Derivs - Credit

European industry groups and senior bank representatives last night discussed the creation of a secondary market price reporting system for credit default swaps, corporate bonds and structured credit assets.

The International Swaps and Derivatives Association is set to announce next week those firms that can take their place on the coveted Determinations Committee for deciding CDS trigger events.

Morgan Stanley’s former head of strategic finance in Asia, Francis Tay, joined JPMorgan in Hong Kong yesterday as head of client solutions and illiquid risk trading.

CQS will launch the CQS Credit Long Short Fund in April, with a starting size of USD100 million.

IDX Capital, an electronic credit derivatives interdealer broker, is looking to hire two managing directors for its investment-grade credit default swap desk and one associate for high yield CDS.

The 6-9% tranche of the iTraxx main index in Europe started trading upfront last week.

Morgan Stanley is recommending credit investors short the 25-35% layer of the CDX High Yield index, while going long the 15-25% tranche.

JPMorgan is advising clients short the CDX North America Investment Grade series 11 to roll into series 12 by buying protection on the IG.12 and selling IG.11 protection. That’s because the on-the-run series is trading 39.25 basis points tighter than its predecessor since the roll Friday.

Emerging markets credit default swap players are considering a move to the new standardized CDS format, following in the footsteps of their North American counterparts.

China’s State Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC), the country’s regulator for all state-owned enterprises (SOEs), will now have to approve in advance any transactions deemed risky, placing all over-the-counter derivatives into that bracket.

Mel Gunewardena, global head of fixed-income prime brokerage and credit derivative intermediation at Deutsche Bank, has left the firm.

Credit default swaps on Canadian paper and pulp maker AbitibiBowater Inc. may have been triggered after the company said Friday it was looking to reduce interest payments and term out a loan maturing at the end of this month.