With the summer holidays of the Another Fine Mezz team fading like the chlorophyll from the tree leaves, it was back to normal this week. Similarly, the European securitization market has eased into October with deal flow slowing to a much more manageable pace compared to a rampant September.
WiZink Bank completed a successful return to the market after a troubling debut in 2023 for its Portuguese credit card ABS. However, host Tom Lemmon argued that despite a much smoother ride this time around, the trade revealed some familiar problems in the European ABS market. Despite a record year of issuance, the investor base is still far too small and doing the credit work for anything even slightly funky takes far too long.
Meanwhile in the UK, Tandem Bank's debut RMBS caught the attention of European ABS reporter, George Smith. It was a roaring success but the question is whether it's a further sign that UK challenger banks will start using the securitization market to help with capital management with trades not dissimilar to the large banks' significant risk transfer deals of recent years.
Finally, Tom's wine tasting trips are bearing fruit as he explained how new businesses that aim to make it easier to invest in assets like wine, art or fancy cars are looking to use securitization and asset-backed lending to help them scale.
