Sector developments and company hires

CLO heavyweight to lead combined platform
Sound Point Capital Management has appointed Gunther Stein as head and cio of its US performing credit and CLO platform. The move follows Sound Point’s recently announced agreement to acquire Assured Investment Management, the institutional asset management business of Assured Guaranty that was formerly known as BlueMountain Capital Management (SCI 6 April).

Stein is a longtime investor and veteran portfolio manager who previously served as chairman, ceo and cio of Symphony Asset Management, which was bought in 2001 by Nuveen Investments, which itself was acquired in 2014 by TIAA. He will join Sound Point in June and his responsibilities will include overseeing the firm’s US CLO vertical, which encompasses 30 US CLOs and a long-only loan investing business. Under the transaction with Assured Guaranty, Sound Point will also assume the management of 32 active AssuredIM CLOs, comprising 25 US CLOs and seven European CLOs.

In his new role, Stein will jointly oversee the US CLO investment committee with Sound Point founder and ceo Stephen Ketchum and chief credit officer Tom Newberry. He is also expected to join the firm’s management committee.

Stein joined Symphony in 1999, having previously worked at Wells Fargo, First Interstate Bank, Standard Chartered Bank and Citi. He rose to ceo and cio at Symphony in 2009, growing the business from approximately US$7bn in AUM to US$19.5bn when he departed the firm at the end of 2018. Under his leadership, Symphony issued more than US$10bn of CLOs and related products.

At Symphony, Stein oversaw a broad slate of traditional and alternative strategies for both institutional and retail investors. In time, under his leadership, Sound Point expects to launch new initiatives in the performing credit space.

In other news…

EMEA
Addleshaw Goddard has hired Taymour Keen as a partner in its structured finance and securitisation practice, based in London. With specific expertise in structured real estate finance, he was previously counsel at Weil, Gotschal & Manges, which he joined in January 2016. Before that, Keen worked at Berwin Leighton Paisner and Trowers & Hamlins.

S&P has promoted md Cian Chandler to chief analytical officer for the global structured finance practice, based in London. He was previously head of EMEA structured finance, having joined the rating agency as associate director in July 2000.

FNMA closes fifth CIRT deal
Fannie Mae has transferred US$424.4m of mortgage risk through its fifth credit insurance deal of 2023, designated CIRT 2023-5. The GSE has visited the capital markets with three CAS CRT deals so far this year, the last at the end of April, so the pattern of making greater use of the reinsurance market than the debt markets - established in the last 18 months or so – continues.

The coverage in the latest CIRT transaction was written by 19 insurers and reinsurers, says Fannie Mae. The pool of mortgages includes around 53,000 loans – which were acquired between March and June 2022 - with an unpaid principal balance of US$18.1bn. It is a high LTV pool, with LTV ratios of between 81% and 97%.

Fannie Mae retains the first 135bp of loss, worth US$243.8m. If this retention layer is exhausted, the 19 reinsurers cover the next 235bp of loss to a maximum of US$424.4m.

North America
Satish Mansukhani has joined Rithm Capital as md in investment strategy. In this role, he will lead in-house research, strategic positioning and cover new emerging opportunities within Rithm’s investment portfolio and operating platforms. Mansukhani previously served as md, head of agency MBS research at Bank of America and worked at Credit Suisse and Bear Stearns before that.