Derivs - Equity

Mary Schapiro, chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, testified before Congress that she would use USD74 million of a requested SEC budget of $1.4 billion to hire derivatives specialists, increase oversight of credit raters and to oversee compliance of Dodd-Frank requirements.

Derivatives market participants questioned why European regulators have chosen now to launch an antitrust investigation into the industry at a time when imminent over-the-counter derivatives reform will likely create greater competition anyway.

Peter Fung, the former managing director and head of exotics trading for the Asia Pacific at Deutsche Bank in Hong Kong, is being tipped to join Barclays Capital in a similar role, according to officials familiar with the move.

Bank of China has launched a retail equity linked deposit program in Hong Kong, according to offer documents filed with the Securities and Futures Commission.

Credit Suisse has begun marketing so-called LastLook outperformance bonus certificates with a deep barrier level of 25%, the deepest barrier in an outperformance structure for the European structured product market, rival structurers say.

Barclays Capital researchers are recommending trades to take advantage of the expected convergence between credit spreads and equity prices and volatility of MGIC Investment, the U.S.’ largest mortgage insurer.

EFG Financial Products, the structured products arm of EFG International, has opened a Hong Kong branch, according to the Securities and Futures Commission register.

BNP Paribas, acting through its Hong Kong branch, has launched a program for non-capital protected unlisted callable equity-linked contracts for single stocks, according to a filing with the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission.

BNP Paribas has hired Sebastian Boulan, Michele Backman, Mark Kuhlman, and Stefan Yurica to its equity derivatives desk.

Derivatives dealers and investors expect implementation of regulations related to interest rate swaps to take up to two-and-one-half years, far beyond the projected operational date of the end of 2012.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury will exclude fx swaps from derivatives regulations.

Only about one-third of the 387 sets of rules required by the Dodd-Frank Act have not yet been proposed, as the first deadlines for the regulations in July draw near, according to the law firm David Polk & Wardwell.