Search results for

* Merrill Lynch gave European investors a welcome taste of US asset backed product this week, with a $411.98m auto loan deal for Mitsubishi Motors Credit of America, and underlined the inward march of ABS spreads. Mitsubishi Auto Owners Trust 1999-1 offered four sequentially amortising tranches of fixed rate bonds with top ratings from Moody's and Standard & Poor's. With average lives of 0.33, 0.99, 1.68 and 2.56 years, the classes were priced at 4bp over four month Libor, 38bp over 12 month Libor, and 85bp and 93bp over Treasuries.

SECURITISATION looks set to take off in central and Eastern Europe in 1999, as a swelling group of potential issuers examine the technique. Ceskomoravská Hypotecní Banka is to launch a Ckr3.6bn ($117.4m) five year mortgage backed bond on February 8. The bank's parent IPB will lead the deal with an underwriting syndicate -- the coupon will be 8.9%.

STANDARD & Poor's has hired Ian Bell, one of the securitisation partners at Clifford Chance in London, to act as its senior counsel for Europe. Bell will join S&P on March 1, and report to Jo-Anne Rose, global general counsel in New York. "I had been doing the same kind of work for 11 years at Clifford Chance, and was looking for a chance to change when S&P called me in the summer," said Bell. "It is a fabulous job -- too good to miss. I will be at one of the centres of the European structured finance market, helping to shape its development."

CREDIT Suisse First Boston and Salomon Smith Barney are to launch a $200m GDR sale for Indian telco Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd (VSNL) within two weeks, taking advantage of a rising local share price and recent substantial increases in profits at the company. Cazenove, Dresdner Kleinwort Benson, Jardine Fleming and SG have been invited to form the syndicate and a meeting for analysts from these houses will take place on Monday. An accelerated roadshow programme is likely to begin on January 18.

Australia The Australian government has appointed ABN Amro, Credit Suisse First Boston and JB Were as co-ordinators for the sale of a further 16% stake in Telstra. The line-up is identical to that for the successful first tranche sale in November 1997.

* Macquarie Bank has decided not to sell PUMA, the securitisation vehicle which has issued some A$7.5bn of mortgage backed securities. Macquarie invited bids in October, but announced on December 23 that none of the offers satisfied its criteria for a sale in relation to price, staff and clients. Macquarie had expected that an Australian mortgage originator could derive economies of scale by amalgamating its servicing systems with PUMA's, but that proved not to be the case.

MALAYSIA'S national oil company Petroliam Nasional Berhad (Petronas) launched its largest ever Samurai bond this week, raising ¥51bn via Daiwa Securities. The first ever deal by the group to be targeted at the retail market, the issue comprised one ¥34bn tranche of five year paper (increased from ¥30bn) and one ¥17bn tranche of 10 year paper (increased from ¥10bn).

SOCIETE Générale Australia executed the largest Australian domestic asset backed deal at the end of December, with an innovative equipment lease securitisation for its Sogelease Australia subsidiary. The A$700.7m transaction takes virtually all of Sogelease's operating leases, finance leases, commercial hire purchase agreements and chattel mortgages off balance sheet, and allows further issuance up to a maximum of A$1bn.