Another Fine Mezz returned to its traditional line-up this week, with senior securitization reporter George Smith hosting fellow ABS journalist Tom Hall.
Recent deal making activity in European securitization has come in falvaours as varied as the continent's different cuisines.
Tom hasn't even been at GlobalCapital for three months, yet CMBS is already is favourite subject — at least if you believe George.
Who can blame him? It's a ripe time to be looking into the asset class, which is — if not quite resurgent — certainly enjoying a more buoyant moment.
Last week's cover story went into the Bank of America and Together deals that took the repackaging of commercial real estate loans beyond the Blackstone-driven logistics sector that has dominated the asset class in recent years.
Glasgow's Silverburn may not be too thrilled to be seen as "tertiary quality property", to quote one investor, given its illustrious history as 2019 Shopping Centre of the Year no less. But it was one of two big loans backing a BofA deal that was priced this week and suggests positive signs for both appetite for securitized products and the health of commercial real estate financing more broadly.
Elsewhere, Italian ABS gets a mention as it has taken a more prominent role than usual in the first quarter of 2025, while challenger bank Aldermore also excited the pod as UK prime RMBS enjoys strong demand.
Meanwhile, George's moonlighting as a CLO reporter has seen him delve into an inaugural deal from Arcano.
More debutants are allegedly on the way, even as a familiar question persists: given a stodgy leveraged loan market, how do new managers plan to get their fill of assets?