ABS

Two rating agencies, separately, plan to change their criteria that affect RMBS, paving the way for possible further downgrades.

CIT Group announced that it has reached an agreement with activist investor Carl Icahn that will provide a $1 billion line of credit to the troubled New York-based finance company.

French bank BNP Paribas is on a hiring spree as it seeks to grow its U.S. fixed income group by as many as 70 professionals over the next 18 months, a bank representative confirmed. Most of the new hires will be in sales.

On October 7, the Reserve Bank of Australia bumped up the benchmark cash rate by 25 basis points to 3.25%, signaling a turnaround in policy since the monetary authority began cutting the rate in September 2008 from 7.25%.

The financial crisis of the last couple of years has brought to the fore the shortcomings of the major credit rating agencies.

Things were rosier at last week's ABS East gathering. For one, attendance was up 33% versus last year, according to Information Management Network figures.

When Tishman Speyer Properties and BlackRock Realty acquired Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village on Manhattan's lower East Side for $5.4 billion three years ago, it was billed as a marquee property purchase. But a recent New York Court of Appeals ruling against the developers threatens to unravel the deal and further roil a fragile commercial real estate finance market.

Securitization and its players have started to emerge from the black hole the market was in at last year's gathering. In 2008, the attendees at this event were worried about the possible end of securitization. Everyone was so downtrodden that it almost seemed like there would never be another ABS East conference.

Life settlement securitizations have picked up some renewed interest in recent weeks, and the sector is better placed than ever to live up to its volume potential. However, it still needs to get a few things in order for it to really take off.

Ever since the credit drought set in, loan market participants have been wondering when a new CLO would fall from the sky. There have been a number of predictions regarding CLO activity over the past year or so, but only a few have actually materialized. However, now that conditions have improved, some market participants think a CLO storm cloud is just over the horizon, and they expect to see new CLOs in another six months or so.

Last year, RMBS issuance in major markets of the U.S. and Europe plunged due to either sickly collateral, skittish investors or a combination of both. Colombia, meanwhile, put out a record volume of Ps1.6 trillion ($834 million) in RMBS domestically.

At the Federal Open Market Committee's meeting in late September, its statement indicated that it would slow the pace of its MBS buying, extend the purchases through the end of the 1Q10 and buy the entire $1.25 trillion.

Discussions and proposals on reining in the excesses of the financial system remain active. The last few weeks saw an announcement by the Federal Reserve targeting executive compensation as a component of its plans for financial reform, along with discussions about reducing the financial system's exposure to firms that are "too big to fail."

U.K. loan servicers have never been more under scrutiny, given the current state of the economy and with increasing numbers of loan defaults and limited options for refinance. Although some structured finance investors might believe the current situation for loan servicing is overwhelmingly negative, servicers themselves claim that the picture is mixed.

Several deals made the round today that include eligible collateral under Federal Reserve’s TALF.

INPDL BioPharma announced that it has priced a $300 million securitization transaction intended to monetize certain of its antibody humanization patents and royalties.

The struggling GMAC Financial Services sold $2.9 billion in government-backed debt late on Oct. 28, ahead of a regulatory deadline in November that will test the mortgage/auto lender's capital levels and ability to absorb losses.

Dallas-based Southwest Securities has opened a new fixed income office in San Francisco, the firm said today. The office will serve mainly institutional customers in fixed income sales.

U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday overturned a lower court decision to dismiss a case against Countrywide that alleges the company was behind a nearly $900 million reinsurance kickback scheme which potentially affected hundreds of thousands of borrowers in clear violation of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA).

Mission Capital Advisors is marketing a portfolio of commercial mortgage loans with an outstanding balance of around $48 million.