2003 innovation and achievement

2003 Innovation and Achievement

Award Ceremony

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60 leading MTN issuers and dealers attended the our awards reception at the Institute of Directors in London at the end of December.

The reception coincided with the publication of the Innovation and Achievement Review, an authoritative survey of issuer and dealer performance during 2003.

The Review The Awards

Achievement – Equity Linked MTNs

As well as establishing itself as a leading light in the development of the inflation-linked MTN market, BNP Paribas showed clear leadership of the equity-linked sector in 2003. It established a commanding lead over rival houses with nearly EUR2bn of sales for third-party borrowers, a market share of almost 20%. It sold the year’s largest deals in a number of equity-linked structures and continued to exploit its Ariane coupon concept, an innovation much replicated elsewhere.

BNPP’s Frair Appleby-Walker receives its award from Julian Lewis, Managing Editor, mtn-intelligence

Innovation and Achievement Awards 2003

‘Recognising landmarks of MTN

creativity and diversity’

Rocket-fuelled performance

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MTN Achievement

This year Citigroup managed to extend its already commanding lead in key markets. By mid-December the firm stood poised to add Euros to its established number one positions in US dollars and yen. A unique approach to organising and managing its MTN business and unmatched global reach explain its further progress in 2003.




Citibank Head of MTNs Chris Cox, accepts award from mtn-i Founder and CEO Mike Tims


Biggest gets bigger

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Equity-Linked MTN Innovation

Commerzbank’s 2003 Innovation & Achievement Award reflects its creative migration of the targeted redemption rate structure into the equity-linked sector. Its Aggregate Coupon Equity (ACE) note, which merged key elements from the structure with those from traditional best/worst equity basket structures, formed the centrepiece of another highly active year for the firm in equity and fund-linked MTNs.




Commerzmerk’s MTN team, Marko Milos and Amaury Gosse, collect their award from mtn-intelligence managing editor, Julian Lewis

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Ace in the hole


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MTN Product Innovation

Deutsche Bank’s 2003 Innovation & Achievement Award reflects a host of MTN product innovations this year. These include the first note in one of the year’s key new structures, targeted redemption, as well as a unique currency forward-linked product, some of the first equity default swap and ladder inverse FRN structures and a host of credit-linked hybrid notes.




Chris Jones, Deutsche Bank Head of MTNs receives award from mtn-i Founder and CEO Mike Tims.

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Staying on target


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Internet Innovation: e-debt suite

Web platforms for MTNs and functionality allowing issuers to post levels for private placement execution are not new. But Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein’s latest enhancements to its e-debt suite of products make non-syndicated MTNs part of an integrated system that supports all stages of the fundraising process with new types of information, analytic tools and execution transparency. Crucially, the firm’s system not only creates a competitive edge for its own business, but benefits borrowers too.




Dresdner KW’s Head of e-debt, Axel Thill collects award from mtn-intelligence Managing Editor Julian Lewis and mtn-i Founder and CEO, Mike Tims.

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Competitive edge benefits borrowers

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Product Leadership: Inflation Linked MTNs

The European Investment Bank (EIB)’s 2003 Innovation & Achievement Award reflects its leadership role in the creation of a major new structured MTN market this year. Its EUR1bn of Eurozone HICP-linked notes in Q1 was the driving force behind one of 2003’s best-selling structures. The supranational also broke new ground in the sterling inflation-linked sector. Next: a long-awaited public Eurozone HICP bond and new inflation structures.




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Fuelling the Inflation-linked Lift-off


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MTN Product Innovation

Goldman Sachs’ 2003 Innovation & Achievement Award reflects its product innovations across a broad spectrum of asset classes. It broke new ground with rate, credit, equity, inflation and commodity structures, as well as multi-asset class hybrids. The firm also served up some of the first variations on classical rate structures, a key theme of 2003, as well as continuing to refine some of its own interest rate plays.




Goldman Sachs Alexis Reynard and Ed Tunstallreceive their award from mtn-i Managing editor Julian Lewis.

