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--Mark Pinto, managing director and head of credit research for Merrill Lynch in New York, on a potential change to the firm's research disclosures.

Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse First Boston and Banc of America Securities are independently looking into tightening the disclosure statements that accompany fixed-income research reports.

A handful of fixed-income veterans have joined OTA Asset Management as part of the firm's plans to launch a hedge fund next month.

Value Line Asset Management will add mortgage-backed securities to a $120 million fund that invests in MBS, Treasuries and agencies.

This chart, provided by Citigroup Global Markets, tracks bid-ask prices for par credit facilities that trade in the secondary market. It also tracks facility amounts, ratings, pricing and maturities.

UBS has created a new group that merges its fixed-income, rates and currency research functions.

Franklin Templeton Investments is putting new cash to work in underexposed Asian credits, said Michael Hasenstab, co-portfolio manager of the $700 million Templeton Global Bond Fund within $4.5 billion in assets under management.

Wachovia Securities may have been left in the unenviable position last week of holding a fully bought $1 billion high-yield bond issue that satellite programming company EchoStar Communications pulled at the last minute after its CFO unexpectedly resigned, according to BW sister publication Corporate Financing Week.

Bank of America has hired Brian Friedman, a senior interest-rate derivatives trader at JPMorgan in New York, to head its Chicago-based interest rate option trading desk.

Implied volatility on the Aussie/U.S. dollar currency pair spiked last week after Alan Greenspan presented to the U.S. House of Representatives a rosier than expected picture of the U.S. economic recovery.

John Cieslowski, managing director in credit derivatives at Bank One in Chicago, has left the firm.