Goldman Sachs keeps lead as top U.S. structured notes agent for year to date

By Emma Trincal

New York, March 3 – For the second month in a row, Goldman Sachs beat Bank of America as the top agent in the structured notes market, according to data compiled by Prospect News for the first two months of the year.

Bank of America has been the leader month after month and year after year. Some attribute Goldman’s fresh lead to what made it lead last month’s league tables as well – an exceptionally big offering, which priced at the end of January.

It was Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.’s $1.07 billion of 13-month 0% leveraged notes linked to a basket of unequally weighted indexes. Those were the Euro Stoxx 50 index, the FTSE 100 index and the Topix index.

A biggie

Goldman Sachs so far this year sold $1.69 billion in 135 deals, or 24.79% of the total volume. Following closely behind by a gap of about $125 million is Bank of America, which priced 67 offerings totaling $1.56 billion, or 22.97% of the total.

Goldman Sachs last year was third, a ranking now held by JPMorgan, moving down one notch from second. Barclays, last year’s No. 5 agent, moved up one notch.

In February, the top agent was Bank of America with $571 million, or 26.97% of the market, while Goldman was third with $265 million, or 12.49% of the total. JPMorgan was between the two with $361 million, or 16.98% of the total.

This suggests that Goldman’s big offering in January was a critical factor behind its year-to-date ranking as the firm lost its momentum last month.

Bank of America last month priced a few sizable deals.

The first one was Bank of America Corp.’s $145.16 million of 14-month leveraged notes linked to the S&P 500 index.

The second was Credit Suisse AG, London Branch’s $83.8 million of two-year capped leveraged notes linked to the S&P 500.

Finally, Bank of America issued $74.28 million of 14-month leveraged notes linked to the Euro Stoxx 50.

Slowdown

Meanwhile, the overall market is showing signs of weakness.

Agents so far this year have priced $6.81 billion, a 22.5% decline from the $8.77 billion sold in the first two months of last year.

The number of deals fell as well to 1,187 from 1,462, a drop of about 19%.

A look at the league tables based on the underlying asset class is relative. Some underlying classes did better than others. Some did pretty poorly.

Commodities issuance for instance is barely surviving. Agents this year priced only $13 million of commodity-linked notes, a 95% decline from $240 million a year ago. The number of deals, which was 42 last year, has dropped to eight.

JPMorgan is the top agent in this category with 71% of the volume.

Foreign exchange issuance has continued to collapse, falling 28% to $31 million from $43 million. JPMorgan is also the lead with 81% of the total.

Equities

The most commonly used asset classes, equity indexes and single stocks, have both registered a decline in volume, which is uncommon, at least for equity indexes, as this asset class is usually growing.

Agents sold $5.67 billion of equity index-linked notes in January and February, a nearly 5% decline from the same period the year before.

In comparison, volume in this asset class grew 42% from the first two months of 2014 to the same period of 2015, according to data compiled by Prospect News.

The top agent in equity indexes this year was Goldman Sachs with $1.64 billion, followed by Bank of America, the traditional leader with $1.46 billion. The narrow gap between the two again seems to indicate that Goldman’s ranking is the result of its giant deal.

Deals were smaller on average with 780 offerings this year versus 621 last year.

Single-stock issuance continued to weaken but at an accelerated pace. Agents sold $374 million in this asset class versus $1.54 billion last year, a 76% decline in notional.

During the same period last year, volume in this asset class had dropped 30% from 2014.

Pricing occurred in fewer deals. Their number dropped by two-thirds to 213 from 572.

JPMorgan took UBS’ slot as top agent, pricing 37 deals amounting to $80 million. UBS is now ranked No. 3. Its decline is due to the strong reduction in the number of deals it priced, falling 72% to 104 from 368.

Rates

Interest rate issuance is also down.

Traditional rate deals amount to only $47 million this year, down by nearly half from last year’s $84 million. Wells Fargo kept is ranking as the top agent.

Interest-rate products with a structured coupon but no underlier, such as step-up notes, step-down notes, fixed-to-floating notes and capped floaters, have dropped too.

Those products, however, are not included in the overall totals and are listed separately.

Structured coupon issuance amounted to $6.32 billion versus $11.73 billion, a decline a nearly half.

First Tennessee remains the first agent with $396 million.

Issuers

Credit Suisse remains the top issuer for all products with nearly 30% of the total in 194 deals totaling $2.96 billion.

Goldman Sachs is the No. 1 issuer for equity index products.

Barclays Bank plc is the most commonly used credit for single-stock deals, taking the place of JPMorgan Chase & Co., now second.

JPMorgan is the first name used for the issuance of commodities and currency notes.

