The 20th annual ABS East conference, held September 21–23 in Miami Beach, Florida, was a whirlwind event this year, with great sessions and a superb exhibit hall that was perfect for catching up with colleagues normally working hundreds or thousands of miles away. This was the second year Greenfield Advisors attended this conference hosted by IMN, and it was obvious that it is a top destination for everyone involved in the U.S. securitization market.
Cliff Lipscomb, Greenfield Advisors’ Director of Economic Research, spent the time meeting various third-party vendors and took a side trip to a South Florida Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) chapter meeting down in Coral Gables. “ABS East is a really good place to catch up with all of the relevant players in the RMBS [residential mortgage-backed securities] space, from government to data vendors, which is why we attend.”
Our marketing coordinator, Joe Schulman, sat in on several sessions dedicated to the concepts and terminology of asset-backed securities (ABS) and residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS). During one session, Evan Kelson of the law firm Hogan Lovells explained how securitizations are analyzed. It was a good session for anyone looking for a tutorial or refresher.
Photo of the Fontainebleau Miami Beach Chateau Lobby courtesy of Wikimedia Commons user Dani1015, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Kelson’s session was followed by a similar talk by Deloitte and Touche LLP Senior Manager Lisa Hernandez. Hernandez’s session looked at RMBS and their similarities and differences to ABS.
The Greenfield team focused on visiting almost all of the booths in the exhibit hall to catch up with old friends and meet potential new partners. Overall, ABS East is a top-notch conference for anyone in the securitization industry, whether a veteran or someone just starting. It also didn’t hurt that it was held at the beautiful Fontainebleau Miami Beach, one of the most historically and architecturally significant hotels on Miami Beach.
Did you attend? What are your thoughts? Share them in the comments.
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