CDOs

Goldman Sachs’ top managers told equity analysts at Bernstein Research that their firm has not lost many customers in the wake of a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) lawsuit.

New Mexico District Judge Stephen Pfeffer has dismissed a pay-to-play suit filed by former Educational Retirement Board (ERB) Investment Officer Frank Foy and the state watchdog on grounds that the claims and alleged wrong doing pre-date the pertinent state law.

The Carlyle Group has acquired $4.2 billion worth of CLOs and $950 million worth of managed accounts from Stanfield Capital Partners, increasing the size of its credit assets under management to $18.1 billion from $13 billion.

Moody's Investors Service took negative rating actions on 30 structured finance transactions backed by Greek assets.

Collateralized debt obligations were never the main avenue for the sale of banks' trust-preferred securities. But it's on such credit-market side streets where their buyers — fellow banks, especially small ones — have gotten mugged.

The last time the bank loan market saw a spattering of new CLOs, Twitter was just getting started and Britney Spears was still growing back all of her hair. Now, the details of four new CLOs have begun circulating, one of which will consist of new loans, a source familiar with the deal said.

Deutsche Bank named Pius Sprenger as head of trading for ABS and CDOs, replacing Greg Lippmann, according to a report from Bloomberg, which quoted two people familiar with the matter who declined to be identified.

Goldman Sachs, its image tarnished by a new subprime-related legal action brought by the government, on Monday made additional comments on the case, including a revelation that it too lost money on the CDO transaction in question.

The CDO at the center of the fraud case against Goldman Sachs is known as ABACUS 2007-AC1, and a class of its debt was cut to 'D' from 'CCC-' by Standard Poor’s in May 2009.

Two weeks after Citigroup priced a $525 million CLO and a week after Orix, Apollo and GSO Blackstone all started arranging their own CLOs, Bank of America Merrill Lynch has begun arranging a $500 million CLO.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has charged Goldman Sachs and one of its vice presidents for defrauding investors by misstating and omitting key facts about a synthetic CDO backed by subprime mortgages.

Good things, it seems come in threes, with three new CLOs in the works. Orix, Apollo Management and GSO Blackstone are arranging the three CLOs, sources said.

Investors selected Prudential Fixed Income to serve as replacement manager for two CLOs: GSC European CDO III SA and GSC European CDO IV SA.

European public CLO issuance has declined to virtually zero from more than €80 billion ($108 billion) in 2007 and Unicredit analysts said there is no progress by way of revitalizing issuance.

Citigroup has priced a $525 million CLO, upsized from $500 million, that will be managed by an affiliate of WCAS Fraser Sullivan Investment Management.

According to Fitch Ratings, 32 corporate synthetic CDO tranches will default following the recent ISDA ruling which called a credit event on Ambac Assurance Corporation.

While the CLO market still struggles to get back on its feet, the bank loan retail mutual fund market appears to be off and running.

Societe Generale Corporate & Investment Banking (SG CIB) appointed Naseem Haffar as its U.S. head of loan sales and trading.

Deerfield Capital agreed to buy $1.8 billion in CLO contracts in a deal to acquire an investment manager specializing in leveraged loan credit products, the Chicago-based asset manager announced today.

Earlier this week, Citigroup underwrote a new $500 million CLO, ending a year-long drought that saw no new vehicles consisting of widely syndicated loans.