Bonds

Municipals were slightly firmer in secondary trading while new-issues were repriced to lower yields from initial pricing wires. U.S. Treasuries were stronger and equities sold off ahead of the FOMC meeting Wednesday. The current market technicals combined with a slowdown in issuance is creating a general malaise in the municipal market, according to a New

Municipals were stronger on the short end, hitting record low levels for the second time this year, in quiet trading while U.S. Treasuries were treading water and equities did much the same as all markets await Wednesday’s Federal Open Market Committee meeting announcement. Triple-A benchmarks moved one to two basis points lower inside of five

The Government Finance Research Center at University of Illinois Chicago has tapped public and not-for-profit financial management professional Deborah Carroll to fill the director’s shoes being vacated by the retiring Michael Pagano. Carroll comes from the University of Central Florida where she was an associate professor in the School of Public Administration and the director

A busy Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board quarterly board meeting saw Patrick Brett selected as fiscal year 2022 chair, the adoption of a multi-year strategic plan, decisions on several regulatory initiatives and the adoption of a $43 million operating budget. Those and other developments emerged at the MSRB’s in-person meeting held July 21-22 in Washington. Brett,

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board cast doubt Friday on a temporary deal between the truckers and the interim governor which is pausing the truckers’ strike. Around 9:30 p.m. Thursday Gov. Pedro Pierluisi announced the temporary deal in two tweets. The deal was with the striking truckers’ union, Frente Amplio de Camioneros. Pierluisi was off the

What bond-market guru Mohammed El-Erian said Friday was enough to make bond investors listen like they’re in an old E.F. Hutton commercial. “Inflation is not going to be transitory,” the chief economic adviser at Allianz SE said in an interview on Bloomberg TV. El-Erian likened it to his belief in 1999 that Argentina would default,

Municipals were steady in typical summer Friday style ahead of a less-than-robust new-issue calendar to end July. The U.S. Treasury 10-year ends 10 basis points higher than it started the week, but back to levels of a week ago, while the stock market rallied and earnings pushed them to all-time record highs Friday. Triple-A benchmarks

The Puerto Rico Aqueduct and Sewer Authority plans to refund $1.8 billion of outstanding 2012 debt in an August deal, coming into a market that is starved for high-yield paper. For several months the authority and the Puerto Rico Oversight Board has mentioned the possibility of refunding the authority’s Series 2012A bonds. On Friday it

Akron, Ohio-based FirstEnergy Corp. agreed to pay $230 million to resolve federal charges in connection with an alleged bribery scheme involving a $1 billion public bailout for two nuclear power plants owned by a bankrupt subsidiary with municipal debt. Federal authorities charged the public utility holding company with conspiring to commit honest services wire fraud.

Analysts say a strike of Puerto Rico truckers is a threat to the island’s economy and a challenge for the Oversight Board. The board spent a page in the most recent fiscal plan talking about the need to not extend the minimum rates to privately negotiated trucking contracts. The truckers are striking for this as

A group of bondholders with a stake in Great Lakes Senior Living Communities LLC’s $380 million of debt agreed to a forbearance that diverts funds earmarked for debt service to pay for capital needs under a restructuring designed to help the facilities recover from the COVID-19 pandemic’s blows. The bonds sold through the Arizona Industrial

The top bond counsel firms combined for a total of $220.03 billion in 6,077 transactions in the first half of 2021, up from the $191.51 billion in 5,124 deals in the first half of 2020. Only one firm remained in the same spot they were at this point last year, the rest of the rankings

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell enjoys broad support for his renomination among top White House advisers, though the decision is expected later this year and hasn’t yet been put in front of President Joe Biden, according to people familiar with the matter. But Biden officials are keeping an open mind about how the administration can

eMerge Americas, a venture-backed platform focused on changing Miami into the tech hub of the Americas, closed a round of investment led by Florida Funders, the firm announced on Tuesday. Florida Funders is a a venture capital fund and an angel investor network, and its investment in eMerge Americas is aimed at helping Miami’s tech

The National League of Cities is calling on lawmakers to take swift action on infrastructure funding, even as the path forward remains extremely muddled ahead of a vote planned Wednesday. The brief NLC letter, dated July 19 and addressed to House and Senate leadership of both parties, references a previous more comprehensive policy document from

Municipals underperformed a flight-to-safety rally in U.S. Treasuries as COVID-19 and its variants surge around the globe, pushing edgy investors to flee the stock market, as some contemplate the idea the economic recovery has peaked, and will potentially regress from the virus’ effects. Municipal triple-A benchmarks were pushed to lower yields by one to three

President Joe Biden said he believes the surge in U.S. inflation is temporary and that he has told Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell that he respects the central bank’s independence. Biden said Monday at the White House that recent price increases are “temporary,” countering Republican arguments that the president’s economic spending plans would cause inflation

Richard “Dick” L. Weill, 78, a pioneer in the financial guaranty insurance industry and former vice chairman of MBIA Insurance Corporation, died on July 4. With over 40 years of experience in the municipal bond industry, Weill was a former partner and municipal bond attorney at Kutak Rock before joining MBIA in 1989 as general

Florida has seen 14 straight months of job growth, gaining 69,300 private sector jobs in June, the state’s Department of Economic Opportunity said Friday. June’s increase was more than double the May gain of 34,600 jobs and the largest rise of the year. Since the height of the pandemic in April 2020, Florida has gained

The Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority of Illinois trimmed its spread penalties in the first primary outing of an Illinois-linked borrower to reap the benefits of the state’s positive rating momentum. The agency that manages Chicago’s downtown convention center campus priced $811 million of refunding bonds Thursday. It saw a 98 basis point spread to