Simon Crompton
Managing editor
Increased regulatory capital requirements in the US and EU will spur banks based there to use derivatives to fund acquisitions of strategic stakes this year.
With greater focus on banks' core capital, many are looking at ways to use equity derivatives to help clients take stakes in troubled companies in both Europe and Asia.
The highest profile example in 2009 was the purchase of derivatives over Volkswagen stock by the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) from Porsche. But while that was driven by existing contracts that Porsche had arranged to try and engineer a takeover, deals such as Aabar's acquisition of a stake in Daimler were arranged by derivatives behind the scenes.
The structure means that investors take on none of the leverage or risk of those derivatives though, leaving it all to the bank to manage.
"These deals will definitely be on people's radar in 2010," said...