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CDC IXIS Capital Markets is setting up an alternative risk transfer desk to trade weather, catastrophe, life and automobile insurance risk. Michel Queruel, head of alternative risk structuring in Paris, said the bank is ready to trade weather risk via insurance and derivatives products, but it will take a couple of months to start trading the other types of risk.

Volumes have shot up in the Czech interest-rate derivatives market over the last month as macroeconomic changes have created disagreement over the direction of interest rates there, according to traders in London, Frankfurt and Prague. Simon Stuart-Smith, eastern European currencies derivatives trader at Bankgesellschaft Berlin in London, said he now trades six to seven Czech swaps a day compared to one or two earlier in the year.

Sempra Energy Trading plans to start offering weather derivatives to its customer base in the next several weeks and will also start trading the instruments on a proprietary basis. Sempra is looking to enter the market now because liquidity has improved, and because customers have grown increasingly interested in the products, according to Jackie Mitchell, managing director, overseeing West Coast natural gas operations in Stamford, Conn.

Comments on the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision's proposed New Basel Capital Accord for banks are due on May 31. The proposed accord would include much more detailed treatment than current international risk-based capital standards for banks that offer or purchase credit derivatives, or that perform various roles in synthetic securitizations effected through credit derivatives. The Basel Committee is continuing to discuss many issues in these areas, particularly regarding synthetic securitizations.

The euro/U.S. dollar options market slumbered after the Federal Reserve cut U.S. interest rates by 50 basis points Wednesday. One-month implied vol rose to 13.5% Wednesday from 11.9% Monday, but trading was thin as players remained unclear on the future direction of the euro, said options traders. Kamal Sharma, currency strategist at Commerzbank in London, said immediately after the Fed announcement the euro fell to under USD0.87 against the dollar, but rose again to hit USD0.8850 within an hour and half. Sharma said the euro/dollar gyrated after the Fed cut because the market was shocked by the timing and confused about the reason.

Enron recently sold a summer season basket option based on the temperature in Marseilles, Berlin and London. The trade was noteworthy because it is believed to be one of the first basket options transacted in the European weather derivatives market, according to Philippe Chauvancy, v.p. business development at United Weather in Jersey City, N.J. United Weather brokered the several million dollar (notional) transaction on behalf of a French financial institution, Chauvancy continued. He declined to name the counterparty.

Masatoshi Inoue, managing director and head of equity derivatives at Deutsche Securities Ltd,Tokyo in Japan, has resigned to pursue his own interests, according to a spokesman. The spokesman at Deutsche Securities, part of the Deutsche Bank Group, declined comment on a potential successor.

Billions of dollars of derivatives flows from U.S. banks could be subject to transaction size limits and collateral requirements when the Federal Reserve implements a law next month. The Federal Reserve by May 12 must introduce some sort of regulation regarding restrictions on derivatives transactions between banks and non-bank affiliates under the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley act. The 1999 act was intended to modernize financial services statutes in the U.S. This regulation would seek to prevent the bank from being subjected to loss due to derivatives transactions with affiliates.

Bank of America has asked Moody's Investors Service to rate a EUR360 million (USD318 million) collateralized debt obligation because a Fitch rating alone could not shift the deal. Hans-Jurg Lips, managing director structured credit products at Bank of America in London, said the firm's experience in the U.S. and the collateral seller's experience in Italy lead it to believe a Fitch rating alone would be sufficient to move the deal in Europe.

Y.J. Rhee, interest-rate derivatives trader at HSBC Korea in Seoul, is joining Credit Agricole Indosuez in Seoul as head of derivatives trading. In this new position Rhee will look to build up the firm's derivatives trading book, offering interest-rate and fx products said J.H. Kim, head of sales, and the other member of the derivatives desk. Kim added that investors in Korea are especially keen on using currency swaps, allowing them to convert off-shore investments into won. He mentioned that Credit Agricole Indosuez would likely become involved with the credit derivative market when regulations are loosened. Rhee could not be reached by press time.