Over $11.7 billion in new-issue ABS was marketed last week, despite the market respectfully abstaining from activity on Wednesday Sept. 11. Brisk activity, however, acted as bookends to the day of mourning with supply - for the most part - coming and going rapidly.
Continuing the trend of the third quarter, home equity and mortgage-related supply dom-
inated the landscape accounting for $8.5 billion of the total, approximately half of which was collateral acquired in the whole loan market and, in turn, offered off underwriters issuance shelfs.
Bank of America, Credit Suisse First Boston, Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley and UBS Warburg all brought self-led home equity transactions to market last week. Chase Funding also brought a self-led deal, Chase Funding Asset-Backed Trust (not to be confused with Chase Funding Loan Acquisition Trust) is backed by Chase-originated loans. Third-party issuer GMAC-RFC tapped the market twice last week, with a subprime RASC trade early in the week and a RFMS high LTV offering late in the week.
But the largest ABS in the primary market last week came from overseas, as Northern Rock plc placed $4 billion (USD equivalent) of U.K. RMBS from its Granite Trust issuance vehicle via JPMorgan Securities and Salomon Smith Barney as global joint bookrunners. The 2002-2 trade contained $1.7 billion of dollar-denominated senior-subordinated paper. The 3.44-year 1-A2 class priced at 18 basis points over three-month Libor, two basis points outside the first Granite transaction, which priced Mar. 13.
Redwood Trust's Sequoia issuance vehicle priced $1.03 billion of Merrill Lynch Capital Corp. loan-backed supply, through Merrill Lynch & Co. The tenth Sequoia offering saw a slight restructuring, with $3 million being carved out of the initial $193 million 3.96-year triple-A rated 2A1 senior to create a new 2A2 class. Down in credit, the single-A 2B class priced at a discount and triple-B class had yet to price as of press time.
Renaissance Mortgage Acceptance Corp., formerly Delta Funding, sold $246 million of home equity supply via Wachovia Securities, which has been lead manager on three offerings in the past two weeks and co-manager on another. The third-home equity offering from the Renaissance shelf was structured to triple-A for the $205 million 3.07-year senior class, but was moving slowly before a FSA wrap was added. After the surety, demand picked up and spreads came in at 38 basis points over one-month Libor, inside of price talk in the low 40 basis point area.
Late in the week, Renaissance followed up with a net-interest margin securitization, the first-ever NIM led by underwriter Wachovia. Coming in at $24 million on size, the triple-B rated offering is making the rounds in the private Rule 144A market and had not priced as of press time.
In credit cards, MBNA Bank America tapped the market early in the week, pricing $1 billion of five-year triple-As from the MBNASeries master note trust. Led jointly by Barclays Capital and bookrunner Salomon Smith Barney, the 2002-A10 transaction priced its single tranche at 14 basis points over one-month Libor, versus initial talk in the 15 basis point area over Libor.
Not to be outdone, Citibank brought late in the week $1.25 billion of three-year senior credit card paper via Salomon. Pricing within hours of being announced, CCCIT 2002-A5 priced at the tight end of initial guidance, with a coupon of four basis points over three-month Libor.
In student loans, KeyCorp had a $961 million all Libor-indexed deal making the rounds via bookrunner Deutsche Bank and joint lead McDonald Investments. Despite spreads at a discount to Sallie Mae and an Ambac wrap on $688 million of the total pricing had not been seen as of late Thursday.
The only auto-loan ABS to surface last week was from United Fidelity Bank's Auto Receivables Trust. The $49 million 2002-A offering is the first visible term ABS for the Evansville Ind.-based banking unit of holding company Fidelity Federal Bancorp. City Securities, located in Indianapolis, was tapped to lead manage the three-tranche FSA-wrapped offering solely.
$10 million of a 0.29-year A1 class was talked at 19-29 basis points over three-month Libor; $27 million of a 1.4-year A2 class was talked at 50-60 basis points over swaps and $12 million of a 3.26-year A3 class was talked in the 58-68 basis point range, also over swaps.
