Primary awakens with Kraton loan conversion; health care, retail active; energy slides

By Paul Deckelman and Paul A. Harris

New York, Jan. 6 – The high-yield primary – in its early winter deep freeze for nearly a month – showed signs of life on Wednesday. Syndicate sources reported that Kraton Polymers LLC’s lender had converted the specialty-chemical company’s bridge loan into $440 million of 2023 bonds.

The company had marketed an eight-year note offering to prospective buyers via a roadshow last month, but the deal had subsequently languished on the forward calendar for weeks.

In the secondary market, traders saw brisk activity in a number of sectors, mostly on the downside as renewed equity market volatility weighed on Junkbondland.

There were active dealings in such health-care names as Community Health Systems, Inc., HCA Inc. and Tenet Healthcare Corp.

Retailers Neiman Marcus Group and Claire’s Stores, Inc. were busy.

So were telecommunications issues such as T-Mobile USA Inc., Sprint Corp. and Frontier Communications Corp. after T-Mobile release preliminary subscriber data.

Energy names such as Chesapeake Energy Corp. and California Resources Corp. retreated, in line with a steep fall in crude oil prices.

Statistical measures of junk market performance turned lower on Wednesday after having been higher across the board on Tuesday; it was the second lower session in the last three trading days.

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