CDOs

Two and a half years after the global financial markets imploded, the dust has begun to settle, providing a clearer view on which sectors of the securitization market will thrive-and which won't.

Despite recent reports of people changes at some of Wall Street's biggest players in the securitization market, finding work, even for experienced hands, is still no easy task.

As the structured finance market struggles to make sense of myriad new rules stemming from the Dodd-Frank Act, it's become clear that rating agency reform initiatives from the regulators have largely been put on hold.

Although the current syndicated loan and high-yield debt markets are booming, they remain largely unavailable for “turnaround” situations and lower middle-market borrowers seeking to raise funds, according to the Financial Restructuring Quarterly Update report Morgan Joseph TriArtisan issued on Monday.

While default and deferral rates for U.S. bank trust preferred security CDOs remain flat, the sector saw a first last month when a tender offer was accepted in connection with a CDO, according to Fitch Ratings.

The American Securitization Forum (ASF) opened a Washington, D.C. office in an effort to further its advocacy efforts on behalf of the securitization markets.

Business development companies, closed-end funds that invest in the debt and equity of private companies, took their lumps during the credit crisis, but they are suddenly hot commodities.

The 11 banks contesting MBIA’s February 2009 restructuring have long said the regulatory process allowing the move was based on outdated and inaccurate financial information. Now, they have evidence.

Moody's Investors Service would like to hear from market participants regarding proposed changes to its modeling framework for cash-flow CLOs.

Troubled bond insurer Ambac Assurance Corp. posted a gain in its statutory surplus even as its bankrupt parent recorded a net loss in its fourth-quarter filing Wednesday.

Portfolio managers are trying to assess the damage the repricing tidal wave has inflicted on their funds, with most dreading what their returns will look like once the water recedes, while other say the damage will be light.

Assured Guaranty announced today that chief operating officer Séan W. McCarthy will be leaving the company at the end of the month to “pursue other opportunities.”

The $5.7 billion plan San Bernardino County Employees¹ Retirement Association (SBCERA) previously discussed two potential CLO investments at last week¹s meeting.

Lloyds TSB Bank and the Bank of Scotland issued a £1.45 billion ($2.35 billion) CLO of project finance loans.

Ally Financial said late Wednesday that the U.S. Treasury will be repaid $2.7 billion from the sale of all the Trust Preferred Securities that the agency holds in the bank holding company and mortgage lender.

Goldman Sachs said in regulatory paperwork filed on Monday that it could lose about $3.43 billion as a result of judicial, regulatory and arbitration proceedings launched against the firm over the last decade.

Lawmakers laid out a series of ambitious deadlines in the Dodd-Frank Act, requiring regulators to complete roughly 170 new rules by July.

The Dodd-Frank Act's Section 939A prompts banking regulators to remove any "reference to, or requirements of reliance on, credit ratings" in their regulations and capital requirements. The uncertainty of how regulators will interpret those words has the ABS industry bubbling and proposals emerging.

Borrower behavior changes over time and investors and lenders should constantly adjust the way they utilize the different credit score values to accurately predict loan performance, according to officials from FICO and VantageScore.

Tomorrow the European Central Bank (ECB) is set to extend its minimum two-rating requirement for all existing ABS to remain repo eligible at the central bank’s window. This effectively ends the grandfathering period that started a year ago.