Wells Fargo & Co. tops for rate products.

All structured products, no ETNS, by agent, year to date

2015 Comparables

	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Goldman Sachs	1.687	135	24.79%	3	1.335	107	15.23%
2	Bank of America	1.564	67	22.97%	1	2.366	72	26.98%
3	JPMorgan	1.135	277	16.67%	2	1.784	312	20.35%
4	Barclays	0.457	103	6.72%	5	0.588	91	6.71%
5	Morgan Stanley	0.356	71	5.23%	6	0.438	84	4.99%
6	UBS	0.355	168	5.21%	4	0.977	470	11.15%
7	Citigroup	0.245	51	3.61%	9	0.232	42	2.65%
8	Credit Suisse	0.231	101	3.39%	7	0.255	72	2.90%
9	BMO	0.204	40	3.00%	8	0.236	19	2.69%
10	HSBC	0.184	72	2.71%	10	0.189	99	2.15%
	Total	6.807	1187	8.768	1462
	Average size:	0.006	0.006
All structured products, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Credit Suisse	3.179	288	31.58%	2	2.113	229	19.39%
2	Goldman Sachs	1.687	135	16.76%	4	1.335	107	12.25%
3	Bank of America	1.564	67	15.53%	1	2.366	72	21.71%
4	JPMorgan	1.135	277	11.27%	3	1.784	312	16.37%
5	UBS	0.655	173	6.51%	5	1.230	472	11.29%
6	Barclays	0.457	103	4.54%	6	0.588	91	5.40%
7	Morgan Stanley	0.356	71	3.53%	7	0.438	84	4.01%
8	Citigroup	0.245	51	2.44%	9	0.232	42	2.13%
9	BMO	0.204	40	2.03%	8	0.236	19	2.17%
10	HSBC	0.184	72	1.83%	10	0.189	99	1.73%
	Total	10.067	1388	10.899	1637
	Average size:	0.007	0.007
ETNS, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Credit Suisse	2.948	187	90.46%	1	1.858	157	87.21%
2	UBS	0.300	5	9.20%	2	0.253	2	11.86%
3	Nuveen	0.011	9	0.34%	3	0.020	16	0.92%
	Total	3.260	201	2.130	175
	Average size:	0.016	0.012
All structured products, no ETNS, by agent, February
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Bank of America	0.571	26	26.87%	1	1.161	37	31.37%
2	JPMorgan	0.361	107	16.98%	2	0.637	167	17.21%
3	Goldman Sachs	0.265	62	12.49%	4	0.278	51	7.52%
4	Morgan Stanley	0.191	37	9.01%	6	0.220	36	5.96%
5	UBS	0.149	83	7.03%	3	0.505	218	13.66%
6	Barclays	0.144	40	6.78%	5	0.271	50	7.33%
7	Citigroup	0.098	19	4.63%	7	0.184	29	4.97%
8	HSBC	0.093	28	4.39%	10	0.107	52	2.90%
9	Credit Suisse	0.092	38	4.34%	8	0.113	34	3.06%
10	RBC	0.066	21	3.10%	9	0.109	27	2.93%
	Total	2.124	494	3.700	735
	Average size:	0.004	0.005
Commodity structured products, no ETNS, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	JPMorgan	0.009	6	71.08%	2	0.067	18	27.91%
2	UBS	0.003	1	24.32%	7	0.001	1	0.28%
3	Morgan Stanley	0.001	1	4.60%	3	0.055	12	22.86%
	Total	0.013	8	0.240	42
	Average size:	0.002	0.006
Equity index structured products, no ETNS, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Goldman Sachs	1.635	123	28.82%	3	1.166	91	19.55%
2	Bank of America	1.455	59	25.64%	1	2.026	55	33.97%
3	JPMorgan	0.929	199	16.38%	2	1.187	137	19.90%
4	Barclays	0.382	73	6.74%	5	0.369	53	6.18%
5	Morgan Stanley	0.261	47	4.59%	7	0.153	33	2.57%
6	Citigroup	0.220	38	3.87%	10	0.073	20	1.22%
7	UBS	0.199	34	3.51%	4	0.510	67	8.55%
8	Credit Suisse	0.184	78	3.24%	6	0.181	49	3.03%
9	HSBC	0.135	50	2.39%	8	0.131	69	2.20%
10	Deutsche Bank	0.075	13	1.33%	11	0.027	6	0.45%
	Total	5.673	780	5.964	621
	Average size:	0.007	0.010
Foreign exchange structured products, no ETNS, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	JPMorgan	0.026	2	82.08%	2	0.018	9	41.00%
2	Barclays	0.006	1	17.92%
	Total	0.031	3	0.043	12
	Average size:	0.010	0.004
Interest rate structured products, no ETNS, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Wells Fargo	0.018	2	38.10%	1	0.027	1	32.39%
2	Goldman Sachs	0.016	1	33.12%	7	0.003	3	3.54%
3	Citigroup	0.011	1	22.38%	2	0.019	3	23.14%
4	Incapital	0.002	1	4.26%
5	Morgan Stanley	0.001	1	2.13%	5	0.007	1	8.30%
