Given the range of institutions active in CLOs, there is remarkably limited tiering between names.

Quasi-independent debt management offices are bringing new sophistication to government debt management. But de-risking government balance sheets that have so far failed to account properly for contingent liabilities may be beyond them. Peter Lee reports.

After years of unfulfilled promise, there is the whiff of optimism in Indonesia as government tackles tangled economic and political challenges. Euromoney spoke to Indonesia’s finance minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, about problems, progress and promise. Chris Leahy reports.

Despite its size and maturity, the covered bond market is fast changing. New countries, new asset classes and new issuers vie for investors. But does the conflict between regulators’ desire for quality and consistency clash with investors’ needs for yield and diversification?

“It’s so bloody liquid, it’s not even funny.”

Time is running out for Eurotunnel as it tries to refinance its debt.

The dealers at Scottish Widows cemented their reputation as smart traders by winning the Goldman Sachs trading game at the Trade Tech Equities conference for a second year in a row.

Bankruptcy of Nici shows vulnerability of small German SME securitizations.

Buy-to-let mortgage originators in the UK market have often argued that these assets should be seen as prime assets rather than non-conforming.

British Land’s decision to convert to a Reit might prompt the restructuring of its Meadowhall securitization.

Until recently, it seemed that the big FX players in FX were happy to leave the retail sector to aggregators, perhaps taking comfort from the prospect that once these had built up a decent size position they would see the business anyway.

Barely a month seems to pass without either the launch of a new foreign exchange trading platform or at the least a significant enhancement and upgrade to an existing one.

The bad news for Mexicans is that their country is one of the most prone to earthquakes. But at least the government’s financial resources will not be stretched to the limit should one strike following the launch of a $160 million catastrophe bond last month – the region’s first.

A rival trading platform for smaller stocks in London is giving the LSE a run for its money.

Reports of the death of analysis have been greatly exaggerated. Time and again, analysts are proving their worth in league tables and through innovation and bespoke research. But ‘me-too’ forecasting is a hard habit to break.

The ability of the US to run a high current account deficit rests on a widespread belief that inflation and the cost of capital will remain low. But the conditions that underpin the deficit and the dollar’s role as the principal source of global capital are unlikely to be sustained for long.

...While Wax wows them

The expected evolution of opco propco to the pub sector failed to materialize in May when Robert Tchenguiz’s Globe Pub Company opted for a whole business structure to fund the the ex-Spirit pub portfolio.

Having emerged from a reshuffle in in the Hypo Real Estate Group at the start of the year, Hypo Real Estate Bank International is the most significant institutional response to the Pfandbrief Act yet. The merger of two banks with distinct business models and funding tools has created a real estate financier well equipped to match its hunger for growth, writes Florian Neuhof.

“Financial institutions should put customers’ needs first”, according to a report published by PriceWaterhouseCoopers on May 24. But should their services extend to matchmaking for young journalists? One of Euromoney’s débutant hacks was secretly pleased on a recent trip back from Moscow when his host bank’s head of IR forgot her passport: the subsequent delay meant a missed flight back to London, and a chance to watch the Champions’ League final in Vienna with the bank’s PR man and a gentleman from the Austrian media.

Wondering why everyone in global capital markets is thinking China these days? Look no further than PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Greater China IPO Watch. According to the accountants, the average deal size from the Greater China region (including mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan) was $260 million in 2005, an increase of more than 200%. For the first time, it exceeded that of the US ($170 million) and Europe ($100 million).

The global market tremors that have shaken emerging markets might have been expected to cause a few wobbles for the Bank of China IPO, but not a bit of it.

Financiers in the Caribbean are planning to establish a region-wide capital markets exchange to create a financial hub with critical mass.

“Given all that has happened I’m surprised it wasn’t negative $60 billion” James Gorman, Morgan Stanley In his first public presentation since joining Morgan Stanley in February as president and COO of the global wealth management business, James Gorman outlined how he intended to turn the dwindling arm into a competitive force in the industry.

Hiring and firing securities markets regulators on the basis of stock index performance is not a particularly credible policy. But that’s what the Saudi authorities did last month, sacking the chairman of the Capital Markets Authority, Jammaz Al-Suhaimi, a modernizer and reformer unfairly demonized on stock speculators’ bulletin boards across the kingdom as somehow being responsible for the crash of an overvalued market.

Indian companies have been the largest issuers of foreign currency convertible bonds in Asia. But there could be trouble ahead.

As more and more Mexicans are encouraged to buy their own homes, the companies that provide mortgages will increasingly look to the international capital markets to fund their lending. Armando Guzman, director general of mortgage provider Metrofinanciera, talks to Lawrence White about his expansive borrowing strategy and his hopes for the development of mortgage-backed securitizations.

One year on, new bonds offer good value.

The advent of whole-business securitization and the creation of a liquid market in project-related debt has opened investors’ eyes to the rewards available in infrastructure. Governments’ desire for off-balance-sheet funding has also boosted the supply of suitable investments. But what makes infrastructure different? How do you buy it, sell it and manage it?