Lehman Brothers said Tuesday it has brought back two senior managers. Michael Gelband will return to serve as global head of capital markets, and Alex Kirk has rejoined as global head of principal investing. They will report to Bart McDade, the newly named president and chief operating officer. Gelband joined Lehman more than 25 years ago and has held various senior roles, most recently as global head of fixed income. He has also overseen several businesses in fixed income, including central funding, futures, insurance products, interest rate derivatives, Asia fixed income and MBS derivatives trading. Kirk most recently served as co-chief operating officer for the fixed-income division and was head of global credit products, with responsibility for the CDO, high-grade, high-yield, structured credit and emerging markets credit businesses. He also held the role of global head of the distressed debt business with responsibility for trading, sales and research.
Brazilian boutique shop Hampton Solfise has hired Jose Candido Pimentel as a directing partner. Pimentel spent 11 years up to the beginning of 2008 as treasurer of Aracruz Celulose, a leading global producer of wood pulp. Before high-flying commodity prices precluded the need to raise funds in the securitization market, Aracruz periodically issued bonds backed by export flows. Hampton belongs to the first wave of arrangers that several years ago began structuring deals in Brazil using the receivable investment fund, a vehicle that eventually became ubiquitous in the domestic ABS world. Pimentel joins founding Hampton partner Patricia Bentes and Luciano Araujo, who came on board in 2005.Royal Bank of Scotland has hired Stephen Hynes as senior manager in group treasury, with specific responsibility for securitization. He reports to Richard Harding, head of capital raising. Hynes was previously head of capital markets at GMAC RFC in the U.K.
Merrill Lynch hired Jenna Collins as a director within its proprietary trading desk in fixed income currencies and commodities, EMEA. Collins previously worked for London-based fund manager Cairn Capital, where she managed ABS. At Merrill Lynch, she will report to Ben Rick, head of that desk.
BNP Paribas appointed Adam Brodnicki and Andrew Miller directors in the New York fixed-income team. Both will cover institutional and hedge fund clients for foreign exchange, rate and structured products as well as all emerging market products from across the BNP Paribas global platform, including the Middle East, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Brodnicki and Miller join the firm from Bear Stearns. During his time at Bear, Brodnicki covered institutional clients for local emerging markets. Miller was in charge of institutional client coverage for foreign exchange products. Brodnicki previously held various positions in debt trading at Credit Lyonnais, Bank of America and ING Barings. Meanwhile, Miller previously spent three years with HSBC on the institutional sales desk and 10 years at Republic National Bank as a foreign exchange trader. At his new post, Brodnicki will be part of the local markets sales team, where he will distribute global emerging market products to institutional clients and will report locally to Garry Popofsky. Miller will be part of the foreign exchange sales team and distribute all foreign exchange products, focusing on currency options and derivatives to hedge fund clients. He will report to Cyrille Buisson, head of international financial institutions.
David Howe has been named partner in the securities practice at the London office of Sidley Austin. Howe has extensive experience acting for arrangers, issuers and trustees on a wide range of capital markets transactions, including plain vanilla eurobonds; euro and U.S. medium term note programs, regulatory and other hybrid capital instruments and structured issuance programs, among other things. Effective July 1, the firm will have 681 partners split between offices in the U.S., Europe, Asia and Australia.
Markit appointed Scott Stark as a director in its index division. Stark, who will be based in London, will lead a new bespoke index service within Markit that will offer index administration, calculation, and publication, to third parties. Markit's bespoke index service will span synthetic credit, structured finance, equities, bonds, interest rates and foreign exchange. Additional asset classes will be added to the service as required.
Mission Capital Advisors promoted Luis Vergara to director of sales and trading. Vergara is responsible for sourcing and trading portfolios of residential and commercial mortgage loans and real estate owned assets. He is also involved in valuing portfolios, structuring pooling and asset selection strategies, providing asset sale recommendations to clients and managing deal executions. Vergara joined Mission Capital Advisors in 2005 from PayQuik, where he helped grow the client base and revenue as director of business development from 2002 to 2005. Before that, Vergara was a senior associate for Tower Hill Capital Group, where he was responsible for principal investing, capital raising and advisory capacities. Before his stint at Tower Hill, Vergara worked at Santander Investment Securities as a senior financial analyst in the corporate finance group. He was also at CIBC World Markets as a financial analyst in the international investment-banking group and as a bank loan manager on the high-yield/emerging markets desk.
