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ABN AMRO is beefing up its global credit derivatives team in New York as part of an intensified effort to increase its presence in fixed income credit products, according to Pat Fay, head of North American fixed income in New York. "We've been adding to the staff pretty aggressively over the last three months," Fay said.

Bank of China International, the investment banking arm of mainland banking giant Bank of China, is setting up an equity derivatives group in Hong Kong and expects to start trading over-the-counter and listed derivatives in two months. "This is part of an initiative to become a full-service investment bank," said Warren Kwan, head of equity derivatives in Hong Kong. Kwan joined last month from Deutsche Bank, where he was a senior equity derivatives trader in Hong Kong. The bank will hire seven traders and marketers to add to its five member derivatives team, which started in the last couple of weeks to establish the group. At the moment Bank of China offers interest-rate and foreign exchange derivatives.

United Utilities Electricity, an electricity company in Northwest England, has entered an interest-rate swap on the back of a GBP100 million (USD142 million) bond it reopened late last month, to convert a fixed-rate sterling liability into a synthetic floater. Tom Fallon, treasurer in Warrington, U.K., said the utility entered the swap with Royal Bank of Scotland Financial Markets, which also underwrote the bond. An RBS official did not return calls.

Bradley Berggren, head of the structured products group for equity derivatives at Banc of America Securities in New York, resigned last week. Berggren, who joined the firm through the merger with NationsBanc Montgomery Securities, reported to Jonathan Sandelman, managing director and executive committee member. Sandelman said Berggren decided to quit because he wanted a lifestyle change. Berggren could not be reached for comment.

Cantor Fitzgerald has begun hiring for its interest-rate derivatives swap team and plans to expand its operation into interest-rate options by the end of the first quarter. The move comes five months after the death of Gopal Varadhan, managing director of interest-rate derivatives, in the Sept. 11 attack on the World Trade Center. Varadhan was recruited to lead the firm's hiring effort a month before the terrorist attacks. "We're starting to take small steps back to where we were," said Harry Fry, senior managing director of North American derivatives in New York. Fry said the New York interest-rate swap group will double to about 10-12 within the next several months.

Municipality Finance, a Finish government-backed lending body that provides financing to local government departments, is planning to enter a swap to convert liabilities on a floating-rate Swiss franc-denominated bond into a synthetic floating-rate euro-denominated obligation.Toni Heikkilä, senior manager in Helsinki, said the lender recently raised CHF100 million (USD60 million) in a fixed-rate deal by tapping a CHF200 million bond it sold last year and now is in the process of converting it to a floating euro liability. "When we do our new funding, we almost always swap it into floating euros," he said.

Euro/dollar and dollar/Swiss implied volatility fell last week after Credit Suisse First Boston reportedly sold USD1.5 billion of one-month dollar puts/Swiss calls struck at CHF1.6875 Tuesday and UBS Warburg jumped into the market to sell over a yard of euro calls/dollar puts, according to traders. The euro calls/dollar puts mature Feb. 26 and were struck at USD0.8725. Traders at CSFB and UBS declined comment.

Under intense scrutiny from all corners, Enron employees are hoping something will come along and take the white hot spot off the company. One banker who spoke to a colleague at Enron recently said his friend noted that everyone at the company is "hoping they catch Bin Laden" to take the heat off of Enron.

This chart, provided by Citibank/Salomon Smith Barney Inc., tracks bid-ask prices for par credit facilities that trade in the secondary market. It also tracks facility amounts, ratings, pricing and maturities.

Joe Zarr, portfolio manager with Meeder Financial, will increase the firm's Treasury bond duration from 2.0 years to 6.5 years if the 10-year Treasury yield rallies to a 4.90% target yield. As of last Monday, the 10-year Treasury was yielding 5.09%. He plans on moving the entire Treasury allocation--currently 90% of the portfolio, or $180 million-- reasoning that conditions will be there for a sustainable Treasury rally, but declined to specify what would spur this rally.

Credit Suisse Asset Management, which manages €7.5 billion in European fixed-income assets from its London office, has taken profits on telco, auto and cyclical paper to make room for new issuance.John de Garis, head of CSAM's European fixed-income team in London, declined to detail the credits he sold.

Chelsea Management Co. is looking to swap out of $30-$50 million in U.S. agency debentures with maturities of over 10 years that are callable in two- to three-years, in order to purchase similar-yielding agencies with maturities of less than 10 years. Tom Techentin, portfolio manager of $375 million in taxable fixed-income, says what he believes is a rising interest rate environment diminishes the value of the longer duration paper. Chelsea will look to swap bonds of a wide variety of agencies, but some examples include Federal Home Loan Bank 6.75% debentures of '16 and 6.5% debentures of '16. The firm will also look to sell Federal National Mortgage Association 6.37% debentures of '14, says Techentin.