Lighting the way

In a topsy-turvy year where equity and credit vied for the prize of most column inches, derivatives-related companies on both the buy and sell side, in all asset classes, will have had many opportunities to show their mettle. We set out here which ones were the most impressive and why.

The past year has proven extremely bipolar. Initially, Asian equity markets continued to surge and tight credit spreads meant innovative credit products were the fixed-income instruments of choice from September 2006 to July. But that all changed in July and August, when volatility and correlation levels jumped, yield curves steepened and credit spreads widened dramatically.

While the overall surge in equity valuations across the region made it easy for equity derivatives dealers to make money