Awards

In a straight fight between UBS and Caliburn Partnership to earn Asiamoney’s award for best M&A adviser in Australia over the past year, the Swiss bank edged out the boutique advisory firm. Asiamoney felt it did a slightly better job at gaining a good outcome for clients, while it was also represented on more sizeable deals through the year.

Macquarie Leasing’s securitisation deal last June was underpinned by auto- and equipment-backed loans, where spreads tend to be wider. While it had an Australian dollar tranche, it included an Irish special purpose vehicle. Its structure was impressive enough for St. George to copy it and the deal rightly earns Asiamoney’s award.

Primary Health launched the largest leveraged buy-out loan in Australia during 2008. It promised to sell surplus assets of target Symbion and to use the proceeds to refund much of the money it had been lent. The promise of early repayment and appealing pricing attracted interest from a selection of high-quality banks.

Staff at banks have been on the front line as far as the global financial crisis is concerned, with bonuses slashed and entire teams of people let go. It was a challenging environment for the region’s recruiters too, with firing strongly outstripping hiring. Asiamoney reveals which firms have prospered in the toughest year in a decade.

Asiamoney is pleased to announce the results of its largest ever travel poll. In total, 462 business travelers from 25 countries participated, making the results of this survey our most comprehensive guide yet to the preferences of the region’s elite business clientele.

Westfield Holding is probably the best quality real estate investment trust (Reit) from Australia. The fact that the financing unit of a Reit was able to tap the 144a bond market for a 10-year issue after a six-month hiatus of deals from the sector was impressive and earns Asiamoney’s international bond award for 2008.

Suncorp-Metway waited for a window of opportunity to conduct a hybrid equity issue last year and it duly arrived in May, with the ASX in a recovery phase. The firm gained good momentum by releasing a favourable profit outlook on the first day of its road-show, and it didn’t look back.

When pharma firm CSL needed to raise cash to fund its takeover of a US rival it turned to Merrill Lynch. Acting alone, the bank rapidly built a top-quality order book for the follow-on offering. It helped that experts were so confident in the rationale of CSL’s acquisition.

CBA’s takeover of the Bank of Western Australia and St Andrew’s Australia late last year was timely, smart and sensible. The acquisition was complimentary to CBA’s business and deserves recognition for its nimbleness.

It is the composition of its lending that made Mizuho Corporate Bank stand out in 2008. It was responsible for pricing five of the year’s 10 largest transactions and took sole bookrunner positions on a number of deals.

Mizuho Securities was comfortably top of the pile in terms of overall issuance in 2008. While it raised a lot of funding for itself, it also helped many of Japan’s most prominent local borrowers to raise funding too.

Nomura has set the standard for equity issuance for years in Japan, to the point that many firms won't consider entering the market without Nomura’s name on the ticket. It was involved in four of the top 10 deal mandates in 2008 and was an easy choice for this award.