Robert Paterson, team leader for Morgan Stanley's London-based European securitization research effort, is moving to New York to take on a sales role, according to a firm insider. Paterson will assume his newly created role selling European securitization products to U.S. investors in September. Paterson could not be reached for comment. Increasingly, U.S. investors are looking at European asset-backeds for diversification, creating the need for such a post at Morgan Stanley.
Paterson's duties will be assumed by Sarah Barton and Asim Qureshi. Barton specializes in residential mortgage-backed securities and Qureshi focuses on commercial mortgage-backed deals. Howard Esaki, a repeat member of the Institutional Investor All-America Fixed-Income Research Team in the commercial mortgage-backed securitization is also on the team. This year Paterson's team ranked third in II's 2003 All-Europe Fixed-Income Research Team for ABS and MBS.
Morgan Stanley is not the only firm to have U.S. salespeople selling European ABS. Deutsche Bank's securitization sales teams in New York and London both sell U.S. and European product. "We're a global group. We all sell everything," said one of Deutsche's London-based ABS salespeople.