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Across the asset spectrum


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Structured MTN Distribution & Innovation

USD7.6bn raised for third-party issuers via 425 structured MTNs in as many as 38 different formats this year reveals both the efficiency of JP Morgan’s distribution of complex debt and its capacity to innovate in a variety of markets. The firm was active in almost every one of 2003’s important products, from range notes and targeted redemption to emerging currencies via inflation, commodity and currency plays and more.


JP Morgan’s Lily Horvil, Fiona Doddrell and Fergus Edwards receive their award from mtn-i Founder and CEO, Mike Tims.

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Active everywhere

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Product Innovation

Italian Inflation-linked MTNs

The first dealer to sell Italian inflation-linked notes and the only one to sell a TIPS-style product linked to the domestic index, Lehman Brothers achieved a dominant position in the structure this year with over EUR700m of sales. Its efforts to meet Italian appetite for linkers with a local product even drove the development of a swaps market and gave the firm a stand-out product in a year when it reorganised its MTN business under the continuously-offered products umbrella and more than doubled its total structured MTN sales.


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Linkers for locals

Julian Lewis, mtn-intelligence Managing Editor, with Lehman’s Christoph Mallinckrodt and GisoVan Loon

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Structured MTN DistributionStrategy

Morgan Stanley’s unique approach to structured note distribution put the firm at the forefront of interest-rate derivative and inflation-linked MTN sales in 2003. Its willingness to underwrite structured deals allowed it to focus on creating large liquid transactions, in marked contrast to the small-ticket investor-by-investor approach seen elsewhere. With more than 30 USD100m or larger structured MTNs during the year, the firm leveraged its global presence to create a substantial pool of secondary liquidity for its structured clients.




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Unique underwriter


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Japanese MTN Distribution& Innovation



Nomura forged new landmarks in liquidity for structured yen and vanilla Australian dollar deals in 2003, leveraging both its institutional and retail distribution in Japan. Notching up the two largest power reverse dual currency (PRDC) notes ever with its EIB-issued Samurais, and the two largest AUD MTNs with Uridashi notes issued by KfW and Westpac, the firm created new levels of visibility for these issuers with Japanese investors and boosted the momentum of the PRDC and AUD products.


Nomura Head of MTNs Gayle Turner collects its award from mtn-i Managing Editor Julian Lewis.

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Forging new landmarks


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Structured MTN DistributionChannel




UniCredit Banca Mobiliare’s consistent and imaginative servicing of its domestic branch network on behalf of international borrowers made it the market’s most active seller of inflation-linked MTNs this year and a top performer in number of other structured product categories. The firm provided a string of single-A names with unique access both to structured MTN funding and Italian retail investors.

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Meeting linker appetite with local product


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While structuring and selling deals grabs most of the headlines, leading issuers also highlight the importanceof professional transaction management and execution and deal after-care. This dimension of funding operations rarely gets attention, but can have a critical impact on performance. Reporting a wide variety of service from their dealers, issuers highlight Credit Lyonnais as a leader in this area more often than any other firm.

MTN Transaction Management & Execution

The Borrower Award

Banque General du Luxembourg’s Yvon Antoni presents the Borrower Award to CL Head of MTNs, Fabrice Pasquier.

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MTN issuer achievement awards


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A borrower that uses the MTN market exclusively for structured funding, BGL is one of the best recognised structured issuers. Its 2003 output ranges across all asset classes, with only 75% from rate structures and as much as 20% from equity-linked deals even in a relatively quiet year for the sector.

Range accruals, where BGL is a top 10 issuer, are the bank’s largest product with more than one-third of its identified volume. Its key transactions include two quanto structures in EUR on USD Libor (EUR70.49m and EUR43.17m, both via JP Morgan).

