Derivs - Equity

Mutual fund firms that trade in derivatives should create separate derivatives committees, have a mechanism for identifying the risk of a particular derivative instrument and have regular educational meetings with the fund’s board of directors, according to senior legal and compliance officials at Franklin Templeton Investments and T. Rowe Price Associates.

Derivatives dealers are eyeing automated global collateral tracking and transformation systems as a means of differentiating themselves in post Dodd-Frank markets.

Julius Baer has begun issuing structured certificates that offer investors the opportunity to participate in the positive to flat performance of the Eurostoxx 50.

Nomura has hired Giovanni De Bustis Figarola, an ex-senior single stocks options trader at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in London, in a similar position.

Beverly Hills, Calif.-based Regatta Research and Money Management is currently looking to price enhanced growth structures on the iShares MSCI Pacific ex-Japan index exchange-traded fund as well as the iShares S&P Latin America 40 Index ETF or a basket comprised of ETF’s from Brazil, Chile, and Mexico.

A recent discussion paper from the European Securities and Markets Authority on Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities exchange-traded funds and structured UCITS had investment managers asking what the regulator is trying to accomplish.

India Infoline, a brokerage and execution firm in Mumbai, plans to launch two ETFs in India, both of which may use equity derivatives to replicate the underlying assets when necessary.

BNP Paribas Corporate and Investment Banking has hired Fred Fiddle to head its strategic equity and convertible origination business in the Americas.

The Polish presidency of the European Council narrowed the scope of the European Market Infrastructure Regulation to over-the-counter derivatives instead of all derivatives in its first stab at revising the legislation, in contrast to the last text from the Hungarian presidency.

The European Commission will be more specific in its exemption of financial contracts from a European Union Contract Law while also allaying fears that those contracts classed as sales contracts that have a derivative element to them will not be included, a senior official involved in the legislate process has told Derivatives Intelligence.

HSBC has launched three retail structured equity-linked investment programs in Hong Kong: a vanilla bull ELI program linked to single securities, a daily cash dividend callable ELI program linked to baskets of securities and a DCDC ELI program linked to single securities.

BNP Paribas plans to launch the BNP Paribas Enhanced Volatility Fund, which will invest in futures linked to the CBOE Volatility Index.