RBC Capital Markets has brought on two long-time Citigroup chiefs: Paul Zingarini joins as managing director and head of secondary loan trading, and Richard Rothschild joins as a managing director within the firm's global syndicated finance sales group, the bank said today. Zingarini reports to Head of U.S. Credit Trading David Pichler, also a Citi alum. Zingarini will oversee the development of the firm's U.S. public secondary loan-trading platform. He was a managing director on Citi's high-yield, distressed and loan-trading desks. Rothschild, who reports to Head of Loan Sales Denis Cullen, will be responsible for covering high-profile institutional and bank accounts in the syndicated leveraged loan market. At Citi, he was most recently a managing director and senior salesperson in the firm's loan sales and trading group. He also served as vice president in the loan syndications group and vice president of fixed-income securities operations. RBC streamlined its U.S. high-grade and high-yield bond trading desks early this year, with the plan to integrate the U.S. public loan-trading platform as well, once a loan chief was brought in to run it. The bank hired Pichler to lead the effort as its first head of U.S. credit trading.
Luminent Mortgage Capital appointed Barry Weiss as its new chief investment officer and Eric Richter as a portfolio manager, effective June 30. Weiss was a vice president/portfolio manager for HarbourView Asset Management and Oppenheimer Funds and the portfolio manager for the AAArdvark portfolios, in charge of making investment decisions and setting portfolio strategy. He was also a co-portfolio manager for the Centennial Money Market Trust, the Centennial Govern-ment Trust, the Oppenheimer Cash Reserves and the Oppenheimer Money Fund/VA, where he was primarily responsible for co-managing more than $35 billion of assets. Weiss had been with Oppenheimer Funds since 2000 serving in various roles. Previously, he worked at Fitch IBCA, where he was an associate director in the structured finance group. Richter was a vice president/portfolio manager for HarbourView Asset Management and Oppenheimer Funds since February 2006. Richter has an extensive background in structured products and was focused on the AAArdvark products, specializing in RMBS, CMBS, ABS and CDOs. Before Oppenheimer Funds and HarbourView, Richter was an investment officer at the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. He spent eight years at Loomis Sayles & Co. as a senior analyst responsible for MBS and ABS. He also spent five years at Schroders as a fixed-income portfolio manager, managing U.S. investment-grade fixed-income portfolios.
Orrick, Herrington & Sut-cliffe has hired Howard Altarescu as a partner in its structured finance practice in New York. Previously with Goldman Sachs for more than 20 years, Altarescu was head of Goldman's mortgage finance group, co-head of its MBS and ABS finance group, and was responsible for structured finance in the emerging markets, with a focus on Latin America. He was also chief operating officer for Goldman's mortgage principal finance business. Most recently, Altarescu was responsible for capital markets coverage of some of Goldman's premier residential mortgage origination clients, according to a release from Orrick. Over the years, Altarescu has been part of the seminal structured finance deals such as the first CMO transaction, IO/PO deals and public auto receivable ABS as well as several senior/sub mortgage and credit card deals, among others.
Fortis Bank said it intends to securitize some of its assets in 2H08 and in 2009 as the securitization market is showing signs of improvement in certain products. The bank also said that the unrealized gain on its real estate portfolio is currently not recognized in any core equity calculations. A sale and lease back transaction of part of the real estate portfolio, envisaged to take place in the second half of 2008 and in 2009, would result in the realization of such a gain, thereby strengthening the bank's solvency. These transactions should also result in a capital relief of approximately 1.5 billion ($2.36 billion).
Wachovia has hired Goldman Sachs Group for advice on its loan portfolio, The Associated Press reported last week. Wachovia spokeswoman Christy Phillips-Brown said that the firm was hired to analyze the Charlotte, N.C.-based bank's loan portfolio and evaluate various alternatives. She declined to comment further. Earlier in the month, the bank forced out CEO Ken Thompson amid rising loan losses and other problems, less than a month after the bank stripped him of his chairman title. At the time, interim CEO Lanty Smith said that the step was taken "after very careful consideration" and one that was precipitated by no single event but rather a "series of previously disclosed setbacks." Recently, reports circulated that Wachovia had hired Goldman to assist in its search for a new chief executive. In April, before Wachovia slashed its dividend 41% and reported what would become a $707 million first-quarter loss, it said it would revise the underwriting policies in its mortgage loan business, a step that could potentially make it harder to take out a home loan at the bank. Management remains tightlipped about additional changes, and the bank's share price continues to tumble.
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