ABS

MF Global filed for Chapter 11 protection today, less than a week after being downgraded to junk status.

Manager Activity: Autos Book Runner Amount (US$ Mil) Rank Mkt.

A new timeshare deal from Starwood Hotels is slated to price next week, according to a Bloomberg report.

Holtmeyer & Monson promoted Penny Newbauer to executive vice president. The firm said it also hired Josh Miller as vice president to play a key role in driving the company's ongoing expansion.

Marine cargo container lessors are likely to cut back in spending if the global economy slows more than expected, according to Standard & Poor's analysts.

Swiss Reinsurance Co. is in the market with its Series 2011-3 deal under its principal-at-risk, variable-note program Successor X Ltd.

Guy Carpenter & Co. appointed Desmond Potter as managing director and head of GC Securities M&A Advisory – Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

Reinstating trust in the ratings process is key to growing investor interest, according to buyside participants in a Tuesday panel at the ABS East conference hosted by Information Management Network.

At the ABS East conference, organized by the Information Management Network, the message of ending the market’s over-reliance on ratings rang loud and clear.

There is a scarcity of investors at this year’s ABS East conference hosted by Information Management Network.

When it comes to bond pricing, one message that rang out clear at Information Management Network’s ABS East Conference on Sunday: investors need to do their own homework and make sure they know what’s behind the valuation tools they employ.

The Standard & Poor’s downgrades of leading Spanish banks earlier this week could reverberate on outstanding ABS deals, the agency said.

Auto ABS continues to lead consumer ABS volumes and the latest deal to emerge in the pipeline comes via Honda's $1.0 billion Honda Auto Receivables 2011-3 Owner Trust.

German-based Styrolution Group has closed a €500 million ($667 million) trade receivables program, according to a release from Finacity Corp., which helped structured the deal and serves as the administrator.

Spain’s pharmaceutical lobby is negotiating a plan to sell state-guaranteed securities backed by €5.4 billion ($7.1 billion) of unpaid bills, according to a Bloomberg report.

A new SME guarantee scheme announced by the U.K. government could be positive for SME ABS issuance and would align the U.K. with its European peers.

Esoteric or nontraditional assets are gaining momentum to claim a bigger piece of the ABS market.

U.S. structured finance players are exploring new frontiers. With ABS issuance volume not as robust as it once was, yield-hungry investors have turned to esoteric assets.

The Dodd-Frank Act's call for the creation a self-regulatory organization (SRO) or other entity to assign new ratings was mostly panned by structured-finance industry participants, but relying on existing Rule 17g-5 - the industry's preferred alternative - may have a fatal flaw.