Since the first edition of the book was published, there has been a global financial crisis, but despite the significant events, the instruments that have provided the foundation of debt markets over the years have remained essentially the same.
However, what has changed is the conditions attached to them and the capital required to support them. Borrowers are more flexible on the terms of their financings and a wider variety of investors is now sought. Investors now are prepared to accept a greater variety of risks and instruments. This book is an up-to-date, comprehensive description of these state-of-the-art debt instruments, explaining the nature of the instrument and providing some examples of how they can be applied to commercial situations.
Practitioners will need to have a good understanding of the short-term markets such as commercial paper, medium term highly flexible loan markets, the long-terms US private placement market, medium-term note and bond markets, the covered bond markets (for financial institutions), the convertible market and ways to use Sukuk structures effectively. Each product is outlined, its uses for borrowers and investors are specified and current leaders in the field are identified, where possible using league tables.
The risks of using each product are evaluated thereby bringing the reader up-to-speed on the opportunities available from each market, which means they can assess the relevance of the products for their situation. In the second part of the book some examples of the commercial application of these instruments is provided.