	Total	0.047	6	0.084	13
	Average size:	0.008	0.006
Single stock structured products, no ETNS, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	JPMorgan	0.080	37	21.55%	2	0.382	103	24.80%
2	Bank of America	0.073	4	19.62%	3	0.265	10	17.18%
3	UBS	0.060	104	16.11%	1	0.434	368	28.14%
4	Barclays	0.041	17	10.88%	4	0.128	22	8.28%
5	Morgan Stanley	0.030	8	7.93%	5	0.108	21	7.02%
6	Credit Suisse	0.024	16	5.49%	10	0.015	10	0.96%
7	RBC	0.023	9	6.17%	7	0.053	17	3.44%
8	HSBC	0.023	7	6.08%	9	0.022	7	1.46%
9	Goldman Sachs	0.009	3	2.42%	6	0.092	2	5.94%
10	Citigroup	0.009	6	2.34%	8	0.043	12	2.78%
	Total	0.374	213	1.542	572
	Average size:	0.002	0.003
Interest rate products with structured coupons (not included above), by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	First Tennessee	0.396	16	6.26%	2	0.833	35	7.10%
2	Multi-Bank	0.390	24	6.17%	39	0.057	5	0.48%
3	Guggenheim	0.258	12	4.09%	17	0.221	18	1.88%
4	Vining	0.230	22	3.64%	3	0.655	40	5.58%
5	Finacorp	0.223	14	3.53%	16	0.225	25	1.92%
6	Piper Jaffray	0.218	10	3.45%	14	0.237	20	2.02%
7	Incapital	0.207	15	3.27%	11	0.388	31	3.31%
8	Wells Fargo	0.171	10	2.70%	28	0.100	2	0.85%
9	RBC	0.150	11	2.37%	41	0.047	7	0.40%
10	SunTrust	0.147	14	2.33%	25	0.127	11	1.09%
	Total	6.320	236	11.730	403
	Average size:	0.027	0.029
Interest rate products with structured coupons (not included above), no agencies, by agent, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Underwriter	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Wells Fargo	0.087	6	38.82%
2	Bank of America	0.040	2	17.92%	11	0.010	1	2.33%
3	RBC	0.038	4	17.10%	5	0.034	6	8.02%
4	Goldman Sachs	0.024	3	10.47%	2	0.087	10	20.31%
5	BMO	0.010	3	4.64%
6	TD	0.010	4	4.45%	4	0.046	7	10.77%
7	Citigroup	0.008	2	3.56%	8	0.017	4	3.99%
8	Morgan Stanley	0.005	1	2.23%	12	0.006	1	1.40%
9	HSBC	0.001	1	0.60%	7	0.022	1	5.03%
10	Barclays	0.001	1	0.22%	1	0.108	4	25.11%
	Total	0.225	27	0.429	51
	Average size:	0.008	0.008
All structured products, no ETNs, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.	1.262	29	18.54%	1	1.383	120	15.77%
2	Barclays Bank plc	0.687	118	10.09%	3	1.358	115	15.49%
3	Credit Suisse AG, London Branch 0.678	144	9.96%	2	1.362	141	15.53%
4	JPMorgan Chase & Co. 0.606	196	8.90%	4	1.058	261	12.06%
5	Bank of America Corp. 0.580	15	8.52%	6	0.693	19	7.91%
6	GS Finance Corp. (Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.)	0.449	108	6.60%
7	HSBC USA Inc.	0.447	94	6.56%	5	0.697	130	7.95%
8	Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch	0.377	39	5.54%	10	0.270	58	3.08%
9	Morgan Stanley	0.346	72	5.08%	7	0.454	87	5.18%
10	Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce 0.325	16	4.77%
	Total	6.807	1187	8.768	1462
	Average size:	0.006	0.006
All structured products, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Credit Suisse AG, Nassau Branch 2.960	194	29.40%	1	1.903	163	17.46%
2	Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.	1.262	29	12.54%	2	1.383	120	12.69%
3	Barclays Bank plc	0.687	118	6.82%	4	1.358	115	12.46%
4	Credit Suisse AG, London Branch 0.675	143	6.71%	3	1.362	141	12.50%
5	JPMorgan Chase & Co. 0.606	196	6.02%	5	1.058	261	9.71%
6	Bank of America Corp. 0.580	15	5.76%	7	0.693	19	6.36%
7	UBS AG, London Branch 0.505	145	5.02%	8	0.649	349	5.96%
8	GS Finance Corp. (Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.)	0.449	108	4.46%
9	HSBC USA Inc.	0.447	94	4.44%	6	0.697	130	6.40%
10	Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch	0.377	39	3.75%	11	0.270	58	2.48%
	Total	10.067	1388	10.899	1637
	Average size:	0.007	0.007
