Derivs - Equity

HSBC has hired Regis Loeb, the ex-head of European index trading at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in London, for a similar role, also in London.

The number of structured products listed on the SIX Structured Products Exchange in Switzerland increased 5.57% in 2013 compared to 2012, according to the latest quarterly report from the Swiss Structured Products Association.

Anthony Belchambers, ceo of the Futures and Options Association, is to step down from his role at the listed derivatives trade body.

Laurence Verghese, a former senior equity single stock option trader at the Royal Bank of Scotland in London, has joined London-based interdealer broker Forte Securities.

Macro hedge funds are using the recent decline in the Nikkei 225 as a buying opportunity, executing short-dated February, March or April upside calls with strikes ranging from 16,000-to-17,000.

The China Financial Futures Exchange plans to launch options on the CSI300 index and index futures, while the Shanghai Stock Exchange is planning options on at least four initial single stocks and two exchange traded funds; SSE50 ETF and SSE180 ETF.

Calls and call spreads on the Eurostoxx Banks, as well as a significant move by investors to replace options with equity exposure, are driving a break higher in the index.

Investors should look at buying March 2014 or June 2014 call spreads on the KOSPI2 with strikes between 105-and-115% of spot in a bid to benefit from global growth recovery in 2014, or potential central bank intervention in the Korean won.

Assenagon Asset Management is using an equity derivatives model to assess the fair value of contingent convertible bonds—known as CoCos—and subsequently identify investment opportunities.

Structured products linked to mutual funds are set to increase in popularity next year as European investors look to alternative equity or multi-asset underlyings as a way of generating performance over standard equity indices.

A proposed amendment to South Korea’s Commercial Act Enforcement Decree will allow firms to set off unrealized gains arising from hedging derivatives against the unrealized losses of the underlying transactions.

Nael Tassabehji, an index derivatives trader at Morgan Stanley in Hong Kong, has left the firm.