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* After 10 years on Merrill Lynch's syndicate desk, Simon Potter has joined the firm's secondary market desk to trade Eurobonds denominated in European currencies. Potter is replaced by Ernie Bates, who has joined Merrill's London syndicate desk from the firm's trading operations in New York and more recently Hong Kong. He has been with Merrill Lynch for five years.

ONE OF Italy's leading food processing companies, Cirio, launched its first securitisation this week with a Lit140bn five year trade receivables deal sole managed by Merrill Lynch. "Cirio has been expanding, its equity has performed very well, and it needs finance for further growth," said a structured finance official at Merrill Lynch in London. "With this deal the company can improve its balance sheet by liquefying assets and retiring some short term debt. At this maturity, the cost of funds compares favourably with Cirio's traditional lenders, the Italian banks."

CANADIAN equipment finance company Newcourt Credit Group this week revealed details of its first securitisation of non-North American assets, a £175m deal to finance expansion in the UK. Newcourt treasurer Glenn Votek said a confidentiality agreement prevented him naming the bank that arranged the financing at the end of June. However, market sources said First National Bank of Chicago placed the assets in its International Securitization Corp US asset backed commercial paper conduit.

* The Italian parliament last week passed a law designed to accelerate foreclosure on mortgages. The move could help the country's banks to clear up their hefty non-performing loan portfolios -- several are considering securitising delinquent loans of all kinds. Foreclosure procedures are complex, and the courts typically take five to eight years to repossess a property. The new law amends the procedural code to allow courts to delegate some of their duties to public notaries.

In a typical asset-backed note issue, a pool of collateral is purchased by a special purpose company through the issuance of notes.

Numerous developments are taking place in Japan's rapidly deregulating financial markets - all of them bringing vast opportunities to foreign intermediaries and fund managers. They are also providing a far greater range of investment products and, it is hoped, increased returns for domestic and foreign investors.

What is your company doing to capture a larger share of the Japanese asset management industry? The mutual fund sector alone is already estimated to be worth more than ¥44tr and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The announcement by Moody's Investor Services at the end of July that Japan's foreign currency rating had been put on review for possible downgrade was hardly a surprise.

Politicians and market-watchers around the world are pleading with Japan to fix its economy and to play its part in averting the risk of global deflation.

It is said that all revolutions start from the street level. Some argue that this is what will happen in corporate Japan. The government and its decisions are only part of the equation in revitalising Japan's economy.

There is a curious phenomenon in the Japanese equity markets. Companies and the government are reluctant to issue new stock in the primary or secondary markets at what they consider to be such low prices.

THE EXPORT-IMPORT BANK OF JAPAN (Jexim)