Inverse FRNs in many variations have been BGL’s other key product, providing it with more than USD500m-equivalent of funding. Besides 21 trigger callable leveraged inverse FRNs – the standard targeted redemption format, for which it ranks sixth by volume among third-party issuers – the bank printed 15 standard leveraged structures, 11 step-ups and four cumulative inverse FRNs, an emerging product where BGL’s deals represent 60% of identified volume.

It also issued one of the year’s very few quanto de-leveraging inverse FRNs (on CHF Libor in USD) and a step-up inverse FRN/range accrual hybrid.

Active across the range

Banque General du Luxembourg’s Head of MTNs, Yvon Antoni receives award from mtn-intelligence Managing Editor, Julian Lewis.

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MTN Issuer Achievement


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CDC Ixis sold around USD5bn-equivalent of structured notes in 2003, shrugging off the effect of the phased loss of its French state guarantee from the beginning of the year to become one of the most flexible and active dollar rate structure issuers.

Long-dated structured yen transactions made up around 20% of CDC’s structured funding volumes last year (around USD1.5bn-equivalent). However, the guarantee withdrawal - similar to that affecting the German Landesbanks - shut off a substantial portion of that market.

CDC responded with a concerted marketing effort in Japan, while exploiting the boom in range accruals and other USD interest rate-linked products - typically with a maximum 10-year term. The Japanese currency accounted for 10% of the issuer’s MTN sales this year, with a JPY30bn 1-year Nikkei-linked note and a slew of smaller reverse convertibles contributing significantly.

CDC emphasises flexibility, with a minimum transaction size of USD2m to USD3m, and is a substantial player in NC3M structures. This year it has also added fund and credit-linked structures to its approved list.

Deal highlights this year include a USD200m 20-year NC3M range accrual/leveraged inverse FRN combination via Goldman Sachs in April. The deal has not yet been called.


CDC Ixis Funding executive, Bertrand Verlhac collects award from mtn-i Founder and CEO Mike Tims.

Flying without guarantee

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CBA’s Jacques Lumb collects award from mtn-intelligence Managing Editor, Julian Lewis


Becoming available to deal in London time, as well as from headquarters in Sydney, evidently helped CBA become more accessible and responsive – it now aims to respond to reverse enquiries in less than 20 minutes. As a consequence, it proved one of the leading issuers of commoditised structures in 2003. The bank was one of the leaders in the year’s targeted redemption boom, selling 30 notes in the structure and raising over USD430m - more than any other third-party issuer. It also printed over 120 range accruals throughout the year for USD1.6bn-equivalent.

This year CBA’s identified structured note volumes more than doubled to over USD3.6bn-equivalent from under USD1.5bn in 2002. Besides flow products, it also issued less common structures. These included a series of currency-linked MTNs, such as a triple FX dual range note, as well as an ultra-rare equity-linked deal in Australian dollars.

CBA mostly sourced its vanilla funding (relatively stable at USD1.8bn) in Hong Kong dollars and from Uridashi notes in its domestic currency, rather than more expensive public bonds.

Responsive around the clock

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Eksportfinans Head of Funding and Investor Relations, Soren Elbech collects its award from mtn-i Founder and CEO, Mike Tims

This year Eksportfinans met the challenge of adding a further 40% to a borrowing programme that had already doubled in 2002. To raise the USD4bn it needed without seeing its borrowing costs deteriorate, the Norwegian agency refined the new funding strategy it adopted last year. MTNs play a key role in this, alongside carefully prepared and extensively marketed strategic benchmark bonds. This year Eksportfinans issued twice as many structured MTNs as in 2002. Far from worsening, its average cost of funds has improved significantly as a result, according to the agency. The power reverse dual currency (PRDC) note remains Eksportfinans’ key instrument. Its activity includes capped, digital, trigger callable and even twin currency (see Timeline above) variations. While increasing its identified PRDC volume by 50% this year to some JPY96bn, the agency managed to reduce the product’s share of its total structured sales below 40% - down from almost 60% in 2002. Eksportfinans also reports selling a total of USD1bn in various USD callable structures this year, particularly into Asia. Its other key transactions include the first targeted redemption note from a third-party issuer (a USD12.2m 7-year via Deutsche Bank) and a broad range of credit and fund-linked structures.

