The shortlist for our 2026 European Securitization Awards is available here and you can cast your votes on the same page until January 23!
Some things never change. Among them is the appearance of a Tower Bridge Funding transaction in the first few weeks of January. After Belmont Green metamorphosed into Vida Bank in late 2024, there were questions about how much the stalwart issuer would need the securitization market.
So far, Vida has made good on its intention to get away at least one deal a year. It returned with a new shelf for asset deconsolidation, called London Bridge, last year and now, comfortingly, Tower Bridge has returned to its usual spot on the calendar.
It looks very similar to the pre-banking license Tower Bridges, but given Vida’s access to cheap deposit funding, there’s no mezz this time, just £600m of seniors, £250m of which were placed with investors 75bp over Sonia.
The deal has fired the starting gun on RMBS issuance for the year and there are more banks keen to get some funding done. Santander placed a bumper £1.25bn on Wednesday and Atom Bank has a mandate out for a prime RMBS of its own.
Could it set up a bumper year for prime RMBS after an underwhelming 2025? Tom Hall gets into the weeds of it here.
Data in Vienna
Meanwhile, George Smith has been in Vienna this week at FT Live’s CEE Securitization Summit.
There was an exciting deal to talk about because Polish car leasing firm Vehis got the first cash deal for some time done in the region last year. It was also the first ever Polish deal to follow the specialist lender playbook of aggregating assets in warehouse before a takeout.
In general, however, the cash market hasn’t really got going. SRT continues to overwhelmingly dominate the CEE securitization market and the conference agenda.
Much discussed was the need for banks to get their data in order to meet the needs of investors and the EU’s exacting disclosure standards.
That’s not to say investors can’t take a view on a portfolio without perfect data stretching back decades, but better data gives an extra bit of security, smoother deal execution and probably more comfort.
That need for comfort was reflected in a tidbit from one of the panels. No one GlobalCapital has asked has said they are worried about a Tricolor-esque situation in Europe, where syndicated and rated auto ABS bonds were downgraded because of likely fraud.
Yet clearly some are seeking comfort in the data. Christian Thun, European DataWarehouse CEO and previous Another Fine Mezz guest, said his firm saw a spike in interest in European auto data after Tricolor’s bankruptcy.
It’s always nice to double check.
