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* The World Bank approved two loans for Argentina this week, totalling $3bn, as part of a multi-lateral agency effort to give the country the financial cushion to avoid any future contagion from Asian-style crises. The loans include a so-called Special Structural Adjustment Loan (SSAL) of $2.5bn and a special repurchase facility support loan of $505m. After Colombia, Argentina is the second country to receive an SSAL -- a new type of financing put together by the World Bank in reaction to the current global financial turmoil.

THE INTER-American Development Bank sought to develop a greater following among US investors this week when it launched a $1bn global bond via JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. The issue was aimed at providing a platform for the IDB's expanded borrowing programme over the next two years. Largely prompted by the need to contribute to recovery programmes for Latin American countries hit by the financial crisis, the IDB expects to increase borrowing in 1999 to $9bn, from a planned $4bn.

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Qatar Responses from potential co-arrangers are due in next week on the $475m Qatar Vinyl Company (QVC) project financing. Market talk suggests the re-priced deal will achieve a strong oversubscription, with bankers impressed by the new margin and fee levels.

* The International Primary Market Association has published a standard form pricing supplement, for use in MTN programmes. The document, which IPMA "strongly encourages" its members to use, provides a template to simplify documentation when making trades off MTN programmes, both new and extant. * The signing of Eurohypo's Eu10bn MTN programme has been postponed until early December, although a definite date has yet to be agreed.

BARCLAYS, Chase Manhattan and Greenwich NatWest, are close to winning the mandate to arrange a working capital facility for National Power, Euroweek has learnt. Details remain scarce but the size of the transaction is thought to be $1.25bn. The structure will probably include a short term tranche and a longer term tranche.

Market commentary Compiled by Glenn Blackley, RBC DS Global Markets, London. Tel: +44 171-653 4557

HFC BANK, the UK subsidiary of Household Finance Corporation of the US, launched its fourth securitisation of consumer loans last Friday -- a £150m deal lead managed by Barclays Capital. "We are very pleased with the deal," said Piers Williamson, HFC's treasurer. "This is the first securitisation from a UK repeat issuer since spreads really backed up, and Barclays has done an efficient job of pushing the bonds out.

ING BARINGS-BBL this week launched a Dfl 175m tap of its Colonnade structure, which finances local social housing institutions in the Netherlands. ING created the vehicle to provide an alternative source of funding for the country's 800 building societies, which are privately owned but state regulated providers of social housing, similar to the UK's housing associations.

BACOB Bank launched a Bfr11bn residential mortgage securitisation this week -- the Belgian bank's fourth securitisation of the asset class. MBS-4's three senior tranches came around 3bp, 5bp and 7bp wider than their equivalents in Bacob's previous deal in May, but those levels were still tight compared to most US and European asset backed paper.

* US lender Countrywide reopened the home equity securitisation sector this week after a drought of nearly two months with a $156m home equity line of credit securitisation through Countrywide Home Equity Loan Trust 1998-D. Wrapped by triple-A rated monoline insurer Ambac, the deal's single tranche has an average life of 3.51 years and expected maturity in November 2005.

What is exposure? It is one of the buzzwords of modern risk management, but in fact the word is used to describe a number of different variables.