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Royal Bank of Scotland is seeking to hire up to five new bankers for its London-based securitization business and is aiming this year to originate more deals in Europe. The new hires will be made to fill out the 45-strong securitization team, says Philip Basil, head of securitization. Last year, RBS was third on the sterling securitization league tables and this year Basil plans to boost the firm's presence on the Continent.

Robert McDonald is the finance director at Burton-upon-Trent-based Punch Taverns. The company is one of the U.K.'s leading operators of leased and tenanted pubs, with a nationwide portfolio of over 4,500 pubs. Punch Taverns has two securitizations outstanding, Punch Taverns and Punch Funding II.

Jeff Schumacher joined The Royal Bank of Scotland last week as a v.p. in its loan syndications group. Schumacher is coming from The Royal Bank of Canada, where he was a director in RBC's leveraged capital group managing middle-market syndication efforts. Schumacher affirmed that the new position was on the same level as his previous position at RBC, despite the title switch from director to v.p. Before RBC, Schumacher was at Heller Financial, where he also worked in the leveraged loan department.

Martin Currie Investment Management, an Edinburgh fund manager which currently invests solely in equities, is looking to hire a team of bond managers. Ross Leckie, head of marketing, says the impetus to add a fixed-income team is a response to clients' increased interest in the asset class. The firm will hire two to five managers, but Leckie did not say what types of fixed-income products Martin Currie will launch. Martin Currie has £6 billion in assets under management.

The financing for the upcoming M77 and Southern Glasgow Orbital project, which entails the extension and refurbishment of roadways in Southwest Scotland, will be completed using a whole business securitization. The deal, which will be roughly £150 million, will be lead-managed by Royal Bank of Canada and a monoline wrap is being provided by XL Capital, according to bankers familiar with the plans.

The primary market juggernaut just continues to roll as a further $12.5 billion in investment-grade volume and $1.5 billion in high-yield volume hit the market last week. This brings year-to-date investment grade volume to $45.5 billion with $19 billion of that being accounted for by supra/sovereign deals. The week was one for elephant-sized deals as GE began its annual borrowing program with $5 billion of 10-years that priced at 112 basis points and Italy launched a $3 billion 3-year deal. There is a distinct skew in the issuance pattern by rating so far this year with triple-A rated deals currently accounting for 31% of issuance versus 2002's full year total of 13%. This is relatively common as the liquid global benchmarks usually lead the market out of the gate in a new year, so we do not read the fact that the weighted average rating is now higher than at any point in 2002 as indicating a lack of risk appetite in the market.

ABN AMRO and UBS Warburg's $175 million "B" loan for CSX Lines was on its way to filling as LMW went to press. The "B" piece is part of a $200 million credit backing The Carlyle Group's $300 million majority stake acquisition of the CSX Corp. subsidiary. The deal launched Jan. 14, and while one banker thought that press relating to CSX's former ceo, John Snow, and his alleged trip-ups as President George Bush's nominee for U.S. Treasury secretary could work against the credit, another banker contended that investors just needed to distinguish CSX Lines' business from others in its sector. He explained that the ocean liner company is a Jones Act-related shipping company, which means it is regulated and protected in its U.S. port-to-port shipping practices. This differs from the more volatile international shipping industry. "The Jones Act makes it more stable," he said. Officials from ABN and UBS declined to comment.

KBC Financial Products has hired three senior high-yield professionals who were recently let go as part of large scale cutbacks at DrKW Grantchester (BW, 12/5). The New York-based dealer, a unit of Belgium's KBC Bank, hopes to make several more hires in high-yield sales, trading and research to take advantage of cutbacks and closures at other high-yield dealers, according to Joe Garofoli, a managing director who is one of the firm's founders.

Orthodontic Centers of America (OCA) has completed a new $125 million credit with Banc of America Securities, replacing a $100 million revolver led by Wachovia Securities. After the merger of Wachovia and First Union, Wachovia's industry focus shifted away from companies in OCA's sector, stated Cory Armand, v.p. of investor relations and the person responsible for financing and banking relationships at OCA. "They had changed their core focus areas in their healthcare group," he stated, explaining that the break with Wachovia was a mutual decision. He added that OCA had developed a relationship with B of A after it led, with Bank One, its Nov. 2001, $50 million bridge term loan backing a merger with OrthAlliance. Officials at Wachovia declined comment beyond saying the split was amicable.

Large pieces of Enron's bank debt were said to have traded this week with more than $70-80 million in paper changing hands. Market players said the company's 364-day credit traded in the 15-16 range with a European bank rumored to be the seller. Traders said the paper moved because the levels had ticked high enough for the bank to want to unload some of its exposure. Raymond Bowen, Enron cfo, could not be reached by press time.

Evenflo Co., which is owned by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., and makes baby and infant products, secured a $99 million credit line as the final piece to a recapitalization plan that allows the company to pare its overbearing debt load. Prior to the recap, the company had a $105 million credit and $110 million of subordinated debt that carried a coupon of 113/ 4%. "It was too heavy of a load to cover interest and capital expenditures with normal profits," said Daryle Lovett, senior v.p. of finance and cfo. To reorganize, Evenflo sought an equity injection of $18 million from its largest shareholder, an affiliate of KKR, and exchanged its notes for equity in the reorganized company and cash. Lovett declined to be specific about the distributions.

TRW Automotive's expected leverage figures of about 4.1 times are on the high side, according to Moody's Investors Service. This is reflected in the Ba2 rating of its $1.81 billion bank deal, which is in syndication. The credit backs the $4.725 billion acquisition of the automotive company from Northrop Grumman by an entity controlled by affiliates of the Blackstone Group. Moody's states that TRW's moderate pro forma EBIT-to-cash interest coverage figures of 2.1 times and weak 5.7% estimated EBIT return on assets are sources of concern. "There's not exciting interest coverage for the amount of debt," said Lisa Matalon, v.p. and senior analyst at Moody's. "Fundamentally, we liked the company, but the capital structure was on the rich side," she added, explaining that TRW needs to display increased cash flow in order to strengthen its credit status.