Berry Plastics, Paramount, Plantronics price; Altice, Cequel down; funds up $1.35 billion

By Paul A. Harris and Paul Deckelman

New York, May 21 – The high-yield primary universe saw another moderately busy session Thursday that was on pace with Wednesday, syndicate sources said.

Berry Plastics Corp. had the big deal of the day, a quick-to-market $700 million offering of eight-year secured notes, which traded actively around their issue price when they reached the aftermarket.

There was also a pair of regularly scheduled transactions that came off the forward calendar.

Plantronics, Inc. did $500 million of eight-year notes, and Paramount Resources Ltd. priced an upsized $450 million of eight-year notes. The latter deal was seen firming when it moved into the secondary sphere.

In the secondary arena, besides the aforementioned new issues, Wednesday’s offering from Hilcorp Energy I LP was the day’s volume leader among the purely junk issues.

Away from the new deals, bonds of Altice SA and Cequel Communications were lower in busy dealings for a second consecutive session as investors reacted to the news that Altice will acquire 70% of Cequel and its Suddenlink Communications operation in a leveraged buyout transaction.

Statistical market performance indicators turned higher across the board on Thursday after having been lower all around over the previous three sessions.

And high-yield mutual funds and exchange-traded funds saw a big net inflow of fresh cash, snapping a four-week losing streak, as $1.35 billion more came into those funds than left them during the most recent trading week.

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