Volkswagen Leasing has no plans to issue a privately placed auto ABS deal but it is currently marketing the new VCL 12 deal to investors.
The company's managing director Stefan Rolf said that the company had not considered issuing a private placement as market reports indicated earlier this month. Its public market deal, on the other hand, is currently marketing to a very interested European buyside.
The €475 million ($602 million) auto lease ABS deal dubbed VCL 12 is scheduled to price next week.
VCL 12 is the first public transaction to be issued under the new German securitization standard established by True Sale International (TSI). Rolf said that the new standard stringent guidelines that test the quality of the structure.
Standard & Poor's has assigned preliminary credit ratings to the €475 million ABS floating-rate notes. The transaction is backed by German auto lease receivables that were originated and sold by VW Leasing.
According to S&P, VCL 12 will benefit from a subloan of €20 million that an affiliate of Volkswagen AG, which is the subordinated lender, will grant. The subordinated loan will provide credit enhancement in the form of subordination for the class A and B notes and will rank below the notes for payments of interest and principal, the agency said.
The loan, however, will not form part of the securitization, S&P said. The preliminary ratings reflect S&P's analysis of the ability of the servicer, VW Leasing, to fulfill its role in the deal and the cash flow mechanics of the offering under various stress scenarios.
Rolf said that while hard to predict what the flow of auto ABS might be from Germany this year, although he said that Volkswagen would continue to be an active issuer in the market.
The German auto leasing company is also looking to expand its VCL platform into other jurisdictions.
