Corporate Debt Offerings Total More Than $1.4 Billion
May 05, 2011
Another $170 million of preferred securities were sold for the DLJ Capital Trust, a financing arm of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette; government-sponsored agencies sold more than $1 billion of debt. In trading, yields of investment-grade bonds were unchanged in relation to Treasury yields. But high-yield bonds, which are also influenced by the stock market, gained about 1/4 point as stocks rose. Israel sold $471.9 million (proceeds) of zero-coupon notes with 20 long-term maturities through lead manager Merrill Lynch and $533.144 million of notes with four intermediate-term maturities through Lehman Brothers. The issue is the eighth under a $10 billion program guaranteed by the U.S. Agency for International Development begun in 1993. The ratings are triple-A from both Moody's Investors Service Inc. and Standard & Poor's Ratings Group. The structure, combining zero-coupon notes with cash-pay notes, was chosen in part to comply with repayment limitations set out by the legislation authorizing the guarantees, said Glasgow Woo, deputy chief fiscal officer for the Government of Israel, in an interview. Meanwhile, Citicorp's $200 million of 7.25% noncallable notes were sold through Citicorp Securities as a 12-year maturity because the flattening yield curve made it cheaper than selling the 10-year maturity banks commonly sell, said a Citicorp treasury official. The bank wanted to avoid an expected rush of issuers following the Labor Day holiday, the official said. In ratings actions, Moody's late Thursday downgraded the senior debt ratings of Pacific Bell and related entities, citing concerns about the ability of Pacific Bell to continue generating highly predictable cash flows in the increasingly uncertain competitive and regulatory environment. Moody's downgraded Pacific Bell's outstanding debentures and notes to single-A-1 from double-A-3, and similarly downgraded its shelf registration of debt securities to (P)A1 from (P)AA3.
VastPress 2011 Vastopolis
