News Cuttings
* Two new directors were elected to ISDA's board. Hidetaka Hara, co-head of business management and planning in global fixed income at Nomura Securities in Tokyo, and Uday Narang, president of Entergy-Koch Trading Europe in London.
* The trade organization announced its plans to launch a 2003 Master Agreement Protocol that will bring into line all existing ISDA documentation with the 2002 Master Agreement.
* ISDA plans to publish Master Agreements in Japanese and Mandarin in the coming weeks.
Seen 'N' Heard
* "[Warren Buffett's] been having trouble shutting [General Re Securities] down because he won't pay a realistic price on outstanding contracts."--Kaushik Amin, managing director and co-head of global interest rate products at Lehman Brothers in New York, speculating on the likely reason for Buffett's comments about derivatives being "weapons of mass destruction."
