Some alternative definitions for the themes of the year.
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| Glossary | |
|---|---|
| Additional Tier 1: | Bank capital instrument that investors buy because it looks like a bond. No, wait, it’s equity. No, hang on, it might only become equity in the future. Heck, who knows why anyone buys the stuff. |
| Alibaba: | 1. A folk tale in which a slave does most of the hard work for the hero and gets very little in return; |
| 2. A fabled IPO in which… never mind. | |
| Anonymous Analytics: | Hedge-fund plaything that promotes short selling as a form of social justice. Not to be confused with another AA that actually helps people. |
| Anti-mar: | Mysterious chemical designed to leave no trace of fingerprints on your smartphone – or, possibly, on your balance sheet. |
| Bank capital: | Financial safety net. Something Asian lenders thought they had plenty of before Basel III. |
| Basel III compliant: | In Asia, any bank capital security that gives regulators the power to blow up their country’s financial system. |
| Block trade: | Preferred route for banks looking to make a sizable amount of money from the equity capital markets overnight, unless that deal involves CIC and Noble Group. |
| Bookbuild: | Public order-taking process that only starts once a deal is already covered. |
| Cornerstone: | Absolutely anyone willing to be named as a buyer of an IPO. |
| Frontier market: | Country where the government pays 5% for 10-year US dollar debt. |
| G3: | The world’s three major funding currencies. The US dollar, renminbi and Australian dollar. |
| Global connectivity: | A phrase used to take credit for other people’s work. Especially popular among Asian bankers, describing US financings, for example, “This deal really showcased the firm’s global connectivity.” |
| High yield: | Over 3%. |
| Mid-cap: | Singapore bond issuer |
| Modify: | verb. To take an optimistic view of terrible companies, solely because the country has a good prime minister. |
| Myanmar: | 1. A country in which no reputable bank should do any business (2012); |
| 2. A country in which every reputable bank should be doing business (2014). | |
| Occupy Hong Kong: | 1. Something that bankers should never voice their opinion on; |
| 2. Reason for HSBC to cover its ground floor space with scaffolding. | |
| Ping An: | New expletive at Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs. |
| PONV: | Point of Non-Viability. In Asian banking, the point at which regulators admit that their state-owned banks need to be, err, state owned. |
| Premier League: | A place where Asian tycoons pay millions for the chance to lose all of their management credibility. |
| Princeling: | Former banker. |
| Rebate: | In private banking, a replacement for credit analysis. |
| Relationship lender: | A banker who volunteers for a jog with an Indonesian finance official in freezing temperatures in Tokyo. (See also: |
| Quantitative easing: | A method central banks use to create jobs (in investment banks). |
| Qingdao: | Chinese city famous for beer, seafood, and for making commodities disappear. |
| RBI: | Restricter of Bond Innovation. |
| Signing: | In loans parlance, an excuse to travel far outside your own country, for example, to sing Bollywood songs in Turkey. |
| Sovereign wealth funds: | Institutions established to preserve the long-term wealth of their countries through investments in exactly the same securities as mutual funds, but three months later. |
| Sponsor: | In Hong Kong IPOs, the can carrier. |
| Umbrella revolution: | Anti-social walking style. |
| Weekends: | Time not spent working – a new concept this year among Goldman Sachs juniors. |
| WH Group: | In Hong Kong IPOs, proof that the wrong price is still the wrong price even if you hire 29 banks to say otherwise. |