Sector developments and company hires

SRT departures
Last week saw a couple of high-profile exits from SRT banking teams in London. Structuring specialist Jeremy Hermant is understood to have left Santander, while md Bob Paterson has reportedly been put at risk of redundancy at Lloyds.

Spokespeople at both banks declined to comment, although the latter stated: “Whenever we make role reductions, these changes do require making difficult decisions. We are focused on supporting our colleagues during these changes.”

Paterson has been head of credit sales at Lloyds since February 2016 and before that was head of ABS syndicate. He had led sales for the bank’s risk transfer programmes.

Hermant worked in Santander’s private debt mobilisation, notes and structuring team, assisting md Steve Gandy with issuing and arranging true sale and synthetic capital relief trades. He had been with the bank since September 2016 and before that was an equity derivatives trader at Triton Square.

One London-based headhunter told SCI that management on the Spanish side of the business at Santander is “less keen on the risk transfer area” and may have taken the strategic decision to re-evaluate its involvement.

“While the strategy continues to be increasingly popular among investors, on the banking side, SRT teams appear to be reducing in size,” he adds. “SRT bankers have niche – but transferrable - skills and limited opportunities, given the size of the market. As such, they are often looking for something new, as they perceive that their careers aren’t really going anywhere.”

However, the headhunter concedes that two departures in one week could just be a coincidence. “It’s a small market, so it seems like a significant development,” he concludes.

Digital ABCP
LBBW’s ABCP programme Weinberg Capital has executed another issuance via its digital DLT platform to MEAG, the asset management company of Munich Re and ERGO. Like the first issuance a year ago, the ABCP was tokenised and transfered over the Corda-based Weinberg DLT platform without any parallel process. Payment was also triggered via the platform, ensuring a full payment versus delivery in a T+0 settlement time. But this time the platform also provided email notifications and additional settlement information. The firm says its vision for the technology is to become a multi-issuer, multi-investor and multi-banking issuance platform.

EMEA
Dow Schofield Watts has appointed Phil Tarimo to lead its new debt advisory arm, DSW Debt Advisory. Tarimo joins DSW from DF Capital, where he was an executive board member, having previously been the North of England regional md for corporate and structured finance at RBS among other roles. The DSW Debt Advisory service is aimed at medium-sized companies seeking debt funding of at least £20m and will operate from its Northern offices until it begins work nationally.