Commodity structured products, no ETNS, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	JPMorgan Chase & Co. 0.009	6	71.08%	3	0.050	14	20.93%
2	UBS AG, London Branch 0.003	1	24.32%	6	0.010	4	4.19%
3	Morgan Stanley	0.001	1	4.60%	2	0.055	12	22.86%
	Total	0.013	8	0.240	42
	Average size:	0.002	0.006
Equity index structured products, no ETNS, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.	1.238	27	21.82%	2	1.207	99	20.23%
2	Credit Suisse AG, London Branch 0.630	112	10.91%	1	1.253	103	21.01%
3	Bank of America Corp. 0.572	14	10.08%	4	0.576	13	9.66%
4	Barclays Bank plc	0.538	85	9.48%	3	1.035	57	17.35%
5	GS Finance Corp. (Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.)	0.421	98	7.41%
6	JPMorgan Chase & Co. 0.413	125	7.29%	6	0.494	109	8.28%
7	HSBC USA Inc.	0.382	69	6.74%	5	0.519	83	8.71%
8	Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch	0.333	33	5.86%	10	0.114	17	1.90%
9	Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce 0.325	16	5.73%
10	Morgan Stanley	0.267	50	4.71%	8	0.193	39	3.24%
	Total	5.673	780	5.964	621
	Average size:	0.007	0.010
Foreign exchange structured products, no ETNS, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	JPMorgan Chase & Co. 0.026	2	82.08%	2	0.009	3	20.96%
2	Barclays Bank plc	0.006	1	17.92%
	Total	0.031	3	0.043	12
	Average size:	0.010	0.004
Interest rate structured products, no ETNS, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Wells Fargo & Co.	0.018	2	38.10%	1	0.027	1	32.39%
2	Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.	0.016	1	33.12%	6	0.003	3	3.54%
3	Citigroup Inc.	0.011	1	22.38%	3	0.019	3	23.14%
4	Credit Suisse AG, Nassau Branch 0.002	1	4.26%
5	Morgan Stanley	0.001	1	2.13%	4	0.007	1	8.30%
	Total	0.047	6	0.084	13
	Average size:	0.008	0.006
Single stock structured products, no ETNS, by issuer, year to date
					2015 Comparables
	Issuer	Amount	No.	Share	Rank Amount	No.	Share
1	Barclays Bank plc	0.093	18	24.82%	2	0.218	40	14.15%
2	JPMorgan Chase & Co. 0.071	33	18.95%	1	0.382	93	24.80%
3	UBS AG, London Branch 0.059	103	15.67%	4	0.171	285	11.06%
4	Morgan Stanley	0.029	7	7.66%	6	0.105	19	6.83%
5	Credit Suisse AG, London Branch 0.028	20	7.46%	10	0.045	24	2.89%
6	HSBC USA Inc.	0.024	8	6.49%	5	0.116	20	7.52%
7	Royal Bank of Canada 0.023	9	6.17%	3	0.193	46	12.55%
8	Deutsche Bank AG, London Branch	0.019	3	4.96%	7	0.097	30	6.30%
9	GS Finance Corp. (Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.)	0.009	3	2.42%
10	Citigroup Inc.	0.009	6	2.34%	11	0.043	12	2.78%
	Total	0.374	213	1.542	572
	Average size:	0.002	0.003
Prospect News Structured Products Rankings

Criteria

• The tables include all dollar-denominated offerings sold in the United States as public, Rule 144A or similar deals reported to Prospect News.

• Offerings are included in the time period in which they price.

• Amounts are based on the total sales price (face amount multiplied by the offering price). The full amount is credited to the lead manager. For multiple managers, the total value is divided equally among all the firms.

• Each tranche is counted as a separate deal.

• Notes are included that convert into or are linked to one or more stocks, indexes, commodities, currencies, interest rates or other assets.

• Interest-rate products with a structured coupon but no underlier, such as step-up notes, step-down notes, fixed-to-floating notes and capped floaters, are listed separately; they are not included in overall totals. Agencies are included in this category.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.