Nationwide Building Society said last week that it's looking to expand its credit department. The U.K. building society said it would be running an ad in the Financial Times with the intent of hiring more people in its credit and treasury division.
Justin Fox, head of Treasury markets at Nationwide, said that the bank has created a new position of head of structured credit, with a focus on CDOs.
"We recently went to the board with plans outlining our expansion," Fox said. " We have GBP3.5 billion ($6.8 billion) of triple-A ABS portfolio holdings and we are looking to delve into cash and synthetic structures."
Nationwide, Fox said, is also looking to grow its risk department to compliment the new expansion. The firm and HSBC are two of 10 major U.K. mortgage players who have not yet issued an RMBS program.
Market players have been speculating that both banks have a program in the works with plans to debut an issue at some point next year. Nationwide established a covered bond program in 2005. It also merged with the Portman Building Society this year and has, consequently, introduced non-conforming loans to its portfolio.
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