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Pubmaster Ltd this week became the fifth UK pub company to be securitised in its entirety, and the first to successfully use the technique at a lengthy interval after the company's creation. The £305m deal, structured by the securitisation team at Bankers Trust that is now part of Deutsche Bank, will allow Pubmaster to retire some £120m of debt taken out when the company was formed through a management buyout from UK leisure concern Brent Walker Group in November 1996.

Deutsche Bank issued its third CORE securitisation of loans to small and medium sized German companies this week, a Eu1.3588bn transaction that reinforced the strong franchise Deutsche is building with its campaign to take up to DM50bn of assets off its balance sheet and into the capital markets. With a smaller deal to sell and investors now familiar with the product, Deutsche held a much briefer marketing drive than for its earlier jumbo securitisations, and ended with the lower rated tranches two to three times oversubscribed, and a marginal excess of demand for the triple-A notes.

Bank Brussels Lambert brought its third securitisation of Belgian auto loans this week, after a two year absence from the ABS market. Bear Stearns and ING Barings-BBL lead managed the Eu450m issue, broadening the investor base for the B-Cars programme but running into choppy credit markets. "The deal was very well received," said a syndicate official at Bear Stearns in London. "We launched it in the 28bp area and brought the pricing in to 27bp, with a very wide distribution including strong placement outside the Benelux region."

Dutch Housing Association Finance BV, the second special purpose vehicle set up to provide international bond market finance for the Netherlands' 700 local housing associations, this week launched the first issue from its Eu1bn MTN programme, with a Eu109m 10 year bond lead managed by Rabobank International. Like Colonnade, a vehicle structured by ING Barings which debuted last year, DuHAF issues bonds secured on matching loans to housing associations, which provide rented housing for people on low and middle incomes.

Andy Clapham has quit his job as head of asset securitisation and principal finance at Greenwich NatWest in London. He will spend the next few months travelling, before resuming his career elsewhere. Steve Skerrett will take his place, as managing director and head of the UK/European asset securitisation team, reporting, as Clapham did, to Bruce Snider, managing director and head of ABS origination, sales and trading outside the US.

Healthcare company Mayne Nickless Ltd last week completed Australia's first securitisation of revenues from operating a hospital. The A$92m deal marks a significant expansion in the scope of Australia's asset backed market. In Europe securitisation has been applied to an ever growing range of operating assets, many of them emerging from privatisation schemes like the UK's private finance initiative, but Australian ABS have almost exclusively parcelled loans and leases of various kinds, mostly to private individuals.

Westdeutsche Landesbank has agreed to provide a £122m warehouse facility to UK property company Workspace, in preparation for a £185m securitisation next year. Workspace specialises in acquiring office, industrial and retail space and letting it for short periods to small companies, often newly started. The company aims to refinance £110m of existing properties in London and the Midlands and fund a new acquisition in London, worth £75m. Altogether, the portfolio will include 70 properties with around 3,000 tenants.

The last two Learning Curve articles described a multi-factor model for energy prices based on the observed forward curve and showed how energy derivative prices can be calculated.

Citicorp and Salomon Smith Barney were awarded the lead manager roles for a debut international bond offering by Manila Electric (Meralco) this week - a sign that the combined talents of the merged Citigroup could prove a formidable power in winning Asian mandates. Citicorp's ability to provide aggressive bridge financing for the Philippines utility, and Salomon's distribution capabilities, made for a winning combination given that the group has ambitions to launch a bond deal but may be compelled by time constraints to first put a bridge facility in place.

KOREAN finance company Daewoo Capital this week closed the first South Korean domestic asset backed deal to be structured without recourse to the seller. Chase Securities structured the W229bn securitisation of auto loans, which was lead managed by Daewoo Securities. "The closing of this transaction for Daewoo demonstrates the growing interest in local currency asset backed structures among Korean borrowers," said Paul Burke, head of global securitised finance for Chase in Asia Pacific. "Financing in won is becoming as viable an option in the asset backed market in Korea as it is for straight debt. This allows sellers to take advantage of the historically low won interest rate environment, the strengthening of the won against the dollar and the active support of the Korean regulators."

JAPAN'S fifth largest leasing company, Diamond Lease Co, entered the asset backed market this week with the largest ever international term ABS offering from Japan, apart from collateralised loan obligations. The $416m deal, sole managed by Tokyo-Mitsubishi International, parcels 13,648 equipment leases extended to 4,911 Japanese companies by Diamond Lease, a member of the Mitsubishi group.

Australia Ecorp rocketed 58% during its first day trading and closed yesterday (Thursday) at A$1.960 from a launch price of A$1.20. Merrill Lynch lead managed the A$161m offering, which was substantially oversubscribed. Of the institutional tranche, two thirds went to domestic investors with the remainder going overseas.