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Syndication of the $450m five year facility for the State of Qatar has been closed this week. The deal was signed on Monday after receiving a healthy oversubscription.

Rating: Aaa/AAA/AAA Amount: $250m (fungible with $250m issue launched 14/02/02)

Oil conglomerate Repsol took the Spanish market by storm yesterday when it launched the largest ever accelerated offering in the region, a Eu2bn issue in gas distributor Gas Natural. Goldman Sachs was bookrunner with BBVA and La Caixa, the Spanish banks on the offering, which bankers expect to price this morning (Friday) at a wide discount to Gas Natural's share price.

Grupo Caja Rural, the central body for Spain's savings banks, this week launched a Eu325m securitisation of prime residential mortgages originated by seven unrated banks. Lead managed by Banco Cooperativo Español, DZ Bank and SG, the deal came at the tight end of price guidance, matching previous issues such as Banco Santander Central Hispano's Hipotebansa Eu917m deal in March via Morgan Stanley.

Rabobank this week brought a Eu1bn synthetic managed collateralised debt obligation for Robeco Institutional Asset Management with an unusual amount of flexibility afforded to the asset manager. According to one structurer involved in the transaction, Robeco CDO IV BV is one of the first arbitrage CDOs rated by Standard & Poor's where the manager has a discretionary trading limit of up to 30% each year - normally this is set at around 20%.

ProLogis, the US-based property company that specialises in distribution warehouses, this week brought its second pan-European securitisation backed by a pool of purpose built distribution facilities. Pan-European Industrial Properties Series II SA carried three tranches of notes rated triple-A, double-A and single-A by Moody's and Standard & Poor's via ABN Amro and JP Morgan. All are seven year soft bullets with a legal maturity of July 2012. The triple-A notes were priced at 32bp over three month Euribor, three basis points tighter than the single tranche of the first deal last April.

As the market this week grappled with how best to pronounce the name of Morgan Stanley's new transaction, details emerged on HOTELoC plc, the long awaited sale and leaseback securitisation for Thistle Hotels. Securitisations backed by hotels come to the market infrequently. "It is surprising there haven't been more hotel deals," said one market participant this week. "There was a lot of corporate activity in the sector a couple of years ago, but no securitisations came out - it is good that Morgan Stanley are bringing this and it should make investors more comfortable with the asset class."

First Rand Bank, one of the four largest banking groups in South Africa, this week offered a R12.5bn ($1.227bn) synthetic collateralised debt obligation, shedding the economic risk of a portfolio of corporate loans from the bank's balance sheet. Lead managed by Rand Merchant Bank, the deal has few precedents in South Africa. In August 2000 Gensec Bank and JP Morgan launched a R450m funded securitisation. However, the First Rand Bank's (FRB) deal is thought to be the first example of a synthetic balance sheet securitisation in the South African market.

The head of BNP Paribas' credit derivatives desk in Tokyo threatened to call in the regulator this week after competitors allegedly frontran a convertible bond issue by taking positions in the credit-default swap market. The problem occurred when dealers piled into the credit market to buy protection on Fujitsu before it became widely known that the company was about to issue a convertible bond. Stephane Delacote's complaints were sparked when credit-default swap volumes on Fujitsu increased three-fold two weeks ago in anticipation of a convertible bond offering (DW, 5/13). In a Bloomberg message sent to the major market makers and obtained by DW, he said, "This heavy trading reflects leaks of information and unfair trading." The message continued "we unfortunately will have no other choice than alerting regulators of any massive and unusual trading before the official announcements of a new CB issue." Delacote declined to comment on the matter. For full text click here.

Approximately $15 million of Adelphia Communications' Century Cable bank debt traded in small pieces in the 91-92 range this week as investors fret over a possible delisting of the company's stock from the Nasdaq exchange. If the company's stock is delisted, Adelphia may have to deal with $1.4 billion in convertibles puttable to the company, traders said. Market players question whether the company has the liquidity to handle such an action. The hearing is scheduled for today.

Bank of America, J.P. Morgan and Fleet Bank's $600 million "B" loan for Metro Goldwyn-Mayer-Studios sold out on the day of launch in Los Angeles Tuesday, as the institutional market continues to burn up available credits. The "B" was structured to tap the hungry institutional market as pro rata lending continues contract, said a banker familiar with the deal. Pricing is unlikely to depart from the LIBOR plus 3% spread on the "B" loan though despite the rapid subscription, she noted.