CDS IndexCo LLC, a consortium of 16 investment banks, and Markit Group Limited, which provides mark-to-market pricing and valuations, launched a synthetic ABS index of US home equity asset-backed securities.
The index is a family of five sub-indices, each of which consists of a basket of 20 credit default swaps referencing US sub-prime home equity securities. As with the Dow Jones CDX and iTraxx families of credit derivative indices, the ABX index will roll every six months.
The bonds are selected through a polling process of the ABX dealer group by Markit, in order to select the most liquid securities backed by home equity loans.
The 16-bank consortium includes the following: Bank of America, Barclays Capital, Bear Stearns, BNP Paribas, Citigroup, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, RBS Greenwich, UBS and Wachovia.
Markit will be the administration, calculation, and marketing agent for ABX, which includes capturing daily price fixings, publishing monthly fixed and floating payments, and supplying a calculator for the settlement of trades; handling issues around rules, operations, marketing, and analytics; and producing marketing materials, negotiating dealer and data licenses, and communicating information to the wider market.
“We expect ABX to build liquidity and transparency in the synthetic asset-backed market, attracting global investors that seek exposure to this asset class, both on the buy-side and sell-side,” said Kevin Gould, executive vice president and head of data products and analytics at Markit.
In order to qualify for index selection, an issuer must have rated bonds for each of the AAA, AA, A, BBB, and BBB- categories. One bond from each deal will be referenced in each sub-index, and bonds must be rated by Moody’s and Standard and Poor, with the lesser of the two ratings applying. The five sub-indices are based on the rating of the reference obligations which are equally weighted at index launch. Subsequent weightings may change based on the performance of loans in the underlying pools.
The minimum deal size is $500 million, and each tranche referenced must have a weighted average life of between four and six years (except for the AAA tranche, which must have a weighted average life greater than five years). No more than four deals can be selected from the same originator, and no more than six deals can be selected with the same master servicer.