The author has been described by News Ltd as an "iconoclast", "Svengali", a pollie's "economist muse", and "pungently accurate". Fairfax says he is a "Renaissance man" and "one of Australia’s most respected analysts." Stephen Koukoulas concludes that he is "85% right", and "would make a great Opposition leader." Terry McCrann claims the author thinks "‘nuance’ is a trendy village in the south of France", but can be "scintillating" when he thinks "clearly". The ACTU reckons he’s "an enigma wrapped in a Bloomberg terminal, wrapped in some apparently well-honed abs."

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Aussie securitisation market continues to bounce back strongly with AOFM backing

Bendigo & Adelaide Bank just doubled the size of its securitisation of Aussie home loans from $750m to $1.5 billion at what look to be reasonable prices. The Treasury's AOFM was also a participant in the issue. From Banking Day:

"Bendigo and Adelaide Bank launched its second issue of prime, mortgage-backed securities for the year on Monday. The issue, via TORRENS Series 2010-2 Trust, was launched at A$750 million and follows on from the A$1.1 billion TORRENS Series 2010-1 issue in March.

On Thursday the issue was doubled in size to A$1.5 billion and priced. The success of the issue suggests that there is considerable investor demand, at least for short-dated RMBS...

Bendigo was able to sell A$240 million of Class A1 notes with a weighted average life of 0.3 years at 70 basis over bank bills and A$569 million of Class A2 notes with a weighted life of 1.5 years, at 100 bps over...

Bendigo’s ability to sell the volume of shorter life RMBS that it did was aided by the Australian Office of Financial Management’s willingness to subscribe to the longer life tranches. AOFM took up the largest volume of RMBS since it declared its intention to subsidise such issuance in May.

AOFM acquired A$19.5 million of the Class A3 notes and A$476.5 million of the Class A4 notes. In all, $101 million of Class A3 notes with a WAL of 3.0 years were issued and priced at 110 bps over bank bills (indicative pricing had been set at 105 bps). The Class A4 tranche was only A$1.0 million larger than AOFM’s take-up and priced at 110 bps over with a WAL of 5.8 years.

Interestingly, AOFM seems to have moved its subsidised pricing up on these longer-dated tranches. In the last two deals AOFM has sought a yield of 110 bps over bank bills but was happy with 100 bps over on the first."