Sector developments and company hires

UK to review Securitisation Regulation
The UK government has issued a call for evidence in connection with the Securitisation Regulation. Under the consultation, the government is seeking views on updating the regulation to ensure that it “best delivers” for the UK’s financial sector and real economy.

Responses to this call for evidence will inform the government’s review of the Securitisation Regulation, on which a report will be laid before Parliament by 1 January 2022. The overarching aims of the review are to: bolster securitisation standards in the UK, in order to enhance investor protection and promote market transparency; and support and develop securitisation markets in the UK, including through the increased issuance of STS securitisations, in order to ultimately increase their contribution to the real economy. As such, the government is seeking views on how the securitisation market is performing and how the Securitisation Regulation can be tailored to the UK.

The consultation ends on 2 September 2021.

In other news…

APAC anchor investment disclosed
DBS Group Holdings is set to become an anchor investor in Muzinich Asia Pacific Private Debt I fund, which is focused on private debt solutions targeted at lower middle-market companies. The move is in line with the group’s strategy of investing in new revenue and growth opportunities arising from special situations opportunities created by the pandemic.

Under the agreement, DBS is expected to anchor up to US$200m or 40% of the total fund size, whichever is lower. Alongside this commitment, DBS will have representation on the fund’s investment committee and advisory committee.

The investment rationale includes extending and diversifying credit risk participation beyond DBS’ traditional debt portfolio, as well as increasing the group’s involvement in fund activities to build up product know-how in the special situations space.

North America
Amherst Pierpont has appointed Adam Schwartz as md and head of the firm's structured credit business. He will lead the firm's existing structured credit team in both primary issuance and secondary trading, as it continues to expand upon its fixed-income and structured product offerings.

Schwartz brings more than 15 years of industry experience originating, structuring, marketing and executing a range of transactions across CLOs and other structured credit products. Prior to joining Amherst Pierpont, he held senior banking, structuring and origination roles in credit structuring at Morgan Stanley and BNP Paribas.

Alison Coen has joined Greystone as a senior md in its CMBS lending group, based in New York. In this role, Coen will focus on CMBS loan production.

With 25 years of relevant CRE industry experience, she joins Greystone from Barclays, where she was an md and closed over US$2.6bn of conduit loans. Prior to that, Coen worked at Natixis Real Estate Finance and Citi.

RFC issued on synthetic Libor
The UK FCA has published a consultation on whether to use its powers under the Benchmarks Regulation (BMR) (SCI 21 May) to require Libor administrator IBA to publish synthetic Libor settings beyond 2021, as part of an orderly wind down of Libor. For the one-month, three-month and six-month Japanese yen Libor settings, the FCA intends to compel their publication on a synthetic basis for one year until end-2022, after which they will cease. Additionally, it is proposing to use the Article 23D(2) BMR powers to require a synthetic Libor to be calculated using a forward-looking term version of the relevant risk-free rate (SONIA for sterling and TONA for yen) and the fixed ISDA spread adjustment published for the purposes of the ISDA IBOR Fallbacks Supplement and Protocol for the respective Libor setting.

Of the two term SONIA reference rates (TSRRs) for sterling provided by Refinitiv and IBA, the FCA has selected the latter as a component for a potential synthetic sterling Libor. For yen, it has selected the Tokyo Term Risk Free Rate (TORF) provided by QUICK Benchmarks (QBS) as a component for a potential synthetic yen Libor.

The consultation is open for nine weeks, after which the FCA will finalise its decision based on the feedback received. Where a synthetic Libor is implemented, it will also determine who will be permitted to use it.