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UBS has hired Sergei Lebed, an official at private equity consulting firm Moore, Clayton & Co. in London, as a director in emerging markets derivative marketing in London.

Institutional equity fund managers were scurrying to buy cheap put and call options last week as implied volatility drooped toward historical lows.

ABN AMRO has hired Raahil Bengali, a senior equity derivatives trader and latterly a prop trading chief at Goldman Sachs in London, as head of equity risk and cross-product trading.

Abbey Financial Markets has entered the fund-linked derivatives market by writing an option on its flagship multi-manager fund and packaging it up with a zero-coupon bond to offer investors 65% participation in the fund and full capital protection.

Bank of China International is preparing to launch a range accrual structured note in the competitive Hong Kong retail market, which it believes will be a first.

Serge Marquie, global head of strategics within Deutsche Bank's equity derivatives business in London, is moving to New York to boost the corporate sales effort in the U.S. Marquie confirmed the move and said it is in response to a resurgence in U.S. corporate activity.

Barclays Capital has hired Anthony Wah, head of equity derivative sales at ABN AMRO in Hong Kong, in a newly-created role as head of the sales structuring group for non-Japan Asia, based in Hong Kong.

Bear Stearns has hired Jason Cohen, an official in the global strategic trading group at Bank Of America in London, as managing director with responsibility for growing the firm's European swap trading business.

Traders snapped up short-dated Canadian dollar calls/U.S. dollar puts last Tuesday after the Canadian's sharp gain against the greenback in the spot market caught them by surprise.

Dealers were rushing to put together multi-currency basket plays last week to take advantage of the weakening euro following rejection of the E.U. constitution by French and Dutch voters last week.

Proteom Capital Management, a New York-based fund manager, expects to start using equity variance swaps to take views on the future volatility of global indices.