Europe's primary securitization market woke up from its summer lull with the pricing of an RMBS deal and two new credit card securitizations that are in the market today.
Moody's Investors Service said today that it has assigned provisional ratings to the 'Aaa (sf)' £1.15 billion ($1.8 billion) credit card deal issued from Barclays Capital's Gracechurch Card Program Funding. The Series 2011-4's floating rate structure will come due in 2016.
Series 2011-4 is the seventh issuance of the Gracechurch trust and Barclays' medium-term note program and the 19th transaction backed by credit card receivables from the bank's Gracechurch Receivables Trust.
The assets backing the notes are receivables arising under designated MasterCard and Visa revolving credit card accounts originated or acquired in the U.K. by Barclaycard, a business unit of Barclays.
The Royal Bank of Scotland Group is considering its first public bond sale backed by U.K. credit cards in six years, according to a Bloomberg report.
RBS’ previous card-backed notes under its Arran Cards Funding Master Trust have matured, freeing up capacity to issue more of the debt. RBS last sold bonds secured by U.K. credit-card payments in 2005 when it raised $3.3 billion from the debt, according to the report.
The last offering of credit card securities was in June when Lloyds Banking Group issued $946 million of the notes, Barclays Capital data showed.
The newest credit card deals come as the European securitization market reopened from its nearly three-month summer lull with Santander’s Holmes 2011-3 £2.4 billion-equivalent deal.
