People
Bob Campbell, the head of risk management at buyside firm T. Rowe Price, has decided to leave the company. Campbell was actively involved in ABCP credit reviews and was the leader of the money fund group, in addition to many other responsibilities. He was at T. Rowe Price for 11 years. His future plans are not yet disclosed.
Bear Stearns continues with its efforts to spruce up its London-based ABS operation with the addition of Ali Ettehadieh and Isabelle Saadjian. Ettenhadieh is an associate director and will concentrate on the firm's whole-business securitizations and principal finance deals. He joins the company from Credit Suisse First Boston's asset finance team. Saadjian, a vice president of the ABS team, will focus on CDOs and joins the firm from S&P's structured finance ratings group.
Albert Guazzi also joins Bear Stearns where he will be a senior managing director and head of the debt corporate finance group for Southern Europe. He was previously at Deutsche Bank and headed debt capital market operations in Italy.
With its first CDO on one sleeve, Duchess I, Duke Street Capital Debt Management took extra measure to ensure it position in the European securitization market and hired Leona Campbell, formerly with Royal Bank of Scotland. Campbell will be an associate director. Her expertise in senior debt and mezzanine transactions in the European acquisition finance market is expected to enhance present and future funds designed by the firm, company sources say.
News
Washington Mutual is in the process of ramping up its presence in the hybrid ARM sector of the public ABS term market, said sources close to the situation. WAMU, the largest thrift in the U.S., would like to be a programmatic issuer in the primary market, on par with issuers such as GMAC-RFC, which offers various RMBS product on a quarterly basis.
"WaMu is building investor interest in the market as the precursor to tapping the term ABS market on a regular basis," a source said. "Programmatic issuance gives an issuer, over time, a significant increase in liquidity."
Ratings
Standard and Poor's has changed Brazil's BB-minus local currency rating to outlook negative from stable. Brazil's fiscal pressures, which may persist through 2002, coupled with the slow global economic growth and financial volatility throughout emerging markets triggered the change in outlook. The budget deficit has risen to 7% this year and S&P said the increase reflects the structure of government debt, which is highly sensitive to interest- and exchange-rate fluctuations.
Last week Moody's upgraded the class B notes of Paragon Mortgages No.1, a U.Kbased RMBS deal, to Aa1 from A1. The move was prompted by the satisfactory performance of the underlying pool of assets, which contains 87.5% of buy-to-let mortgages. Over 90 days delinquencies have been stable and to date the deal has reported no losses.
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
Oct. 2-5: Paradise Island, Bahamas - ABS East 2001 will be sponsored by Information Management Network. For more information call Scott Brody at (212) 768-2800 ext 210.
Oct. 23-24: Rome, Italy Information Management Network presents the Italian and Southern European Securitization Conference. For more information, visit www.IMN.org.
Nov. 13: New York, NY Information Management Network will host Credit Derivatives in 2 Venues. One will be in New York, and one will be in London. The date has yet to be announced for London, however it will be in the Fall of 2001. For more information, visit www.imn.org.
Dec. 3-5: Palm Beach, Florida Commercial Paper will be presented by Information Management Network. For more information, visit www.imn.org.
Jan. 6-8: South Beach, Florida Commercial Mortgage Securities Association will host the CMBS Investors Conference. For more information call 212-509-7844 or visit www.cmbs.org.
To have your event included in this section, please fax information to 646-822-4920, or, alternatively, e-mail to colleen.garry@tfn.com
