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J.P. Morgan is said to be considering the sale of Octagon Credit Investors, its leveraged loan asset management arm with over $1.75 billion of assets under management. Bankers said the reasons are twofold. FIN 46, a Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) measure that calls for the consolidation of special purpose vehicles on the balance sheet of the firm or bank taking on most of the vehicle's risk, is unnerving J.P. Morgan as it tries to interpret the effect it could have on its balance sheet.

The Asset Managers Forum is studying ways to automate swap confirms to recommend a best practice to its members. "The most pain and risk in swaps is the confirm process," said George Hall, v.p. at Goldman Sachs Asset Management and a co-chair of the AMF's swaps committee.

Vertical Crossings.com, the last major independent Internet-based securitized bond trading firm, is shutting its operations after its co-founder Patrick Downes and three senior colleagues resigned to join futures powerhouse Fimat USA to launch a structured products trading group. Harry Kaplan, co-founder at VCross, could not be reached for comment. Kaplan recently sent a letter to VCross stockholders, a copy of which was obtained by DW sister publication BondWeek, elaborating on the "severe financial difficulties" of VCross that prevented it from Òcontinuing as a going concern." The letter said Kaplan will oversee the wind-down as the sole director. A former VCross insider says the wind-down largely involves finding a buyer for the firm's Internet auction technology.

Lehman Brothers has transferred Mark Ames, European head of structured credit trading in London, to New York to become head of fixed income client strategy. He will report to Ken Umezaki, head of fixed income strategy, and Tom Humphrey, head of fixed income sales, according to Tarun Jotwani, head of international credit markets in London. Ames, Umezaki and Humphrey could not be reached ahead of the long weekend.

JAPAN

The People's Republic of China revealed this week that it is planning to launch a $1.5bn dual currency bond before the end of the year. The benchmark issue will be split between a $1bn 10 year global bond and a Eu500m issue.

Taiwan this week became the first Asian country outside Japan to launch a catastrophe bond.

Westpac Banking Group returned to the capital markets this week with a A$750m five year bond. The self-led transaction was launched and priced within 24 hours, and, buoyed by domestic demand, proved a success.

September promises to be a hectic time for Korean primary issuance, with several banks kicking off a flood of new deals.

Hong Kong

Nomura Securities is bookrunner for the sale of its own stock being offloaded by troubled Resona Bank. The deal is being packaged as a domestic placement, but foreign funds, which own about 29% of the investment bank, can apply for the institutional offer, which will total 20% of the placement.

JBWere and Grange First Provident on Wednesday raised gross proceeds of A$80.9m for Prime Retail Group. Prime, a small Australian real estate investment trust, this week announced the purchase of roughly half a $488m portfolio of shopping centres in the US state of California.