With a full market close Thursday, in observance of Thanksgiving, and an early close on both Wednesday and Friday, trading slowed to a virtual standstill, as just a couple of new issues pricing by press time Tuesday. Among the completed trades were a manufactured housing securitization and a rare re-opening of a credit card-backed deal.
MH lender Vanderbilt Mortgage priced the $392 million 2002-C deal Monday that was announced the week prior via Credit Suisse First Boston, after splitting the $102.5 million triple-A A1 class into separate one-year fixed- and floating-rate classes. The $82.5 million A1 A class priced at 81 basis points over EDSF to yield 2.52% and the $20 million of A1 B paper priced at 31 basis points over one-month Libor.
Sears Roebuck Acceptance Corp., which was in the market the week before last with an $812 million three-year floater via Deutsche Bank Securities and Morgan Stanley, also reopened a deal that initially priced back in May. Tapping the market at significantly wider spread levels than each of its four previous transactions this year, the three-year 2002-5 deal priced its senior bonds at 38 basis points over one-month Libor.
The $400 million reopening of a 9.9-year 2002-3 trade priced via Merrill Lynch at a discount margin of 70 basis points, compared to the 29 over spread at pricing. SCAMT 2002-3 now totals $900 million.
Continuing the dealer shelf trend that has dominated the mortgage-related sectors of the ABS market, Lehman Brothers priced its ninth ARC Trust deal of the year. The visible floating-rate senior tranche, with a 2.5-year average life, priced at 48 basis points over one-month Libor, in line with the sector as a whole.
In the week following the holiday, Avis Group Holdings issuance vehicle Chesapeake Funding is expected to be in the market with a $544 million fleet lease
ABS via Barclays Capital as lead
manager. This will be the second offering for Chesapeake, which sold its $650 million 2002-1 fleet lease
deal May 31 through JPMorgan Securities and Wachovia Securities jointly.
Supply is expected to increase in the post-Thanksgiving/pre Christmas year-end push. With basically three weeks remaining to complete a new issue, the top spot in the league table is still up for grabs. Through Nov. 20, JPMorgan was leading the pack with $47.5 billion of supply sold to investors. Credit Suisse First Boston and Salomon Smith Barney were within striking distance, trailing JPMorgan by $2 billion and $3 billion, respectively.
Despite the increased competition amongst underwriters, each is on track to top last year's business. JPMorgan has already bested its supply total of $43.4 billion from 2001. Salomon last year's leader with $49.2 billion and 2001 runner up CSFB sold $48.7 billion.
