Sector developments and company hires

EMEA
Alantra has reinforced its portfolio advisory capabilities with the addition of six senior professionals in Lisbon (Ana Almeida, as a director), London (Jim Fadel, md; Robin Michaels, director; and Meena Evans, vp), Madrid (Valerie Castro, director) and Milan (Renato Limuti, md). The firm has also hired former Carnegie md Sebastian Hougaard as an md in the Nordics, establishing its presence in Denmark. Finally, it has opened an office in Hong Kong, with the recruitment of Sandeep Talwani, who will cover South East Asia.

TwentyFour Asset Management has appointed Paul Kim as an analyst in its New York office. Kim will be a key member of TwentyFour’s multi-sector bond team, which manages the firm’s Strategic Income and Dynamic Bond strategies. He was previously a credit analyst on the high yield fixed income team at Credit Agricole.

Mid-market debt vehicle
European Risk Capital has launched CreditStream, a £1bn multi-client debt programme providing UK non-bank originator lenders with wholesale funding access to the alternative debt capital markets. With an individual deal target size of £10m-£100m, CreditStream is aimed at financing balance sheets of UK mid-market asset-based lenders, including bridging and development lenders, second charge mortgagees, consumer and SME funders, auto/equipment finance companies and fintech lenders. Unlike single-issuer debt programmes, CreditStream may be accessed by multiple originator lenders effectively sharing economies of scale, streamlined credit and documentation processes, and consequently lower risk-adjusted funding costs.

North America
Greystone has expanded its Houston-based lending and sales advisory group with the addition of Ed Gray as an md and Brooks Steele as a director. Joining from Sabal Capital Partners, the pair will help drive loan origination efforts in the Houston region across a range of lending platforms, including Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, FHA, CMBS, bridge and mezzanine.

Fred LeMoine will succeed Nigel Godfrey as evp of insurance management services at Horseshoe Group. Godfrey, who is also the group’s cfo, is retiring but will continue to be involved with Horseshoe as a consultant, as well as chairman of its UK operations. LeMoine joined Horseshoe at the beginning of the year and has over 20 years of successful experience in the Bermuda insurance and reinsurance market, including in ILS. He was most recently cfo and coo of Aspen Bermuda, where he served on various executive committees and boards.

SFR junior prepayment
Invitation Homes last month became the first single-family rental RMBS issuer to elect to voluntarily prepay the class F notes in IHSFR 2017-SFR2 reverse sequentially with unrestricted cash. Wells Fargo structured products analysts note that unrestricted cash typically comes from outside a deal, thereby leaving the underlying properties untouched. They suggest that by paying down the lower tranches and effectively converting them to equity, the move could strengthen the deal from a DSCR perspective, as the same level of rental income is now supporting less required debt service.