News
Bankers pitching Union Acceptance Corp. say the issuer may not be rushing to the term market this month since it has reportedly sold $150 million in receivables to CIBC's SPARC conduit on June 25. UAC typically originates between $300 million and $400 million in receivables per quarter.
Canadian Tire Receivables Trust came to market last week with its first public offering. The $515 million five-year, fixed-rate deal, which was rated by DBRS and Standard and Poor's, was led by Scotia Capital. Other members of the syndicate were CIBC World Markets, Royal Bank of Canada, TD Securities, BMO Nesbitt Burns, National Bank Financial, and Merrill Lynch. The deal had two classes, a triple-A rated $500 million tranche and a $15 million single-A rated class. The transaction, which was said to be well received, priced at 46 over the five-year benchmark.
Scotia Capital is also leading a C$265.2 million CMBS deal for Mansfield Trust, a vehicle of Sun Life Assurance Co. Sun Life is Canada's largest life insurance company.
The multi-tranche transaction is rated by DBRS, S&P, Moody's Investors Service and Fitch. The pool is made of 86 fixed-rate mortgages, which range from C$451,851 to C$6.8 million. Eighty-two of these loans are secured by first mortgages while four are secured by second mortgages. These four are subject to a first mortgage, which are also contained in the mortgage pool.
Other members of the syndicate are CIBC, TD and National Bank Financial. Roadshows will be held in Vancouver on Monday, Montreal on Tuesday and Toronto on Wednesday. Books will be opened for the deal after that.
The senior subordinated debt of Amresco Inc., Dallas, has been downgraded by Fitch from CCC to D. The action followed Amresco's announcement that it has filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. Fitch noted that Amresco has entered into an asset purchase agreement with a group of investors under which it will sell substantially all its assets, except for cash and cash equivalents, for $309 million, subject to certain adjustments and to bankruptcy court approval.
Tyco International Ltd., Pembroke, Bermuda, has sold the CIT Group/Sales Financing Inc.'s approximately $1.575 billion manufactured housing portfolio to Lehman Brothers, but says it will continue to service existing customer accounts and originate manufactured housing financing for sale to other entities. The move is part of Tyco's plan to exit CIT's noncore businesses and concentrate on "stronger growth prospects." In total, Tyco plans to divest $4 billion to $6 billion of its "non-strategic" assets by year-end and considers itself about halfway to that goal. Although it is still in the business of originating manufactured housing for others, it has ceased its in-house originations of recreational vehicle financing "in order to concentrate efforts on more robust growth opportunities."
Moody's Investors Service is set to release a rating for Costa Rica's Banco San Jose this week. It will mark the first servicer rating out of Latin America.
ABN Amro's subsidiary, Australian Mortgage Securities, will sell about $468 million of debt backed by residential mortgages. There will be three classes and it is expected to price this week.
People
Moody's Investors Services has several new players on board. Daniel Gringauz will be the assistant vice president and will work on prime and subprime mortgage deals. He joined Moody's in 2000 rating primarily sub-prime auto deals. Previously, he worked at UBS Warburg.
Candice Workman Nona will also join the team working with residential mortgages as an associate analyst. She began her career at Moody's in April 2000 rating municipal debt in the Public Finance Group.
Moody's will also welcome Joseph Tuite as an associate analyst and will work on various residential mortgage-backed products. He started his career at Moody's as a financial analyst in business planning. Prior to that, Tuite worked for the Mayor's Office of management and budget as an assistant analyst.
Carey Hobbs has also joined Moody's as a three-year associate analyst.
According to published reports, Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown has added Alexander Crawford as a director and head of mortgage strategy, according to officials. For the past four years, Crawford was chief mortgage strategist and senior interest rate strategist at Morgan Stanley.
In his new role, Crawford will report to Karen Weaver, global head of asset securitization research, and Ifty Islam, head of U.S. fixed income strategy.
"Deutsche Bank recently integrated MBS trading with Treasuries and Agencies as part of our commitment to be a premier cross-sector fixed income house, and Alec's unique background, which includes 12 years of experience in MBS, interest rate and derivatives research, will be critical in supporting that effort," said a Deutsche Banc official.
Calendar 2001
Sept. 11-12: Berlin Germany Information Management Network will present Securitization in Deutschland. For more information, see www.imn.org.
Sept. 12-13: Berlin, Germany 2001: A CDO Event will be hosted by Information Management Network. For more information, e-mail mail@imn.org or call 212-768-2800 ext. 1.
Sept. 30-Oct.3: Southhampton Princess, Bermuda- The Strategic Research Institute presents The Bermuda ABS 2001 Symposium. For more information, visit www.srinstitute.com or call 888-666-8514.
Oct.1-3: Washington, D.C.-International Venture Partners, LLC will host the Latin Summit and Expo Americas, the premier conference for investing in the Americas. For more information, visit www.latin-summit.com
