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MERRILL LYNCH this week reopened the sterling convertible market with the £250m offering of convertible bonds for Airtours, the world's largest holiday tour operator. The deal was launched into a rising UK market in which investors are keen to acquire well priced assets -- but in which the downside protection of a convertible instrument is also a welcome feature.

BANKBOSTON completed a $2.18bn securitisation of loans to US corporates this week, offering three and five year global bonds. To maximise liquidity and secondary market support, BankBoston employed three leads: Lehman Brothers (books), Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. "BankBoston has set the new benchmark for CLOs," said a syndicate official at Lehman in New York. "The deal was tremendously successful -- we took into account everything that investors want. The loan diversification is high, the portfolio shows as few losses as any of the other CLOs, and the whole deal is ERISA eligible. We will also be providing monthly collateral reports, as on a credit card deal."

MBNA International Bank, the UK arm of US credit card issuer MBNA, brought its seventh securitisation last Friday -- a £240m three year deal lead managed by Barclays Capital. "We started premarketing on Tuesday, and found demand in the mid-20s over Libor, but we wanted to do the full size deal and make it the success that MBNA is used to," said Richard Mann, syndicate director at Barclays.

* ING Barings has executed a $100m future flow securitisation of Visa voucher receivables for Banco de Crédito del Perú. The deal was privately placed earlier this month with a wrap from MBIA-Ambac International. The transaction has a 3.88 year average life and seven year legal maturity. It is backed by hard currency revenues that BCP earns from overseas banks, mainly in the US, for honouring Visa vouchers. The transactions arise when travellers to Peru use a credit or debit card.

GREENWICH NatWest this week brought the second securitisation of UK sub-prime mortgages for Ocwen Ltd, the subsidiary of US lender Ocwen Financial Corp, which acquired the UK business of City Mortgage Corp in April this year. City Mortgage issued six securitisations before its takeover, which all continue to perform, but its business practices were criticised by the Office of Fair Trading.

ROADCHEF, the UK's third largest operator of motorway service areas, this week launched a £210m bond secured on its assets, sole managed by Barclays Capital. Nikko Europe's principal finance group bought RoadChef for £175m in May this year -- the group's first acquisition since it was set up in 1997. RoadChef in turn paid £80m for two smaller competitors, Blue Boar and Take A Break, in July.

NEW LIFE was breathed into Australia's domestic debt markets this week when its most prolific corporate borrower, Ford Motor Credit, launched an A$100m two year fixed rate deal. The new offering, led by Merrill Lynch with Warburg Dillon Read as dealer, marked Ford's first fixed rate offering since 1992 and the first corporate deal in the domestic market since Orica in August.

HENGAN Group has been granted approval to launch a HK$700m ($90m) IPO on Monday. The BNP Prime Peregrine-led issue was delayed last week after the Hong Kong stock exchange refused permission for the sanitary products manufacturer to list because of some discrepancies in the prospectus. The deal will now launch next week with roadshows in Hong Kong, Singapore and London. Bankers said that premarketing had shown unexpectedly high demand in Europe that would ensure the transaction was a blowout. "We've already had demand from the UK which would make the deal subscribed many times over," said a banker.

THE JURONG Town Corporation (JTC) inaugurated its newly signed S$4bn MTN programme yesterday (Thursday) with the launch of its first public bond offering. Unusually, the S$300m ($185m) twin tranche, seven year transaction is to be launched via a tender process, on a pay as you bid basis, similar to Singapore government Securities. Pricing is to take place on November 23, with a coupon to be announced at 5pm following the close of tender at noon.

CREDIT Lyonnais has won the restructuring and equity placement mandate for Krung Thai Bank, beating Credit Suisse First Boston, JP Morgan and Lehman Brothers. Analysts said any equity offering was some way off and that Krung Thai Bank intends to find a foreign partner before any placement to portfolio investors. "The most important job is integrating the assets of the other merged banks and reorganising the structure of the company, which is somewhat unwieldy," said one.

NOMURA'S draconian reining in of its international operations finally hit its rapidly expanding Asian empire this week with the departure of its three most senior fixed income directors, as well as a further 20% cull of its 55 strong Asian primary markets team. Most prominent among the departures was that of regional head Stefan Ludwig, who left immediately after his business plan for Asia was rejected by Tokyo. That veto, delivered by new global debt head Hiroshi Toda, reflected the depth of risk aversion of a Tokyo management which last week moved decisively to gather in the reins of power previously held in Nomura's far flung and relatively independent international division.

CONCOR successfully completed its $53m secondary offering this week, giving the Indian privatisation process a much-needed shot in the arm. It also potentially opens the way for a VSNL offering before Christmas, despite the failure of the government to appoint an adviser following a controversial mandating exercise. The Warburg Dillon Read-led Concor issue closed 1.5 times subscribed, having priced at the government's target level of Rp250 per share. That represented an 11.5 times multiple to fiscal 1998 forecasted earnings, compared to a BSE Sensex average of 9 times and a multiple of 10 times for MTNL, 6.1 times for VSNL and 6 times for IOC.