CDOs

It's looking more likely that the credit derivative product company (CDPC) Athilion Capital Corp. will be downgraded over the short term. Until now, CDPCs had been relatively unaffected by the credit crunch, but the latest action on Athilion will bring this sector under the spotlight.

Primary issuance and secondary trading remained light last week as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac uncertainties continued to weigh on the ABS market's mood. This is despite U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's rescue plan that will, in essence, guarantee the GSE bonds by buying equity stakes in these companies and boosting the lines of credit available to them.

Deerfield Capital has acquired the management contract for Robeco CDO II, according to today’s release.

Baker & McKenzie has hired Hans Montag as partner in its New York office. Montag joins the law firm from the New York office of Clifford Chance where he worked for almost ten years.

Alcentra, a specialist investor focused on subinvestment-grade debt, is moving one of its top managing directors from London to New York to lead its U.S. leveraged loan business, according to the Financial News.

The recent departure of Noel Kirnon, global head of structured finance

As deal flow has fallen silent in the subprime mortgage and CDO markets, forecasts that ABS is in its death throes have grown louder and more confident.

Standard Chartered Bank has completed Start V CLO, its fifth CLO transaction under its Start CLO series.

Year to date as of 08/16 Term (days) 08/10 08/11 08/12 08/13 08/16 1-week

The Securities and Exchange Commission delivered a blistering report Tuesday that detailed the shortcomings of Fitch Ratings, Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's when it came to rating RMBS and CDOs.

CLOs continued to squeak out new issuance in the second quarter, making them the only corner of the U.S. CDO market to do so. The good news is that, of the new CLO deals to hit the market, several were structured from fresh loan assets - rather than from balance sheet assets, which have thus far represented most 2008 CLO issuance.

Nine European and global trade associations today released Ten Industry Initiatives to Increase Transparency in the European Securitization Markets in response to the European Council of Finance Ministers’ (ECOFIN) call in its October 2007 roadmap to “enhance transparency for investor, markets and regulators” by mid-2008.

A Goldman Sachs analyst estimates that Citigroup will face an $8.9 billion write-down in its second quarter earnings.

Lehman Brothers said Tuesday it has brought back two senior managers, and promoted two other staffers. Michael Gelband will return to serve as global head of capital markets, and Alex Kirk has rejoined as global head of principal investing. They will report to Bart McDade, the newly named president and chief operating officer at Lehman.

An internal memo made the rounds announcing that the European Securitization Forum (ESF) has developed its own centralized Web portal to link a variety of sources containing information on European RMBS transactions and CDO managers, Royal Bank of Scotland analysts reported.

Many financial institutions, including M&T Bank Corp., got burned by the CDO market's collapse resulting from the crumbling of subprime mortgages.

Morgan Joseph & Co., the New York investment bank, has launched a structured products group, naming Darren Wolberg and Dale Hoffman to serve as co-heads and managing directors of the new analytics and trading unit.

Babson Capital Management has chosen Robert Little to head its real estate finance group (REFG) at the end of 2008, where he will assume oversight of a $22 billion portfolio.

M&T Bank Corp. is suing Deutsche Bank AG for $82 million, saying the Frankfurt company's securities unit sold CDOs that proved an unsound investment.

The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association's (SIFMA) credit rating agency task force expressed concern regarding the implications of a proposal presented by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last week at an open meeting hosted by the commission.