High Yield Report articles from March 2005

High Yield Report archives from March 2005

Market View.
March 7, 2005... The traditional lending relationship between corporate clients and their banks, now but a distant memory in the US, is still a reality across the border in Canada. There, companies in the subinvestment grade arena have none of the myriad...

Market View.(banking market share, bond markets)
March 7, 2005... The Asian high yield bond markets could be the global junk sector's hottest area of growth this year. That's because the prospect of new deals and, even more enticingly, higher-than-average fees is drawing a contingent of the world's top junk...

Banks.
March 7, 2005... To get a break from your investment bankers, sometimes all you need to do is ask. At least that's what Triad Hospitals Inc. found out when it went to the market with a $600 million high yield note last April. Triad was planning to...

Firms.(United Capital Markets growth plans)
March 7, 2005... United Capital Markets (UCM) president John Devaney has outlined big growth plans for his firm in the coming 12 to 24 months. Following the recent hiring of CFO Linda Hannan and last month's poaching of secondary trader Randall White, Devaney...

Sector.(gaming industry forecasts)
March 7, 2005... The outlook for the gaming industry, which has benefited from an improving economy and the increasing popularity of the Las Vegas Strip, is stable, at best, according to recent reports by both Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's....

Q&A.(Lynn Hopton and Yvonne Stevens of American Express Financial Corp. speaks about company plans)(Interview)
March 7, 2005... American Express Financial Corp. (AEFC) is prepping for a major organizational change this year, as the firm is scheduled to be officially spun-off from its parent in the third quarter 2005. But although AEFC may be obtaining a new name and a...

Gainers & Losers: Level 3/Collins & Aikman.(stocks, Dana Corp., Level 3 Communications Inc.)(Brief Article)
March 7, 2005... Among the gainers last week was Dana Corp., whose 6.5% notes due 2009 traded at 117.375, up 13 points from 104.375. While other automotive parts manufacturers have seen their business suffer, just as industry giants Ford Motor Company and...

Market Buzz.(Dan Fuss of Loomis Sayles Bond Fund predicts markets at)(BankAmerica Corp. appoints Kenneth Leet Loomis, Sayles and Company L.P. conference)(Brief Article)
March 7, 2005... You'd have to go back to the decade of The Beatles and Lyndon B. Johnson's presidency to find spreads more narrow than they are right now in the high yield bond market, which then was largely a private placement market, according to Dan Fuss,...

US Company News.(Star Gas Corp. and Third Point LLC's partnership)
March 14, 2005... Ask and you shall receive. At least that's what kind of happened for hedge fund Third Point LLC and managing member Daniel Loeb, whose February 14 "Valentine" letter to Star Gas Partners requested, among other things, that president and CEO...

Firms.(trends of hedge funds and junk bonds)
March 14, 2005... The dot-com world proved irresistible to many an ambitious Wall Street investment banker in the late 1990s, but another exodus currently under way is beginning to far outpace the Internet migration: that of big name (and not so big) Street...

Europe.(trends of construction industry)
March 14, 2005... Recent troubles afflicting European construction firms are highlighting to market analysts and bankers a growing and hidden level of risk embedded in building companies throughout the Continent. The bankruptcy last month of Germany's...

Firms.(Dan McAloon and Eric Needleman of KBC Financial Products, planning for scondary market)
March 14, 2005... KBC Financial Products, a subsidiary of Belgium's KBC Bank with a high yield effort focused exclusively on the secondary market, is about to go through a change of guard. At the ripe old age of 45 and after 20 years in the market, Dan McAloon,...

Firms.(GoldenTree Asset Management's planning for expansion)
March 14, 2005... GoldenTree Asset Management announced last week that, in light of current market conditions, the firm plans to exit the long-only separate account business, and in turn, return $1.2 billion to investors. At the same time, however, the firm is...

Profile.(First Islamic Investment Bank's Arcapita's high yield bond management)
March 14, 2005... David Crosland, executive director of private equity firm Arcapita Inc., formerly Crescent Capital Investments, Inc., is the first to admit that he is not an expert on the high yield bond market. Yet he found it to be a most attractive...

Corrections.
March 14, 2005... ****** In reference to HYR's 3/7/05 story on United Capital Markets (UCM) - "UCM Has Big Growth Plans" - UCM clarified the following figures related to its revenue and its number of institutional accounts: By GAAP accounting, UCM and its...

Gainers & Losers: Xerox/Delta.(accounting data of AT&T Corp., sales and earnings of Delta Air Lines Inc.)(Brief Article)
March 14, 2005... It was a good week for Xerox Corp., whose European 6.25% notes due 2008 rose 6.875 points to trade at 99.875. It appears as if the company has moved past the accounting scandal and can now focus on its core business, as it ended 2004 with an...

Market Buzz.
March 14, 2005... Cantor Fitzgerald announced that it has hired Carmine R. Urciuoli as the firm's managing director and head of investment grade and high yield business, a newly created position that will support the firm's broad expansion plans. Urciuoli,...

