New hires and company developments in the structured finance sector

CDS ETF Launched

Tabula has launched a European CDS ETF which offers passive exposure to European credit through an index tracking the corporate CDS market.

CMBS downgrade review

Moody’s has placed on review for downgrade all the notes in the UK CMBS Housing Association notes issued by Finance for Residential Social Housing (FRESH), affecting approximately £932m of CMBS. The downgrade action follows the enactment of the Housing Administration regime on 5 July under the Housing and Planning Act 2016. The rating action concludes the rating review, which was initiated on 3 August 2018. Moody's has determined that the inability of the creditors to enforce security during an administration dilutes the value it has given to the security provided by the HA borrowers and negatively affects the strength of the structural features. There is uncertainty around the timing and costs associated with an administration of an insolvent HA which could be significant for larger HAs with substantial numbers of units when compared to the smaller ones. A longer administration process not only decreases the likelihood of enforcement of the security even further but also increases the risk of a disruption of payments on the notes.

Europe

Baker McKenzie has hired Matthew Dening to the structured capital markets practice in London, joining later in the year. Dening was formerly co-head and managing partner of Sidley Austin's London global finance team.

Oxane Partners has hired Yousuf Attarwala as director, head of loan servicing. He was previously associate director, head of primary servicing and loan reporting at CR Group.

Interval fund launched

American Beacon Advisors has announced the launch of the American Beacon Apollo Total Return Fund - a newly organised interval fund and cross-platform credit vehicle. The fund’s shares are available under the ticker symbol ATRYX and it is the result of a partnership between American Beacon and Apollo Global Management. The fund will allocate investments across the credit landscape including the full range of structured finance asset classes.

Issuance platform launched

CAT Financial Products (CATFP) is the first bank-independent financial services provider in Switzerland to offer its own issuing platform via SPVs, allowing issuing clients of CATFP to securitise their own tailor-made products without an investment bank and controlled counterparty risks. The platform is based on balance sheet-neutral SPVs and covers the entire value chain. In addition to the structuring of structured products such as tracker certificates, AMCs, credit linked notes and capital protected products, the securitisation of non-bankable assets such as crypto currencies, real estate or art is also possible. Working in partnership with GenTwo, CATFP structures the products and connects them with their own life cycle management tool.

MBS ETF launched

Janus Henderson Investors has launched an MBS ETF designed to outperform the Bloomberg Barclays US MBS Index. Dubbed JMBS, it will be co-managed by Nick Childs and John Kershner. Kershner has been with the firm since 2010 when he joined as a portfolio manager while Childs joined last year, focusing on valuing opportunities and managing exposure in RMBS.

SOFR feature launched

Principia Partners has launched a feature through its existing platform, pasVal, to capture and value secured overnight financing rate (SOFR) derivatives. The new feature aims to support the increased volumes of trading SOFR-based derivatives in the US. pasVal’s support for SOFR derivatives, including those with optionality, gives users the ability to properly construct a range of SOFR derivatives, as well as price them with confidence and it facilitates trading of SOFR derivatives immediately, without waiting for existing system modifications or upgrades.

US

Annaly Capital Management has hired Timothy Gallagher as md and head of the commercial real estate (CRE) group. He was previously an md at Prima Capital. David Sotolov and Nishant Nadella have also been hired to Annaly’s CRE group. Sotolov has been hired to the role of md and was previously an evp at iStar while Nadella is hired as a director, joining from H/2 Capital Partners where he was a director. Jay DeLong has also joined Annaly as a director in the agency and residential credit groups after holding the position of head of securitised products research at PointState Capital. Tanya Rakpraja, formerly senior director of Capital Impact Partners, has joined Annaly as md, alongside several hires to the role of director. These include Danielle Cooper, previously vp at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Christian Greco, who worked as associate general counsel at Goldman Sachs, Suet Fung Lau, who joins from Sovarnum, and Gregory Insinga who previously worked as a risk management and reporting compliance consultant for both Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs.