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LEHMAN Brothers is planning to break into the crowded European principal finance market. The bank's global asset based lending group (GABL) has carved out a niche in the US by offering highly leveraged secured loans to small and medium sized businesses. GABL has now begun to originate deals in Europe. "We will aim to provide companies with a complete range of financing alternatives, including equity, mezzanine debt, working capital, senior secured warehouse lines and securitisation," said Atul Bajpai, managing director of mortgage and asset backed finance at Lehman in London, who is heading the push.

INVESTORS eager for rare Belgian franc floaters snapped up Bacob Bank's third mortgage securitisation this week. Bacob lead managed the Bfr10bn issue through special purpose vehicle MBS-3, parcelling some 4,500 Belgian residential mortgages.

A company's decision to hedge, and its choice of the most suitable instrument represent the penultimate step in an integrated risk management process.

MACRONIX pulled a planned $280m sale of ADRs this week in a move which dramatically illustrated that Taiwan was not, as some had believed, immune to the troubles of the rest of Asia. The failure of the deal came on top of last week's offer of convertible bonds for China Petrochemical Development, on which the terms had to sharply revised. Corruption allegations against the co-lead on the China Petrochemical sale and against privatisation candidate Chinese Petroleum Corp also reminded investors that some of the problems that plague the rest of the region may also exist in Taiwan.

* The $300m Yankee bond by the National Power Corporation of the Philippines (Napocor) was priced last Friday. Led by Salomon Smith Barney, with ABN Amro and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter as co-managers, the issue emerged with a single 30 year tranche against expectations of 10 and 30 year maturities. Priced with an issue/re-offer price of 98.243, the deal had a coupon of 9.625% to yield 386.5bp over Treasuries. Bankers commented that pricing came slightly wider than a pre-marketed level of around 375bp over Treasuries and about 40bp above the most comparable existing benchmark for the republic, whose 2016 Brady was being quoted just above 340bp at the time of launch.

NSW TAB has announced a price range for its A$1bn offer, to be led by ABN Amro and Merrill Lynch. Conservative earnings projections contained in the prospectus mean the float is likely to raise less than the long expected A$1.2bn. Retail investors will pay a maximum price of A$2.05, while those who reserve shares though a broker will pay a A$0.10 premium to reflect the fact they are more likely to receive a full allocation than regular retail customers. Retail customers who completed a pre-registration process will receive 25% more stock than other retail investors.

THE ASIAN Development Bank (ADB) is to launch its keenly awaited superliquid bond toward the middle of next week, if market conditions stabilise. Led by Nomura International, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and SBC Warburg Dillon Read, the deal is emerging as a roughly $3bn global bond with a likely maturity of five years. In the face of difficulties marketing Asian-linked credits and a wide spread differential between the bank's most recent 10 year deal and comparable supranational credits, Asian support is rapidly coming into focus as the likely platform for the deal. Bankers said that the deal has already garnered strong demand from the region. Asian central banks provide an obvious home for the ADB's paper, both on grounds of the bank's triple-A rating and the role the supranational is expected to play in the region's recovery from economic turmoil. Whether that buyer universe will prove large enough to allow the ADB to meet its funding targets remains uncertain.

NEXT month's A$13bn+ ($8.3bn) AMP float will feature a novel structure protecting its policyholders from missing out on potential large gains in the first week of trade. Lead managers Credit Suisse First Boston and Deutsche Morgan Grenfell hope the provision, a world first, will help convince policyholders who receive shares to recycle them into a facility for institutional investors.

RENEWED hopes that more Taiwanese banks could be enticed to follow Chiao Tung's recent foray into the international debt market have remained unfulfilled, with current spread levels continuing to scare off potential issuers. Borrowing from the island republic, while infrequent, has traditionally resulted in exceptionally tight pricing -- a reflection both of the sovereign's Aa3 rating ceiling and of the rarity value of bank credit.