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Hybrids have become the offering of choice in the retail market now that the institutional market has been roiled by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners' decision to classify some hybrids as common stock.

This chart, provided by Citigroup Global Markets, tracks bid-ask prices for par credit facilities that trade in the secondary market.

The following charts show the top five advancers and decliners in terms of % moves in the loan, bond and credit default swap markets for the previous week.

Five-year credit-default swap spreads on auto parts suppliers and manufacturers tightened slightly last week on positive earnings reports and refinancing efforts aimed at strengthening the beleaguered sector.

Barclays Capital has hired a German equity derivative sales team and also a hedge fund salesman, in a buildout of its sales coverage in London.

Calyon has hired Ciro Ferraz, an associate collateralized debt obligation structurer at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein in London, in a similar role.

Bear Stearns has hired Andrew Suh, director at Citigroup, to fill a new role as a senior managing director in structured equity products in Hong Kong, to push into the growing Korean market.

Platinum Capital Management, a London-based hedge fund and fund-of-funds manager, is considering structuring a capital-protected variation of its most recent launch.

Washington Square Investment Management, a London-based credit fund manager, is in discussions with a potential counterparty about writing derivatives on a listed cash CDO fund it launched last week.

This Learning Curve follows on from last week's discussion of the Pay-As-You-Go form for credit-default swaps on asset-backed securities.

Flows in credit-default swaps on tranches of collateralized debt obligations have triggered an effort to standardize documentation for trading.

The ranks of firms looking to set up limited purpose companies to act as counterparties in credit default swaps are swelling.