EM/Macro Distressed Trading

Hi all,

I was wondering, do distressed trading desks at BBs deal only with corporates or also with sovereigns (ex. Argentina, Peru, Greece). Also, what portion of their business deals with debt from developed markets vs in EM? I'm looking to rotate on the distressed debt trading desk at the shop I'm at for this summer, and though I'm interested in learning about restructuring, valuation/fundamental analysis, I've also always really loved studying macro events - just trying to see if there's a potential of a happy medium here.

Thanks!

2 Comments
 
Best Response

Can't speak to US HY/distressed but those names typically get traded off the EM desk and within that distressed sovereigns traded alongside other regional sovereigns and distressed EM corporates traded along side regional corps. While it varies firm to firm you will often see one person trade Venezuela/PDVSA/Argentina (not distressed anymore!) where as Mozambique is traded by the sub saharan africa trader and IBAZAZ (intl bank of Azerbaijan) traded by the guy that trades eastern european corporates and quasi sovereigns. Peru isn't distressed (sovereign trades at 100 bps) so I think you're referring to the illiquid claims held by a certain hedge fund. Rarely see Greece quoted off EM desks. FYI I'm referring to hard currency distressed and tried to hit some of the bigger ones out there in the market right now.

 

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