Preferred stocks muted ahead of Veterans Day; General Financial gains on improved earnings

By Stephanie N. Rotondo

Phoenix, Nov. 10 – Preferred stocks were near unchanged as the new week started and as an upcoming holiday weighed on liquidity.

“It’s quiet,” a market source said. “A lot of people took today off because of Veterans Day tomorrow.”

“There’s not a lot going on,” another market source said. “Volume was unusually light.”

The source also attributed the subdued state of the market to Tuesday’s holiday.

The stock market will be open for the holiday on Tuesday, but the bond market will be closed.

The Wells Fargo Hybrid and Preferred Securities index closed up 2 basis points.

But while the overall market was on the muted side, one name was experiencing “probably the heaviest volume they have had since God knows when,” a source remarked.

That name was General Finance Corp., which released earnings that beat expectations, according to the source.

The company’s 8.125% $25-par senior notes due 2021 (Nasdaq: GFNSL) traded up 3 cents to $25.53 on volume of about 721,000 shares – vastly outpacing the next most active issue, Citigroup Inc.’s 7.875% fixed-to-floating rate trust preferreds, which saw trading of almost 598,000 shares.

The Citi issue closed the day at $26.62, also up 3 cents.

For its first quarter of fiscal 2015, Pasadena, Calif.-based General Finance posted net income of $3.7 million, or 14 cents per share. That compared to a profit of $400,000, or 2 cents per share, the year before.

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