Structured finance
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Structured finance is a sector of finance created to help provide increased liquidity or funding sources to markets like housing and/or to transfer risk to buyers of structured products.[1] Liquidity and risk transfer is typically achieved in structured finance through securitization of various financial assets (e.g. mortgages, credit card receivables, auto loans, etc.) which has helped to open up new sources of financing to consumers and businesses. Common examples of instruments created through securitization include collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) and asset-backed securities (ABS). The legal structure of these instruments may be quite simple or very complex.
The mortgage market uses structured finance extensively and was traditionally meant to provide liquidity to lenders and funding to borrowers. Controversy has arisen since the 2008 Housing Bubble that structured finance had a role in the bubble and was too complex and not transparent enough to manage or regulate.
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Structure
Securitization
Securitization is the method utilized by participants of structured finance to create the pools of assets that are used in the creation of the end product financial instruments.
Reasons for securitization
- Better utilization of the available capital
- Alternative funding
- Cheaper source of funding especially for lower rated originators
- Reducing credit concentration
- Risk management interest rates and liquidity
Tranching
Tranching is an important concept in structured finance because it is the system used to create different investment classes for the securities that are created in the structured finance world. Tranching allows the cash flow from the underlying asset to be diverted to the various investor groups. The Committee on the Global Financial System explained tranching succinctly: "A key goal of the tranching process is to create at least one class of securities whose rating is higher than the average rating of the underlying collateral pool or to create rated securities from a pool of unrated assets. This is accomplished through the use of credit support (enhancement), such as prioritization of payments to the different tranches."[2]
Credit enhancement
Credit enhancement is key in creating a security that has a higher rating than the issuing company. Credit enhancement can be created by issuing subordinate bonds. The subordinate bonds are allocated any losses from the collateral before losses are allocated to the senior bonds, thus giving senior bonds a credit enhancement. Also, many deals, typically deals involving riskier collateral such as subprime and Alt-A, use overcollateralization as well as subordination. In overcollateralization, the balance of the loans is greater than the balance of the bonds, thus creating excess interest in the deal. Excess interest can be used to offset collateral losses before losses are allocated to bondholders thus providing another added credit enhancement. Another credit enhancement involves the use of derivatives such as swap.
Credit ratings
Ratings play an important role in structured finance for instruments that are meant to be sold to investors. Many mutual funds, governments and private investors only buy instruments that have been rated by a known agency like Moodys or S&P.
Structure
Other structures
There are numerous structures which may involve mezzanine risk participation, options and futures within structuring of financing as well as multiple stripping of interest rate strips. There is no laid-out fixed structure unlike in securitization which is only a subset of the overall structured transactions. Esoteric transactions often have multiple lenders and borrowers distributed by distribution agents where the structuring entity may not be involved in the transaction at all.
Types
There are several main types of structured finance instruments.
- Asset-backed securities (ABS) are bonds or notes based on pools of assets, or collateralized by the cash flows from a specified pool of underlying assets.
- Mortgage-backed securities (MBS) are asset-backed securities the cash flows of which are backed by the principal and interest payments of a set of mortgage loans.
- Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities, (RMBS) deal with Residential homes, usually single family.
- Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities (CMBS) are for Commercial Real Estate such as malls or office complexes.
- Collateralized mortgage obligations (CMOs) are securitizations of mortgage-backed securities.
- Collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) consolidate a group of fixed income assets such as high-yield debt or asset-backed securities into a pool, which is then divided into various tranches.
- Collateralized bond obligations (CBOs) are CDOs backed primarily by corporate bonds.
- Collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) are CDOs backed primarily by leveraged bank loans.
- Commercial real estate collateralized debt obligations (CRE CDOs) are CDOs backed primarily by commercial real estate loans and bonds.
- Credit derivatives are contracts to transfer the risk of the total return on a credit asset falling below an agreed level, without transfer of the underlying asset.
- Collateralized fund obligations (CFOs) are securitizations of private equity and hedge fund assets.
- Partial Guaranteed Structures (PGS)
- Future Flow Transactions (FFT)
- Loan Sell Offs (LSO)
See also
References
- ^ Nathaniel Popper (April 18, 2013). "Wall St. Redux: Arcane Names Hiding Big Risk". The New York Times. Retrieved April 19, 2013.
- ^ "The role of ratings in structured finance: issues and implications". Bank for International Settlements. January 2005. Retrieved November 5, 2008.
External links
- Jobst, Andreas A. (2007). "A Primer on Structured Finance" Journal of Derivatives and Hedge Funds
- Tergesen, Anne (2006). "Structured Notes: Quirkiest Vehicle on the Street", Business Week
- Goldstein, Matthew (2004). "Post-Enron, Structured Finance Addiction Hasn't Ebbed" TheStreet.com
- The Economics of Structured Finance
- Structured Settlement