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The European credit card market kicked off in high spirits this week as regular issuer MBNA Europe Bank returned to market, meeting strong investor demand and tight spreads. Lead managed by Barclays Capital and Deutsche Bank, the Eu795m deal marks MBNA's second securitisation of European assets this year and second CARDS deal to be denominated solely in euros.

Bank of America and Mizuho International this week closed a $250m managed collateralised debt obligation for Aladdin Asset Management. Landmark 2 CDO Ltd is Aladdin's second outing in the leveraged loan CDO market after a $400m deal launched by Banc of America in June 2001. It was sold to a broad range of investors across the US, Europe and Japan.

The Unique Pub Finance Co plc will be launched and priced today (Friday) by lead managers Citigroup/SSSB, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and RBS Financial Markets. Price talk is 48bp-52bp on the triple-A notes with an average life of 7.9 years and a legal maturity of 2014 and 120bp-130bp over Gilts on the fixed rate single-A paper with an average life of 19.6 years and a legal maturity is 2027.

UK mortgage lender Northern Rock led the way this week with another bumper blowout issue, taking its total issuance of residential mortgage backed deals for 2002 to over £5bn equivalent. Although the bank had originally forecast that it would raise £3bn-£4bn this year, a buoyant mortgage market in 2002 meant that it made economic sense to securitise more loans than originally planned.

Mike Pascucci is returning to the sell-side as head of credit products for Merrill Lynch's Europe, Middle East and Africa region. He replaces Tim Grell, who is moving to New York at the end of the year as global head of syndicate business.

EuropeLoan, the internet mortgage lender, is negotiating with Swedish regulators over whether it will be permitted to carry on marketing loans in Sweden, its most successful market. The company is confident of reaching an agreement with Finansinspektionen, the financial services regulator, perhaps as early as today (Friday), though at first it appeared that the regulator wanted to stop EuropeLoan's activities in Sweden.

JPMorgan has reorganized the flow products desk within its risk transformation group and given it a global focus. Stephen Stonberg, managing director and head of European credit derivatives marketing in London, and Andrew Palmer, managing director and head of U.S. credit derivatives marketing in New York, will each continue to run the risk transformation groups regionally, but Stonberg will be responsible for funded flow products globally and Palmer will be responsible for unfunded flow products globally, Stonberg said.

Deutsche Bank and ABN Amro are shopping a $125 million "B" term loan for GenCorp subsidiary Aerojet-General, backing its $90 million acquisition of General Dynamics' ordnance and tactical systems, space propulsion and fire suppression business. The 5.5-year loan, which is priced at LIBOR plus 3%, also will be used to pay $5 million in transaction costs and pay down $30 million in borrowings under the existing $150 million revolver. Deutsche Bank officials declined to comment, and calls to ABN were not returned.

An $60 million auction of Warnaco went off in the 27-28 context this week. The paper had been moving in the low 30s, and the size of the piece was said to have pushed the price down. The company is currently working its way through a bankruptcy restructuring process and will most likely emerge as a stand-alone company at the end of this year (LMW, 6/3). Calls to Jim Fogarty, cfo, were not returned.

The ongoing debate over the definition of restructuring as a credit event has edged closer to all-out confrontation with last week's circulation of a draft supplement by the International Swaps and Derivatives Association and the increasing probability that an argument over Xerox's restructuring will end up in court. The ISDA draft has raised the hackles of a group of major insurers, which believe the association has weaseled out of providing a workable definition of restructuring, industry officials told sister publication Derivatives Week. Officials at the ISDA did not return calls.