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MOVES-ING, Deutsche Bank, MAM Funds Plc, others
NEWEDGEThe brokerage and clearing house appointed Kevin Russell as managing director and global head of brand & communications based in London.INGThe company appointed Paul Cliff and Tibor Bokor as sector heads for metals/mining and EMEA telecoms, respectively. Igor Goncharov was named director of equity research (Russian utilities).It appointed Anna Kochkina, Tatiana Prokina, Pinar Fersoy, Jessica London, Adam Brinkley-Svanberg and Brian Wesneski as vice-presidents. Todd Krummel was named director and head of Russian trading and Naser Nuredini vice-president of EMEA equity trading.DEUTSCHE BANKThe investment bank appointed Frank Wu as head of Trade Finance and Cash Management Corporates for Greater China. Previously, he was the head of Structured Trade & Export Finance, China.MAM FUNDS PLCThe asset management group appointed Tom Delic as investment analyst at its Liverpool office. Previously, he served as technical analyst for both Royal Liver Assurance and Mercers.SIGNIA WEALTHThe independent wealth manager appointed Etienne de Merlis as executive director of its investment team. Prior to this, Merlis worked with JP Morgan private bank.BARING ASSET MANAGEMENTThe investment management firm appointed John Burns as chief operating officer. Previously, he was the COO at Visor Capital in Almaty, Kazakhstan.TOWERGATE INSURANCE GROUPEurope's largest independent insurance group appointed James Strachan to its board as an independent non-executive director, and chairman of the Group Risk and Compliance Committee.
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ANALYSIS-Small ships to unlock rate boon for bulk owners
By Krishna N Das and Jonathan Saul BANGALORE/LONDON, Feb 8 (Reuters) – Dry cargo shippers with smaller vessels are shifting to more-risk, more-reward spot markets, eyeing rising demand for sugar and grains — commodities well suited to versatile supramax and handysize ships. Ship owners generally prefer long-term charters in a weak market. The Baltic Dry Index <.BADI> o-year lows in recent weeks but confidence has been rocked by South Korean dry bulk group Korea Line Corp <005880.KS> filing for bankruptcy protection, highlighting the risk of charter-party defaults. “Concerns now persist industry-wide, as speculation grows as to whether faults,” Deutsche Bank analyst Justin Yagerman said. “Continued charterer defaults could bring into question many companies’ above-market charters.” Flooding in Australia, the world’s biggest coal exporter, and weather-srupted coal shipments and dented sentiment for capesize vessels — the giants of seaborne trade routes, typically hauling 150,000 tonne cargoes such as iron ore and coal. Demand for grains, though, has soared. Wheat prices in the European Union, the world’s No.2 exporter, a year, aided by a Russian export ban due to drought and strong demand from North Africa and Middle East countries. Global food prices, which hit their highest level on record last month, is a mounting worry for world leaders. Recent catastrophic weather around the globe could put yet more pressure on the cost of food, an issue that has already helped spark protests across the Middle East. Egypt is the world’s biggest wheat importer. Eagle Bulk Shipping , which operates supramax vessels that typically have around half the capacity of a capesize, lowing them to haul a wider range of cargoes, has placed half its ships in the spot market. That strategy has been welcomed by investors, and Eagle Bulk Shipping’s price-to-earnings ratio of almost 35 is the highest among its peers, Thomson Reuters StarMine data shows. “We prefer smaller vessels due to the more favorable supply dynamics, more diverse cargo loading options, record spot fixture activity for the last five months due to a recovering worldwide economy, and the increasing ton-mile in the grain trade,” FBR analyst Doug Garber said in a note. Genco Shipping and Trading could be another to gain from a near-term rebound in day rates — the cost of renting a ship by the day — as it has roughly half its 2011 days in open or linked-to-index charters. Conversely, Diana Shipping , DryShips , Navios Maritime Partners LP and others whose fleets are dominated by bigger ships, have placed more vessels in long-term contracts, hoping for steady returns. Diana and DryShips trade at just above 5 and 8 times forward earnings, respectively. Iron ore and coal are the main drivers of the dry bulk trade, accounting for