About

Cardea Partners is a derivatives and debt advisory firm serving the unique needs of corporate, real estate, Native American, not-for-profit, and municipal entities.  Our firm is comprised of highly experienced derivatives professionals, sharing a combined 45 years of industry experience, having executed over $1 trillion notional in derivative contracts.  Our time spent on the trading floors of major financial institutions allows Cardea to stand beside our clients with comprehensive insight into their banking relationships and the market of products available to manage exposures and limit expenses.  


Cardea Partners provides services covering all aspects of derivative advising, including interest rate swap and cap pricing, valuation and reporting, strategy and analysis, fairness opinions, and documentation, while also assisting with debt advisory.  Working with Cardea provides clients with an insider on all derivative transactions.  No longer are clients at the mercy of the derivative counterparty.  Transparency and structuring that was once only available for corporations with dedicated derivatives professionals in their finance departments is now available to companies and organizations of all sizes.

Derivative Advising
Pre-Execution
As your organization decides how to manage interest rate risk on a debt facility or portfolio, Cardea Partners provides structuring to meet your unique risk profile.  Whether you need to establish a bidding platform to engage several counterparties or are negotiating directly with one institution, the experience of Cardea Partners puts you on a level playing with full price transparency to save preserve your organization’s precious resources over the long term.  Every detail and basis point have economic implications with the hedge, and we make sure your interests are served in the process.

Existing Hedges
Cardea Partners knows that organizations face many important interest rate risk management decisions after a hedge has been put in place.  Tracking mark-to-market values and establishing a contingent exit strategy for a hedge are critical issues.  We provide the independent valuations and reports that your auditors require.  Many swap dealers believe that terminating client business should be highly profitable.  Because of this tendency, Cardea counters with a comprehensive suite of existing hedge services to ensure our clients have the information needed to efficiently close out, amend, or maintain a hedge.

Accounting Treatment
Thoughtful and accurate hedge structuring is instrumental for an organization to achieve the most advantageous accounting treatment with any given transaction.  We match your terms for effectiveness and can help negotiate the loan specifications to make accounting issues more tenable.  Cardea Partners uses proprietary accounting software to perform effectiveness testing and generate quarterly or year-end reports for your auditors.  Cardea Partners also maintains as vast network of derivatives accounting specialists throughout North America for consultation and up-to-date best practices in the industry.

Taxable/ Tax-Exempt Structuring
Cardea Partners is qualified to handle derivative transactions for both taxable and tax-exempt entities.  Our professionals have held positions of influence at major financial institutions and structured deals for municipalities and large corporates alike.  We possess the necessary perspective on a wide variety of issuance types and accompanying hedge structures to serve your organization.  The flexibility to use a broad tool box of hedging products for a given debt scenario allows for the most effective and cost efficient means of risk management to be applied, and Cardea can independently help you explore these alternatives.

ISDA Review and Negotiation
As part of our pre-execution services, Cardea Partners offers to review and negotiate the ISDA and other relevant hedging documentation for our clients, including credit support annexes, personal or corporate guaranties, mortgages, assignment of rents and leases, pledge agreements, deeds of trust, and letters of credit.  Cardea Partners also is skilled at negotiating novation documentation, a vital step for existing swap users when transferring their bank relationships.  ISDA’s Schedule to the Master Agreement is an important document for both parties, and should be a balanced document relative to both parties.

Hedging Policy Formation and Review
Establishing or modifying a hedging policy may be the most important issue your organization faces.  The structure of any policy will dictate future hedge structuring and execution while defining appropriate structures based on the risk profile.  Cardea Partners works with private and public sector organizations to create effective and relevant risk management protocols.