ABS

New home sales bounced by roughly 3% in April to an annualized rate of 526,000 units, the first increase since October 2007, analysts from RBS Greenwich Capital said.

The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued last Friday FASB Statement No. 163 or the standard called Accounting for Financial Guarantee Insurance Contracts. This new standard clarifies how FASB Statement No. 60 or Accounting and Reporting by Insurance Enterprises applies to financial guarantee insurance contracts issued by insurance companies. This includes the recognition and measurement of premium revenue and claim liabilities.

Merrill Lynch has tapped Doug Mallach as head of U.S. fixed income, currencies and commodities asset management.

Student loan issuer Nelnet announced that because of recent actions from Congress, including the implementation of H.R. 5715 — a bill that increases the amount of money available from Federal student loan programs — it will continue to originate new Federal student loans to all students, regardless of the school they attend, for the 2008-2009 school year.

A mega-deal collateralizing deduc-tible personal loans has been filed with Brazilian regulators, giving a jolt to a market that had slowed since a banner 2006.

The Bank of England (BoE) reiterated last week that it had no cap on the size of its special liquidity scheme, but said that it will not speculate on how much lending there will be.

Conservative lending practices might be easing banks back into shape, but on the borrowing end, the scenario continues to get messier.

Trouble at Calyon's structured finance subsidiary Omicron Investment Management could serve as a harbinger for the further woes awaiting CDO managers.

With the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s (FDIC) release of a covered bond policy statement and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's public support for the creation of a U.S. market for these traditionally European securities, AsR brought together a group of experts for a discussion of how covered bonds work and trade, how they will be treated by regulators and their potential for growth and development in the U.S. The discussion was moderated by Christopher O'leary.

European funds have started raising money to buy deeply discounted collateral. Some smaller finance houses have even started to invest in mortgage servicing groups that deal with distressed paper.

Spirits were high in the ABS market last week, as banks continued to receive funding by way of the Federal Reserve's Term Securities Lending Facility (TSLF), market participants said.

Manager Activity: AutosFull Credit to Book (Equal if Joint) U.S. Public ABS Market/144A Market

The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) reported a 1.7% decline in its seasonally-adjusted purchase only house price index in 1Q08 from 4Q07.

Clifford Chance has hired Robert Villani for its financial products group as a partner in the New York office. Villani has diverse experience advising clients on different securitization structures.

BlackRock hired Craig Phillips as head of its financial markets advisory group, which is part of the firm's BlackRock Solutions arm. BlackRock Solutions helps institutional investors and financial services firms manage capital markets exposures.

UBS said today that it has closed on the sale of roughly $15 billion of primarily subprime and Alt-A U.S. RMBS to a newly created distressed asset fund that will be managed by BlackRock.

Fitch Ratings has placed the residential servicer ratings for Residential Capital (ResCap) on rating watch negative.

HBOS launched the first U.K. RMBS issue since the credit crisis erupted last summer.

CIFG Holding, the holding company for CIFG’s financial guaranty subsidiaries, responded to today's negative rating action by Moody’s Investors Service’s on the its credit ratings.

Moody's Investors Service downgraded the insurance financial strength ratings of CIFG Guaranty, CIFG Europe, and CIFG Assurance North America, collectively known as CIFG, to 'Ba2' from 'A1'. The rating agency kept the ratings under review with direction uncertain.