Pre-migration untagged articles

Do we sense some winds of change blowing through the normally sedate world of investment banking corporate communications? This is normally a closed shop, where the small number of really good media wizards hatch plots, create spiders’ webs for their competitors and stir steaming cauldrons of decaying offal like the three witches in Macbeth.

AS THE year draws to a close, the top three private placement houses can all celebrate doing more business in 2007 than a year earlier, despite the difficult conditions in the second half.

While UBS probably can’t wait to see the back of 2007, let us hear a round of applause for Credit Suisse, which has ridden out the credit storm with remarkable aplomb.

UBS’s Series 103 Tyger CPDO notes cashed out last Friday, because the net asset value (NAV) had dropped below the automatic unwind trigger of 10%.

EUROPEAN credit markets rallied this week, but without conviction or confidence.

BEHIND a seemingly placid exterior, all is still very jittery in the euro swaps market.

A consortium of French banks is going ahead with plans to set up a conduit to buy asset backed and mortgage backed securities, EuroWeek has learned.

The commercial paper market gave financial specialists cause to breathe a deep sigh of relief yesterday (Thursday), as the market shrugged off spikes in interbank rates and issuers funded themselves successfully over the year-end, even if they had to pay up to do so.

KFW THIS week almost doubled its risk provisions to Eu4.8bn for its exposure to IKB and the Rhineland Funding conduit. Together with the three German banking associations with which it rescued the bank in August, it offered a further Eu350m to deal with new problems related to a mysterious transaction called Havenrock.

ICBC acquires 20% stake in South Africa’s Standard Bank