Derivs - Credit

The US Department of Labor’s new conflict of interest regulations will change the way structured products are packaged and sold to retail retirement accounts, law firm Morrison & Foerster has warned. And although implementation is nearly a year away, the scope and complexity of likely programme changes require immediate attention from both manufacturers and distributors of structured products.

The efforts of regulators to curb the potential for systemic shock caused when big banks fail took a step forward this week, as the US Federal Reserve Board proposed rules that would enforce stays on contractual termination rights between counterparties in different countries. But there are still strong incentives for buyside participants to oppose the plans.

April brought a continued positive shift in the difference between credit default swap spreads and cash spread equivalents, the CDS-bond basis, among US dollar denominated corporate bonds.

The International Swaps and Derivatives Association has launched a protocol to help market participants comply with regulations that enforce stays on contractual termination rights between counterparties in different countries.

In a hearing held last week, the US House Agriculture Committee’s Subcommittee on Commodity Exchanges, Energy, and Credit heard testimony about the effects of Dodd-Frank regulations on end-users of derivatives.

Warren Buffett, who once referred to derivatives as financial 'weapons of mass destruction', still claims to dislike their complicated structures, but sophisticated options trades and bank stakes belie this stance.

The International Swaps and Derivatives Association is moving to distance itself from the process by which credit derivatives disputes are resolved, having offered up to tender its secretarial role on the regional determinations committees (DCs).

TriOptima, the over-the-counter post trade service provider, has teamed up with the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation on reconciling data reported by Australian, Hong Kong and Singapore firms to the DTCC’s Global Trade Repository.

Ezdan Holding, a Qatari property company, has mandated two banks for its debut sukuk and is embarking on investor meetings on Thursday.

Deutsche Bank, Barclays and Standard Chartered all have new-ish bosses, are going through brutal restructuring, and all managed to surpass market expectations when they reported first quarter results last week.

Japanese sovereign bonds managed to deliver positive returns on Thursday, while almost every other asset class suffered from the Bank of Japan’s decision to reject further loosening of monetary policy

Markit and the International Swaps and Derivatives Association have offered concessions to the European Commission in the hope of settling an EU anti-trust investigation into credit default swap trading.