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SALOMON Smith Barney brought two US student loan securitisations to the European market this week in a growing demonstaration of the attractiveness of that asset class to the European investor. The issue also proved a neat demonstration of the synergies generated by the merger of Salomon and Smith Barney.

A NOVEL structure arranged by Bayerische Landesbank will provide US insurer Integrity Life Insurance Company with a portfolio of high quality assets, funded cheaply in the CP market. Bravo Trust 1997-1 issued $450m of senior certificates rated A-1+/P-1 by Moody's, with an initial maturity of 351 days. Balaba provides 100% liquidity support, and also holds the $50m of junior certificates.

US MONOLINE insurer CapMAC has set up a US asset backed commercial paper conduit called Remsen Funding Corp to provide banks with a way to invest in ABS off balance sheet. The conduit is the first to hold single-A assets without third party credit support. The vehicle is not guaranteed by CapMAC -- the monoline acts only as administrator and adviser to the clients.

* Salomon Smith Barney this week announced two new appointments to its investment banking and equity capital markets divisions. Kola Luu, formerly a convertible bond specialist at Credit Suisse First Boston has been hired as a director in charge of building the bank's equity linked business across the Asia Pacific region. Before CSFB, Luu was based in Singapore where he worked in the corporate finance and fund management divisions of NM Rothschild & Sons.

TWO OF CHINA'S leading Red Chips were forced to fall back on their core investor base in Hong Kong this week to conclude IPOs. International accounts are all but absent from Asia at least until the beginning of next year, and both China National Aviation Corp (CNAC) and Tianjin Industrial have drawn heavily on local relationships to drive their issues to completion.

BANKERS ARE predicting a successful outcome for the NZ$132m IPO for New Zealand pay-TV operator SKY Network Television. Syndicate officials report that strong orders are coming in from both domestic investors and from the UK, and expect the company to produce a similarly positive response from its visit to the US this week, where it has held a number of one-on-one meetings with specialist media funds.

BINTUNI Minaraya (BMR), an Indonesian fishing and frozen food holding company, will complete roadshows for its IPO in the US next week after encountering a mixed reception at its Hong Kong and UK presentations. The ING Barings led deal is aiming to raise $100m for the company's $480m 1998 capital expenditure programme -- a figure which some bankers feel is excessive in an economic downturn. However, syndicate officials say tuna fishing is capital intensive, and the company needs to increase its daily volumes to save costs.

CITICORP SCORED an impressive result with the pricing of a $70m issue for Lite On Technology of Taiwan yesterday (Thursday), in the form of a credit-enhanced convertible completed on an accelerated basis. Books closed five times oversubscribed. The deal used similar terms to UBS's $200m deal for First International Computers (FIC) in the autumn, and final pricing came towards the aggressive end of the range.

DEUTSCHE MORGAN Grenfell withdrew as the lead manager of PT Makindo's 377m share IPO last week, its resignation coming during the roadshow presentations and after the deal had been priced A Makindo official said that DMG resigned from the syndicate last Friday, due to a potential conflict of interest over new mandates. The official added, however, that the two companies will continue to have a strong relationship, and the Makindo will look at DMG's offer to sell 15% of its Jakarta branch to the Indonesian firm following the IPO.

AUSTRALIAN corporates are lining up a string of equity issues for next year aimed at capitalising on the positive sentiment created by Telstra's outstanding launch on the market last month JB Were and Macquarie Bank are to launch the first deal of 1998 by the end of January, an A$300m secondary offering of roughly 170m shares for 10 Network Holdings, the parent company of Channel 10, Australia's third largest free-to-air TV station.

INDONESIAN petrochemicals company PT Eterindo Wahanatama is set to launch a $200m Yankee via Morgan Stanley, which looks likely to be the last bond issue of 1997 from Asia. The company will market itself as the beneficiary both of a downturn in the chemical industry's cycle and of the Asia-wide currency crisis, and hopes to benefit from the absence of any other debt-raising activity from the region's borrowers.

The Republic of Argentina will shortly launch a groundbreaking $300m five year variable rate note deal sole led by Merrill Lynch. The offering, due for pricing either today (Friday) or Monday, is Argentina's answer to the emerging market-wide dilemma of wanting to raise money now, but without having to lock in current high spreads for a long period of time.