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It is now increasingly clear that Doughty Hanson's impending buy-out of UK food manufacturer Rank Hovis McDougall from conglomerate Tomkins Plc will be refinanced partly with a large securitisation, worth perhaps £700m. JP Morgan, the arranger and co-ordinator of the buy-out finance, is preparing the transaction and declined to comment, but market participants believe the deal will be a whole operating company securitisation, backed by all the company's assets and revenues. The maturity may be as long as 20 years.

Société Générale has called its only public collateralised loan obligation, Polaris Commercial Loan Master Trust 1999-1. The $2bn securitisation of US corporate loans was lead managed by Lehman Brothers and SG in February 1999. After several of the obligors defaulted, the deal hit an early amortisation trigger, and SG offered noteholders a vote on calling the deal at par.

Hyundai Motor Finance Co, the US finance arm of the Korean car manufacturer, launched its first European targeted securitisation this week, a $180m auto loan backed deal via Société Générale. The company securitised in the US market in 1993 and 1998, but Hyundai Finance Ltd 2000-A was aimed at European buyers.

ING Bank, one of the few top flight European banks to have resisted the lure of securitisation, made its first experiment in the sector in mid-July, launching a huge but almost invisible private transaction. The Eu1.881bn deal, Guaranteed Mortgage Securities BV, parcelled residential mortgages covered by the Dutch government's guarantee programme into a single tranche of bonds rated Aaa by Moody's.

Toys 'R' Us Inc, the US company that is the world's largest toy retailer, raised some $148m of cheap funds last week through an unusual loan market securitisation arranged by Citibank in Japan. The five year deal monetises the licence fees that Toys 'R' Us Japan Ltd pays to the mother company for the right to use its brands and marketing technology in Japan for the next 20 years.

Four leading investment banks in the US securitisation market this week announced plans to create an electronic trading system for asset and mortgage backed securities that could eventually allow investors to trade with each other directly. Bear Stearns, Credit Suisse First Boston, Lehman Brothers and Salomon Smith Barney are to set up a new company to build what the sponsors describe as "the premier electronic trading platform for all types of mortgage and asset backed securities" as well as "an internet-accessible trading system for the mortgage securities market".

Westdeutsche Landesbank last week added a further Eu100m to the Eu191m securitisation of future foreign currency revenues it arranged last year for HalkBank of Turkey. Like the original deal in June 1999, the increase has begun as a loan from WestLB to the Jersey securitisation vehicle, Turkish Remittance Utilisation Securitisation Transaction Ltd, but will later be syndicated.

AXA Investment Managers launched its first collateralised debt obligation backed by high yield bonds and loans this week, as Goldman Sachs lead managed a Eu455.5m deal through Concerto I BV. AXA has previously securitised convertible bonds, but this transaction will be backed by 60-70 assets comprising 60% European high yield bonds, 20% European senior secured loans and 20% US high yield loans and possibly bonds.

Australia Westpac Bank and Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) both tapped the Australian dollar markets this week, launching bond issues on their own behalves.

* The Nasdaq IPO for Asia Global Crossing will now be a September offering as the US SEC has yet to comment on the preliminary prospectus. The delay meant the issue would have emerged too late to catch fund managers before the holiday season. The company planned to sell 53m new shares as well as a 7.95m share greenshoe. The initial filing range was $14-$16. Goldman Sachs and Salomon Smith Barney are joint bookrunners.

SMRT enjoyed a solid if unspectacular debut on the Singapore stock exchange on Wednesday. The shares, priced at S$0.61 each, closed at S$0.615 on the first day and at S$0.62 yesterday (Thursday). Bankers working on the deal report strong follow-on orders from fund managers who took up shares in the institutional offering, which was more than six times subscribed. They believe the shares will perform well as soon as speculative retail investors and syndicates lose interest in the stock. Fund managers report strong interest in the company as a core holding due to its attractive dividend of about 4.5%.

JAPAN's largest public offering since 1998 collapsed almost 25% in its Tokyo Stock Exchange debut on Wednesday. Lawson shares ended the trading session at ¥5,550 yesterday (Thursday), down from the final issue price of ¥7,200 per share. The 36.6m share offering raised the equivalent of $2.4bn to become the fifth largest IPO in Japan's history. The disappointing trading debut is another blow for the Japanese stock market, which has slumped more than 20% since May.