Sector developments and company hires in structured finance

Europe

Simmons & Simmons has hired James Grand to lead its CLO offering. Grand was previously a structured products partner at Freshfields where he spent over 20 years, specialising in advising both the sell-side and the buy-side on CLOs, as well as contentious and non-contentious derivatives work, structured credit, tax structured products, regulatory capital and prime brokerage.

Partnerships

Alexandria Capital has selected Eagle Point Credit Management as a strategic partner for Alexandria Capital’s family office and high net worth client platform. Eagle Point’s investment focus will allow Alexandria to access investment opportunities in CLO securities for its clients and leverage Eagle Point’s expertise in these investments.

Taberna case dismissed

The US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York last week dismissed an involuntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition against Trups CDO Taberna Preferred Funding IV, which Moody’s describes as credit positive because it upholds the basic tenets of non-recourse securitisations and bankruptcy remoteness. In June 2017, three investors in the Taberna IV class A1 and A2 notes filed the petition after several failed attempts to liquidate the collateral, but were opposed by the issuer, its collateral manager (Fortress), TP Management and five investors in notes junior to the senior notes. In dismissing the petition, the court determined that the notes are non-recourse and therefore the claims are limited to the collateral, but the petitioning creditors are still receiving payments pursuant to the transaction’s indenture.

US

BTIG has announced that the fixed income, currency and commodities division has added a CMBS desk led by Weston Friedman, who joins as md and head of CMBS. Friedman will be based in the firm’s New York office and will report to Drew Doscher and Darren Haines, both mds and co-heads of fixed income credit at BTIG. Before joining BTIG Friedman was a CMBS trader at Baycrest Partners.

Victory Park Capital has hired Connell Hasten and Joshua Platek to lead the firm’s new insurance services division. Hasten, who joins as partner, and Platek, appointed as vp, will serve as co-founders of the insurance services platform, primarily responsible for sourcing, underwriting, executing and managing investment opportunities for insurers. Hasten and Platek join from EquiTrust, where they worked as md and vp respectively.