St George Bank looks set to become one of the few issuers of asset-backed securities to get a deal away anywhere this year, and the first Australian issuer to pull off the feat.St George, with help from HSBC and Macquarie Bank, has rounded up enough investors - mainly in Europe - to sell $341 million in commercial paper secured against a pool of car loans originated by the bank's finance arm.The bond is sliced and diced eight ways, with the final eight subordinated tranches (worth $22 million in aggregate) unrated and with pricing undisclosed.The bank said the A-1 tranche of $70 million priced at 70 basis points over the one-month bank bill swap. This tranche has an average life of only four months and is expected to be fully paid in less than a year; money market funds are likely to be buyers of this tranche.The A-2 tranche of EUR100 million priced at 140 basis points over the one-month Euribor rate. The A-3 tranche of $70 million priced at 150 basis points over one-month swap.Volkswagen and Ford have sold three asset-backed transactions secured by pools of car loans in Europe this year. The St George transaction confirms that demand, however tentatively, is returning for securitised assets in select aspects of the credit market.St George last sold asset-backed securities based on car loans in 1999. The current deal is sold under the bank's series of Crusade trusts.The bank has no plans to test the market for a mortgage-backed security where spreads remain exceptionally wide as paper continues to spill out of structured investment vehicles.Not that SIVs are a thing of the past. National Australia Bank yesterday disclosed plans for a freshly minted multi-seller, commercial paper program dubbed MiraStar that will be able to fund up to $3 billion in highly-rated assets.A pre-sale report on the program said that NAB was manager of $3.5 billion in such programs as at December 2007.