He helped develop Asia's fledgling bond markets as an investment banker for Lehman and Salomon, then founded Prudential's Asian bond operation.

Now the 50-year-old American bond pioneer has ventured into what he considers the next terra incognita of Asian fixed income: online trading. He is launching BondsInAsia, an electronic bond-trading platform jointly owned by BNP Paribas, Bridge e-Markets, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and HSBC. Scheduled to go live later this summer, BondsInAsia will allow investors to trade Hong Kong and Singapore local issues as well as issues of Asian credits denominated in dollars, euros and yen. Cobetto says BondsInAsia will soon offer online trading in local bond issues in other Asian countries.

He hopes that by forming partnerships with strong market participants that are regulated locally, BondsInAsia can build the preeminent online bond-trading system in Asia. But Cobetto has competition in Asiabondportal.com, which has operated a fixed-income trading site for a year, and skeptics doubt whether Asia's nascent bond markets can support even one system.

Cobetto acknowledges the challenge. "You always wonder how long it's going to take people to adapt to the leading edge," he muses. Still, he welcomes the change in routine. "When you've done your 50th presentation for a Yankee bond and you've beaten your benchmark for the umpteenth time," he says, "there is a little part of the business that becomes repetitive - immensely stimulating though it may be."