Search results for

If the default swap is the credit derivative market's basic unit, its grandest product is the portfolio swap, which allows pools of risk to be traded at one fell swoop.

* Heller Financial Inc Rating: A3/A-

DePfa Group on Wednesday announced plans to split itself into distinct property and public finance units, signalling the mounting pressures mortgage banks are facing in an increasingly competitive market. The plans involve creating a public sector finance bank, DePfa-Bank Europe, and a property bank, DePfa Bank AG, by 2002, with a view to separate listings.

DePfa has axed Daiwa (Europe) as a dealer off its euro25 billion ($21.1 billion) debt issuance programme. Royal Bank of Canada has been added as a dealer.

Deutsche has hired two senior telecoms investment bankers. David Diwik becomes head of global telecommunications investment banking, while Tony Whittlemore joins as global head of telecommunications M&A. Diwik joined DLJ in July as head of media and telecoms investment banking after six years at Salomon Smith Barney. "I had not really come on board, when the news came through that DLJ was getting bought," he said, "so I was on the beach, literally. It was not exactly what I had signed up for. I had left as manager of one of the best telecoms platforms on Wall Street and I wanted to build something."

Deutsche Telekom has announced the dealers off its $20 billion Euro-CP programme (see MTNWeek, issue 204). The US dealers are Chase Manhattan, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. The European dealers are Citibank, Credit Suisse First Boston, Deutsche Bank and Dresdner Bank. Zimmerman, CP desk at Deutsche Telekom, says: "The programme already has outstandings of approximately euro1 billion. ($843.84 million) We are very satisfied. It is the first CP facility for Deutsche Telekom. Most of our short term refinancing will be done via the CP programme."

Dresdner Bank signed a euro10 billion ($8.58 billion) multi-currency CP programme last week, with Dresdner Bank as arranger and sole dealer. The A-1+/P-1 rated facility will be used to complement the issuer's other financing vehicles by covering its short-term funding requirements.

Technology consulting company Devoteam managed to price shares in its Eu111m secondary offering at a discount of just 0.02% this week, but in the first day of trading the stock fell by 19%. The company priced its secondary offering at Eu70.85, from a closing price of Eu71.

Estonia HypoVereinsbank has closed a $205m project financing of a nameplate galvanising line in Tallinn. The line produces 400,000 tonnes of nameplates a year.

Italian utility Enel this week issued its first bond offering since its partial privatisation, with Deutsche Bank and JP Morgan selling Eu750m of 5.875% five year bonds, priced at a spread of 92bp over the 2006 BTAN. The bond issue follows Enel's acquisition of telecoms company Infostrada from Vodafone - which is due for completion next February - but was not directly related to the purchase. Nonetheless, it is not coincidental that Enel is raising its profile in the bond markets at a time when it is pursuing a variety of acquisitions.

Enel is planning on signing a euro3 billion ($2.57 billion) global MTN programme. The programme has been assigned a A+ rating by Standard & Poor's. The Italian utility is 70% owned by the Italian state.

Eon, the German conglomerate, has signed a euro2 billion ($1.72 billion) Euro-MTN facility. Eon was created out of the merger between Viag and Veba and the new facility replaces Veba's existing $2 billion Euro-MTN facilty. Deutsche Bank and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter are the arrangers. Hans-Gisbert Ulmke, financial director at Eon says: "We do not have the necessity to raise funds at the moment. The programme took two months to sort out and we would rather do it at a time when we don't need funding. It's just a safety measure." The dealers off the facility are the arrangers, Commerzbank, Credit Suisse First Boston, Dresdner Bank, JP Morgan, Merrill Lynch, UBS Warburg and Westdeutsche Landesbank.