Merrill Lynch plans to grow its team that underwrites collateralized debt obligations backed by commercial real estate. Merrill is expanding the group now to build out another asset class, according to an official close to the firm. The group closed its first CRE CDO, the USD807 million Ansonia 2006-1, in November.
Malay Bansal, director, was named head of the group earlier this year. He was previously a deal manager and head of structuring in Merrill's commercial mortgage-backed securities group. Bansal declined comment on how many deals he has in the pipeline or how many staffers he would like to add.
