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Westdeutsche Landesbank has hired Jean Michel Darreguet, senior trader at Bermuda-based hedge fund Ross Capital Markets, as head of equity derivatives trading in Tokyo. Darreguet said he is no stranger to the Asian markets, having traded regional equities and particularly the Japanese market, for several years from his Caribbean desk. He replaces Mike Kokalari, senior equity derivatives trader in Tokyo, who left the firm to pursue an MBA (DW, 8/31). Darreguet noted that he and Kokalari had previously worked together at the former Paribas in Tokyo.

Take me out to the ballgame...When loan market players shouted, "Oh, no" into the phone last week, they were not concerned with the latest deal gone bad.

This chart, provided by Citibank/Salomon Smith Barney Inc., tracks bid-ask prices for par credit facilities that trade in the secondary market. It also tracks facility amounts, ratings, pricing and maturities.

--Matthew Kleiman, a partner at Kirkland & Ellis and an attorney for Exide Technologies, on the company's emergence from bankruptcy.

Barclays Capital has hired Andrew Stonely, former head of U.K. and Scandinavian equity derivatives sales at Citigroup in London, as a director in equity derivatives sales. Stonely left Citigroup earlier this year, according to officials. He could not be reached for comment.

Morgan Stanley is looking to expand its nascent Hong Kong-based credit derivatives operation in the coming months with a mix of transfers and hires. "We generally believe the Asian market will continue to grow. We've been underinvested," said Richard Cohen, Asia-Pacific credit derivatives trader in Hong Kong. Cohen joined earlier this year from Merrill Lynch, where he was head of Pacific Rim credit derivatives in Tokyo, to establish a non-Japan Asia trading desk (DW, 5/4). "The building blocks have been here—it's just a matter of slotting it in," he added, explaining that the desk intends to leverage off Morgan Stanley's fixed income presence in the region.

Derek Smith, head of credit-default swap trading at Goldman Sachs in New York, has been named as the North American chairman of the International Swaps and Derivatives Association's credit derivatives market practice committee. The former head, Blythe Masters, managing director at JPMorgan in New York, stepped down earlier this year. An ISDA official confirmed the move.

The Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht (BaFin), the German bank, insurance, securities and asset management regulator, is set to release rules on the treatment of synthetic securitizations in the coming months. One of the main points of this circular will be to change the treatment of interest sub-participation tranches, according to market participants familiar with the proposed circular.

Bond giant Pacific Investment Management Co. has created an internal risk management committee to determine when and whether the firm should issue collateralized debt obligations and to oversee the bond manager's CDO business, according to Standard & Poor's.

BondWeek is the leading news publication for fixed-income professionals, covering new deals, structures, asset-backed securities, industry and market activity.

BondWeek is the leading news publication for fixed-income professionals, covering new deals, structures, asset-backed securities, industry and market activity.

BondWeek is the leading news publication for fixed-income professionals, covering new deals, structures, asset-backed securities, industry and market activity.