A synthetic collateralized debt obligation, or synthetic CDO, is a transaction that transfers the credit risk on a reference portfolio of assets. The reference portfolio in a synthetic CDO is made up of credit default swaps. Thus, a synthetic CDO is classified as a credit derivative.

While the underlying assets of regular CDOs are traditional fixed-income assets, such as loans, mortgages, and bonds, synthetic CDOs use non-cash assets as the underlying asset, such as credit default swaps, options, and other such contracts. Synthetic CDOs typically offer higher yields than traditional CDOs.

A collateralized debt obligation (CDO) is a structured finance product that is backed by a pool of loans and other assets.

A single-name CDS references only one security and the credit risk to be transferred in the swap may be very large. In contrast, a synthetic CDO references a portfolio of securities and is sliced into various tranches of risk, with progressively higher levels of risk.