Derivs - Equity

Oppenheimer & Co. has expanded its equities options desk by hiring Ralph Ercole, Randall Hughes and Scott Fullman in New York.

Société Générale plans to launch six retail equity-linked structured products in Hong Kong.

Markus Ferber, MEP and member of the European Parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee, has published a long-awaited draft legislative report on the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive.

Volumes in the Asian equity options market are not tracking the recent rally in the cash markets this week, with regional investors instead choosing to sit on the sidelines, according to traders.

The VIX has collapsed quite spectacularly. This was explained by the mini sell-off on March 6 followed by a short-squeeze and the technical details of the VIX calculation.

Paul Marchington, the ex-co-head of delta one at Nomura, has joined UBS as head of Europe, the Middle East and Africa synthetic equity sales in London.

Emmanuel Girod, co-head of Europe, the Middle East and Africa equity-linked trading at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in London, has left the firm.

HSBC has rolled out a handful of structured notes linked to the S&P Low Volatility Index over the past month and a half on the back of client demand and through a licensing agreement with Standard & Poor’s.

Standard Chartered is planning to expand its offering of equity indices this year with an aim of issuing structured products off of them.

BNP Paribas has hires Andrew Dawkins to fill a new role as a managing director in delta one and international derivatives sales for the Americas in New York.

Steven Phan, former global head of HSBC’s investments, access and solutions group in London, has joined Standard Chartered in Hong Kong.

Greg Smith, the now-former head of Europe, Middle East and Africa equities derivatives trading in Goldman Sachs’ London office, scathing op-ed in today’s New York Times set off a wave of reaction around the blogo- and twittersphere.