 100% of the upside of the basket. WestLB has bought a rainbow option with a lookback feature to allocate 50% of the basket to the best returning index, 30% to the second best and 20% to the third.
Thorsten Wegener, head of sales in equity markets, is aiming to build retail distribution channels for the German bank. "We have been selling hedges to structurers for several years," said Wegener. "We have decided to cut out the middle man and pass the margin on to customers," he added. The selling point of WestLB's products will be innovation, which Wegener thinks the U.K. market lacks. "We don't want to bore [investors] to death with the 23rd index tracker," he said.