Increased output at lower cost


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The MTN market’s biggest issuer, and one with a particularly diverse array of products, KfW is as likely to print yet another power reverse dual currency (PRDC) note as to sell its next benchmark bond. The German agency’s near-USD20bn of non-syndicated MTNs over the year includes some USD7.3bn-equivalent of structured notes.

PRDCs, for which it is by far the leading issuer by volume with a 23% market share, are a key product for KfW. By May its yen machine had cranked out over 100 issues, in July it broke the USD2bn-equivalent barrier and it ends the year having sold well over 300 tickets in the structure.

The biggest-ever Australian dollar Uridashi issue (AUD1.665bn via Nomura – see Innovation & Achievement Award above) added to its penetration of the Japanese market this year.

KfW was also prominent in other sectors, selling over USD4.1bn of interest rate-linked products and USD400m of inflation structures. Moreover, the agency has announced its participation on Deutsche Bank’s Continuously Offered Investor Notes (COINS) platform, which will make its debt directly accessible to retail investors across Europe for the first time.

Structured Yen machine breaks USD2bn barrier


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Lloyds TSB transformed itself in 2003 into the default issuer for high-volume commoditised rate structures. With USD5.6bn of identified interest rate-linked volume, it ended the year ranking behind only Rabobank and the special case of US agency Freddie Mac, according to mtn-i data – a significant rise from its sixth position in this area in 2002.

This new prominence has been founded on Lloyds TSB’s domination of the range accrual product, which has provided two-thirds of its total MTN funding.

The UK financial services group printed USD3.6bn of new issues in the structure during the year, USD1bn more than nearest rival Rabobank. This gave it 21% of identified volume, while its 303 deals compare to the 126 printed by the next most active name on this measure (RBS).

Besides around USD250m each in CMS and step-up callable structures, Lloyds TSB was especially active in inverse FRNs. Its USD1bn of such deals included as many as 56 trigger callable leveraged inverse FRNs, the standard targeted redemption format. The issuer’s enthusiastic adoption of Q3’s hottest structure gave it almost twice as many deals as any other third-party issuer and a 14% market share.

Default issuer for key structures


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NIB Capital is an MTN issuer of choice for non-standard structures and, especially, alternative asset classes. Besides selling half as many equity-linked MTNs again as any other borrower this year, scooping up no less than USD1bn-equivalent from the sector, the Den Haag-based institution has put its name to more credit-linked MTNs than any other third-party borrower. It also dominates commodity-linked flows with more than 50% of identified third-party volume, according to mtn-i data.

In addition, NIB Cap has issued a broad variety of rate, currency and bond plays over the year, as well as a credit/rate hybrid. Much of this output has emerged in uncommon or even unique structures, such as an amortising dual-coupon note (JPY400m 10-year via Deutsche Bank).

In raising some USD1.9bn-equivalent overall from structured MTNs in 2003, the bank has offered the striking total of 34 different identified structures. That is significantly more than most borrowers that rank alongside it in the lower reaches of the year’s top 20 structured MTN issuers by volume.

NIB Capital’s Luc Veenstra collects its award from mtn-i founder and CEO, Mike Tims

Exotic issuer of choice

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RBS took the highly unusual step of withdrawing from the MTN market during the middle of the year, in order to review its transaction processing, back-office and risk management systems. Despite the pause, it raised a total of around GBP4bn of MTN funding from 550 notes in 2003, almost entirely in structured/arbitrage funding.

“We are funding deeply sub-Libor on a portfolio basis, so why should we pay up for vanilla debt?” an RBS funding executive comments.

