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DWS Investments has hired a troika of equity structured product officials and market watchers said this means the retail asset management arm of Deutsche Bank with over EUR140 billion under management is likely to launch a structured product business.

John Larkin, managing director in institutional and third-party sales of hedge fund products with HFR Asset Management in New York, has joined Deutsche Bank in New York as a managing director and head of the alternative investment solutions group for the Americas.

Deutsche Bank has added Declan Tiernan, a structured products marketer at HSBC in London, to its structured credit products distribution team.

In the last few years there has been tremendous growth in structured products, especially collateralized debt obligations.

The USD11 billion Ford Foundation is considering changing investment guidelines to allow a broader use of derivatives.

HSBC has kick started its Tokyo credit derivatives effort and hired Hideyuki Kudo, head of structured credit and securitization at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein in Tokyo, as managing director in structured credit origination in Tokyo. Kudo, who came on board last week, could not be reached for comment.

Inter-dealer gap risk trades are picking up in the U.S. The trades, already a feature of the European market, are in demand as firms look to lay off some of the risk associated with structured products.

IXIS Capital Markets is gearing up to structure capital-protected products on the U.S. credit index using constant proportion portfolio insurance, following the recent launch of its European product.

--Steve Park, managing director and branch manager of Credit Suisse First Boston in Seoul, on the process of setting up onshore in Korea.

JPMorgan is expanding its equity exotics and hybrids structuring team by hiring Daniel McNeill, equity derivatives structurer at ABN AMRO in London.

Bank Negara Malaysia, the Malaysian central bank and regulator, has been talking to sellsiders about doing away with the current prohibition on Malaysian banks buying collateralized debt obligations.