News.
March 14, 2005... Telcordia Technologies, Inc. suddenly announced to investors last week that it was canceling allocations and relaunching syndication on its $670 million credit facility and its $300 million bond offering as a result of an anticipated decrease...

Rating Agencies.
March 21, 2005... In response to the heightened interest in both default and recovery prospects in the speculative grade marketplace, all three major rating agencies have decided that it is time to spice up their ratings offerings. Essentially, the agencies are...

US Company News.
March 21, 2005... To the growing frustration of investors and traders, the high yield bond market shows no signs of improving its image, as participants expressed disappointment at what they called a heavy concentration of poorer quality names flooding the...

Private Equity.(bidding for National Hockey League)
March 21, 2005... Bain Capital LLC's and Game Plan LLC's $3.5 billion bid for the entire National Hockey League (NHL) may have set the world of private equity -not to mention sports finance - to quacking, but it also raises an interesting question: Just who...

Derivatives.(International Swaps and Derivatives Association 20th annual meeting in Spain)
March 21, 2005... The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA), the global trade association representing participants in the privately negotiated derivatives industry, held its 20th annual general meeting last week in Barcelona, Spain. During the...

CDOs93 To 03 A Poor Decade For HY CBOs.(High yield collateralized bond obligations)(collateralized debt obligation )
March 21, 2005... High yield collateralized bond obligations (CBOs) - which comprise less than one-quarter of the broader collateralized debt obligation (CDO) universe - accounted for close to three-quarters of materially impaired securities in the US CDO sector...

Expect Debt Maturities Galore In 2007.
March 21, 2005... A significant amount - about $94 billion - of non-investment grade bank debt and bonds will mature within the next three years, Moody's Investors Service reported last week. And $56 billion of this debt is in high yield bonds. The current total...

Gainers & Losers: MGM Mirage/MQ.(stocks)(Brief Article)
March 21, 2005... UAL Corp. made it into the gainers column last week, as its 10.36% notes due 2012 traded up 3.25 points at 50.5 from the previous week. This is some good news for the troubled airline, although the bump could be in connection with the recent...

Market Buzz.(hiring)
March 21, 2005... Adding to the list of high yield staffers jumping ship to other firms lately, Brian Zucker, formerly a vice president in trading with Goldman Sachs, is back on the high yield trading desk at Deutsche Bank, according to sources. Zucker had...

Credit.
March 28, 2005... General Motors Corp. (GM), AT&T Corp. and Sears, Roebuck and Co. Back in the early 1980s, these and other mainstays of corporate America were among the 30-plus non-financial US companies that earned the coveted AAA rating - but not anymore. ...

Market View.(measurement tools for high yeild markets don't reflect true state )
March 28, 2005... Venturing into bond investing these days is a bit like sailing into the Bermuda Triangle in a storm - all the measurement tools are going haywire. Many of the methods investors typically use to gauge market sentiment - such specific...

Mezzanine.(Sixth Annual Mezzanine Finance Forum)
March 28, 2005... While the larger US debt markets have been thriving in recent years, long-time players in the US mezzanine market have gone through some tougher times, having to compete for business with providers of newer debt products, such as the second...

Syndicated Loans.
March 28, 2005... So far, it looks to be a good year for The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, at least in light of the company's success in attaining debt financing. When the Akron, Ohio-based tire manufacturer launched a bank debt refinancing deal about a month...

People Moves.(Stephen C. Peacher leaves Putnam Investments Inc.)
March 28, 2005... After spending 15 years with the firm, Stephen C. Peacher, head of high yield investing at Putnam Investments, is leaving Putnam to head up taxable fixed income at Columbia Management Group. Peacher's decision to switch firms was, in part,...

Profile.(European bank Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein )
March 28, 2005... European bank Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein (DrKW) has big plans to capitalize on the budding M&A market in Europe. In fact, Bill Fish, head of global loan product, anticipates that Europe will continue to see robust activity in the M&A space...

Banks.(Banc of America Securities L.L.C.)
March 28, 2005... In a move intended to support the independence of its fixed income research, Banc of America Securities (BAS) revealed some organizational changes to its debt research division last week. The changes come as many other firms, too, are taking...

Gainers & Losers: XM/EaglePicher.(securites )(Brief Article)
March 28, 2005... The bond market responded to XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc.'s and Hyundai Motor America's announcement last week that Hyundai will begin installing XM satellite radios in all of its models in 2006. As a result, XM's 14% notes due 2010 jumped...

Mezzanine.(Sixth Annual Mezzanine Finance Forum)
March 28, 2005... As the rising interest rate environment is expected to drive more business into the mezzanine market, it has not yet impacted the way deals are formed, according to panelists at the Institute for International Research's Sixth Annual Mezzanine...

Market Buzz.(new appointments)
March 28, 2005... Morgan Joseph & Co. Inc., an investment banking firm serving middle market companies, announced last week that it has hired four new members for its high yield trading, sales and research teams. David Campbell has joined the trading team as...