Ardagh, upsized Ensco price, trade up; Community Health bonds surge; funds jump $2.65 billion

By Paul Deckelman and Paul A. Harris

New York, Jan. 11 – The high-yield primary pricing parade continued to roll on during Thursday’s session, with $1.35 billion of new junk paper coming to market.

Marine energy drilling company Ensco plc had the big deal of the day, doubling its eight-year offering to $1 billion in size.

And glass and metal packaging container company Ardagh Group SA priced a $350 million five-year secured issue.

Both of those new deals firmed smartly on busy volume when they hit the aftermarket.

But the most actively traded issue of the day was Wednesday’s 10-year offering from business services, foodservice and uniform supply company Aramark Services, Inc. which was also up by multiple points on the day.

Away from new or recently priced deals, the traders saw robust activity in hospital operator Community Health Systems Inc.’s several series of bonds, all of them up multiple points in line with a surge in the company’s shares after its biggest investor increased its equity holdings.

Energy names like California Resources Corp. and EP Energy Corp. showed solid gains as crude oil prices continued their recent firming trend.

Statistical market performance measures turned higher across the board on Thursday sessions.

And flows of funds into or out of high yield mutual funds and exchange-traded funds continued positive as $2.65 billion came into those weekly-reporting-only domestic funds.

© 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.