TALF-Eligible World Omni, CarMax Deals Sold

Three deals eligible for funding under the Federal Reserve's Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility, or TALF, have sold just ahead of the loan application deadline for the program.

The top-rated portions of these deals total $2.57 billion, significantly less than the $8.2 billion of TALF-eligible deals that were on offer before the first loan application deadline last month.

TALF is geared toward lowering consumer-lending costs, cleaning bank balance sheets and reviving the asset-backed securities market.

The central bank is accepting loan requests between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. and will release data on how much was requested later Tuesday.

Last month saw just $4.7 billion of funding requests on around $8 billion of securitizations.

World Omni Financial Corp.'s $750 million deal sold, according to a person familiar with the issue. Its largest tranche worth $248 million sold at 185 basis points over a short-term futures benchmark. Joint leads were Barclays and Banc of America Securities.

World Financial Network National Bank also sold its $709 million credit-card loan-backed deal Tuesday. The largest triple-A rated tranche worth $560 million sold at 280 basis points over swaps.

CarMax Inc.'s (KMX) prime auto loan backed deal also sold with the largest triple-A rated portion worth $260 million sold at 265 basis points over a short-term futures benchmark. The deal is $840 million is size but only four tranches are TALF-eligible.

Retailer Cabela's Inc. (CAB) is offering a credit-card-backed $486 million deal, due to be sold later Tuesday.

Under the program, investors can apply for financing by handing over eligible collateral such as new bonds backed by auto loans, student loans and credit-card debt. The list of collateral will eventually expand to commercial and risky, older residential mortgage-backed securities.

Investors have been wary of the program because of lengthy documentation requirements, provisions curbing the employment of foreign nationals and possible interference from legislators.

The World Financial deal had Barclays Capital and JP Morgan as joint leads.

The Cabela's deal has JP Morgan and Wachovia as joint leads. Its triple-A rated tranche worth $425 million has guidance of 200 basis points over one month Libor.

-By Anusha Shrivastava, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-2371; [e-mail]