Morning Commentary: Investment-grade volume remains light; Fidus offers five-year notes

By Cristal Cody

Tupelo, Miss., Dec. 16 – One company moved ahead with plans to tap the high-grade bond market on Wednesday.

Fidus Investment Corp. plans to price registered notes due Jan. 31, 2026 with proceeds slated to redeem all $50 million of the company’s outstanding 5.875% notes due 2023, as well as to repay a portion outstanding under its credit facility. The notes are expected to be rated BBB- or better by Egan-Jones.

Fidus is a company that invests in junk rated middle-market companies.

High-grade supply has been thin week to date with $2.15 billion of bonds sold in Rule 144A and Regulation S deals from Microchip Technology Inc. on Monday and Berry Global, Inc. on Tuesday.

Light issuance is expected over the remainder of December with zero up to $10 billion of volume anticipated for this week and the remainder of 2020.

More than $41 billion of investment-grade bonds have priced month to date, surpassing forecasts of $25 billion to $35 billion of expected issuance for December.

The secondary market has been more active so far this week with trading volume of $21.05 billion on Tuesday, up from $20.87 billion on Monday, according to Trace.

Market tone was mostly positive with equities mixed as the session got underway ahead of the Fed’s meeting statement.

In the high-grade space, the Pimco Investment Grade Corporate Bond index gained 0.08% over the morning to $116.70.

The iShares iBoxx Investment Grade Corporate Bond ETF was up 0.08% to $137.56.

© 2015 Prospect News.
All content on this website is protected by copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. For the use of the person downloading only.
Redistribution and copying are prohibited by law without written permission in advance from Prospect News.
Redistribution or copying includes e-mailing, printing multiple copies or any other form of reproduction.