Merrill hires Debrah from Bear to head U.S. convertible research, forms new global research team

By Ronda Fears

Nashville, Tenn., April 5 - Merrill Lynch & Co. hired Yaw Debrah as head of Americas convertible research while dovetailing convertible research into a new global equity-linked research team headed by Michael Maras, formerly head of global equity derivatives research.

There will be a shift to more research and indexes targeting the hedge fund community as Debrah replaces Anne Cox, who was head of global convertible bond research and left about a month ago to join a hedge fund.

"There has been a shift in the convertible market over the past few years and we are seeing hedge funds providing a lot of desk revenues," Debrah said in an interview.

"We will be extensively using information from the equity derivatives and credit derivatives (credit default and asset swaps) markets as well as information from the high-yield market. What's going on in those markets impacts our market."

For example, Debrah said, the new Merrill convertible team, which will be almost entirely a new group of analysts, will be analyzing straight debt versus convertibles, comparing investment-grade zero valuation against credit-default swap and asset swap markets and developing a convertible volatility index in cooperation with equity derivatives.

In addition to convertible research focused on the U.S., Yaw will be expanding and contributing to the development and marketing of new equity-linked products in Canada and Latin America.

Debrah said it will likely be a few weeks before the team is assimilated and begins turning out a steady flow of research. He does not yet know how many people will be added to the group.

"The creation of a global equity-linked research franchise strategically positions us to capitalize on the historical and anticipated growth of these businesses," said Bob McCann, head of global securities research and economics, in a Merrill Lynch statement.

"The convertible bond business is a powerful global franchise at Merrill Lynch and the clients we serve in this asset class are sophisticated and increasingly demanding of comprehensive, innovative research products and ideas. This new structure will ensure a more integrated delivery to this strategically important client base. It will also provide a platform to develop a series of new equity-linked products for retail investors, further enhancing our product offering."

Before joining Merrill Lynch, Yaw was head of U.S. convertible research at Bear Stearns & Co. for the past five years. Under Yaw's leadership, Bear Stearns' convertible team was a runner-up in Institutional Investor's 2001 All-America Research Team survey. Prior to leading Bear Stearns' U.S. team, he was its emerging markets convertibles bond analyst for two years.

Yaw received his undergraduate degree from Oxford University and his master's from Yale University.

Maras, who joined Merrill Lynch in 1996, has over 10 years of experience in equity derivatives research and spent a significant part of his postgraduate studies on the pricing and integration of global bond markets.

In London, Jeremy Wyett, who joined Merrill Lynch in April 2000 from UBS Warburg, will continue as senior analyst and head of European convertibles research. In Hong Kong, Tse-Ern Chia, who joined Merrill Lynch in January 2000, will continue as senior analyst with responsibility for the Asian Pacific convertible markets.

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