From range accruals and targeted redemption to inverse FRNs and PRDCs, the bank featured in all of the high-volume sectors of 2003, averaging more than two trades per day. It also sold some of the year’s more notable inflation, equity and fund-linked deals. These included TIPS-style US inflation (via UBS), all-items Eurozone inflation (via its own investment bank dealer, RBS) and ratchet equity baskets (via Commerzbank), as well as structures in Polish zloty (via Goldman Sachs) and Norwegian kroner (also via RBS).

Sabbatical pays dividends

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An approach which involves seeing itself as “dealers’ partner, rather than a client” has delivered Rabobank over USD18bn-equivalent of MTN funding in 2003. This total includes over USD8bn in structured notes sales - more than any other international issuer.

Though Rabo operates a USD10m minimum for transactions and has stayed away from issues callable after three months, it managed to print over 400 tickets during the year. The Dutch co-operative bank has also taken a flexible approach to keeping mandates open.

Its landmark structured MTNs this year include jumbo fund and equity-linked deals via Robecco (EUR275m) and BNP Paribas (EUR169m and EUR122m), respectively. Others were the biggest targeted redemption note yet (USD110m via JP Morgan) and an Italian retail-targeted sticky FRN (EUR100m via Morgan Stanley and Banca Akros).

Rabo’s funding stands out as global in scope. This year it has printed MTNs in 13 different currencies – AUD, CAD, CHF, EUR, GBP, HKD, HUF, JPY, NOK, NZD, SGD, USD and ZAR.Dealers continue to applaud the bank’s transparency and consistency. Unlike issuers with smaller balance sheets and wider funding levels, it manages to stay in the market at stable levels in all conditions.

Partnership approach yields USD8bn in structured sales


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Sylvia Ashley, Rabobank Head of Investor Relations and Nadine Alsina collect award from mtn-intelligence Managing Editor, Julian Lewis



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SNS Bank stands out as the year’s most successful single A-rated issuer in structured MTN markets. Lacking the stronger credit of compatriots NIB Cap and Rabo (see MTN Issuer Achievement Awards for both above), the bank has had to look to less conventional channels for its USD1.6bn of structured financing – especially as it falls below the double A minimum requirement of many private banks and other buyers.

SNS’s main response has been to draw strongly on the Italian retail appetite for higher-yielding lightly structured products that UniCredit Banca Mobiliare has refined so visibly this year (see Innovation & Achievement Award above). In two Eurozone inflation issues and a EUR/USD digital via UBM, it raised as much as EUR850m.

Even so, the UBM jumbos account for only just over half (56%) of SNS’s total identified structured MTN volume. The bank also managed to raise a further USD600m-equivalent from a broad variety of rate, equity and fund-linked structures.

These include a EUR141m annually putable FRN and a EUR100m Eurostoxx 50 play. Other highlights were 10 CMS-linked notes in EUR and Polish zloty, a range callable in Czech koruna and the year’s first targeted redemption note for a single A third-party issuer.

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SNS Bank’s Roger Schumann collects award from mtn-intelligence Managing Editor, Julian Lewis

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Reviews Copy deadline Publication Date_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Q4 and 2003 Review 26 Jan 2004 23 Jan 20042004 Outlook 13 Feb 2004 16 Feb 2004Q1 Review 2004 13 Apr 2004 20 Apr 2004Q2 Review 2004 16 Jul 2004 19 July 2004Q3 Review 2004 15 Oct 2004 18 Oct 2004Innovation & Achievement Review 2004 10 Dec 2004 16 Dec 2004Q4 Review 2004 21 Jan 2004 24 Jan 2004

Case Notes and Special Reports* Copy deadline Publication Date_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Targeted Redemption Case Note Q1 2004 Q1 2004Single-A Credits Q1 2004 Q1 2004Nordic Frequent Borrowers Q2 2004 Q2 2004Masters of Retail Q2 2004 Q2 2004

*Further case notes and special reports will be scheduled during the year

2003 innovation and achievement

Documents

mtnintelligence innovation

innovation achievement

mtn business

achievement awards

inflationlinked mtn

linked structures

equitylinked sector

linked product