some two-thirds of demand, but both are highly dependent on China, making the shippers that own bigger vessels more vulnerable to demand swings in the world’s biggest commodity consumer. Sterne Agee expects Baltic Dry Index spot rates to drop 16 percent this year and 9 percent in 2012, noting these declines will be hardest felt by those owning capesizes, where fleet growth is seen at 17 percent this year and 14 percent in 2012. For capesizes, the brokerage forecast a 25 percent fall in spot rates this year to below $25,000 a day. Only three years ago, owners of these vessels could charge day rates in excess of $100,000 a day. Supramax rates are seen dropping about 7 percent to $20,845. “The largest part of the order book concerns the larger ships, the capes. It is actually the capes that are of a bigger concern to everybody in the industry,” said Michael Bodouroglou, chairman and CEO of Greece’s Paragon Shipping Inc , which has smaller supramax and handymax vessels among its fleet. “The panamaxes, the supramaxes and in particular the handies I think they will fare a lot better particularly in the second quarter which is the season where the grain trades pick up from South America etc — these are trades which are accommodated in the smaller sizes,” he told Reuters. The Baltic capesize Index <.BACI> has fallen by two-thirds in the past 3 months to its lowest in more than 2 years. Rates for supramax vessels were faring slightly better, though the Baltic’s supramax index <.BASI> has dropped by a quarter in the last 3 weeks. “In the next few months, a moderate amount of cargo demand is likely to continue to surface, which is likely to result in supramax and handysize rates remaining at healthy levels,” said Jeffrey Landsberg, managing director of dry bulk consultancy Commodore Research. “Global grain demand remains strong and will lend support to rates once the South American export season kicks in to full gear.”
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TEXT-S&P puts 23 rtgs on CW neg after assured guaranty rtg action
OVERVIEW-- On Sept. 27, we placed our 'AA+' rating on Assured Guaranty and its related subsidiaries on CreditWatch negative.-- Assured Guaranty (Europe) Ltd. and Assured Guaranty (UK) Ltd. provide financial guarantees for several European structured finance transactions.-- Consequently, we have placed on CreditWatch negative 23 European structured finance ratings as they are linked to the rating on Assured Guaranty and its related subsidiaries.Standard & Poor's Ratings Services today placed on CreditWatch negative its ratings on 23 ratings in 14 European securitization transactions following the CreditWatch negative placement of our 'AA+' rating on Assured Guaranty Corp. and its related subsidiaries (see "Assured Guaranty Ltd. Operating Companies Placed On CreditWatch Negative," published on Sept. 27, 2011).Specifically, we have placed on CreditWatch negative our ratings on:-- Five tranches in eight structured credit transactions, and-- 18 tranches in six asset-backed securities (ABS) transactions.For the full list of today's rating actions see "European Structured Finance CreditWatch Placements Following Assured Guaranty CreditWatch Placement-Oct. 12, 2011."Today's CreditWatch placements reflect the CreditWatch placement of our rating on Assured Guaranty and its related subsidiaries. As Assured Guaranty through its subsidiaries provides financial guarantees in each of these transactions, either for the payment of the underlying debt obligations or for the repayment of the notes, the ratings on these tranches are linked to the rating on Assured Guaranty or one of its subsidiaries.In each case, the rating on the tranche is the higher of the rating on Assured Guaranty and Standard & Poor's Underlying Rating (SPUR) on that tranche. A SPUR is our opinion of the stand-alone creditworthiness of an obligation--that is, the capacity to pay debt service on a debt issue in accordance with its terms--without considering the applicable guarantee, which in this case is the guarantee from Assured Guaranty.RELATED CRITERIA AND RESEARCH-- European Structured Finance CreditWatch Placements Following Assured Guaranty CreditWatch Placement-Oct. 12, 2011, Oct. 12, 2011-- Assured Guaranty Ltd. Operating Companies Placed On CreditWatch Negative, Sept. 27, 2011-- Counterparty And Supporting Obligations Methodology And Assumptions, Dec. 6, 2010-- European Legal Criteria For Structured Finance Transactions, Aug. 28, 2008
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