Bonds

Municipal trading dropped 25% on Wednesday after an already very slow few days in the secondary, leaving municipal benchmark yields little changed, as U.S. Treasuries also held steady and most participants began checking out for the holiday weekend. For the 25th week in a row, municipal bond mutual funds saw inflows of nearly $2 billion,

Widespread Puerto Rico power outages this week are highlighting the extended age of the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority’s infrastructure and its impact on the economy. The outages affected 33% to 37% of the authority’s customers since Monday and will continue to afflict many for a few more days, according to PREPA. Demand has been

The Puerto Rico Oversight Board asked the Puerto Rico bankruptcy court Monday to continue to hear a suit against a local law that would scuttle the negotiated debt Plan of Adjustment. Lawyers for Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi filed a motion to stay the adversary proceeding, which is like a suit, on Aug. 25. The

A mixture of factors such as rising interest rates, uncertainty over federal monetary policy and unprecedented federal aid for state and local governments fueled a drop in overall bond volume in August from the prior year. While overall issuance fell 8.4% year-over-year, taxable municipal bond issuance dropped nearly 40% in August. Tax-exempt issuance rose 0.5%

Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi is expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit program for the island, which along with another expansion of a federal program, will likely aid the island’s economy, experts said. The federal government will provide $612 million a year for 10 years for the expanded credit, if the local government continues to

Retired West Hollywood, California, City Manager Paul Arevalo has joined Raymond James as managing director in its Pasadena office, further strengthening the firm’s public finance coverage in the state. The broker-dealer entered California in 2011 and has grown to 14 public finance people working in offices in Los Angeles, Pasadena, San Clemente and San Francisco.

Unfunded retiree health-care benefits are the most material long-term liability for about one in 10 states and local governments, Moody’s Investors Service says. Retirement liabilities other than pensions — other-post employment liabilities, or OPEB — were roughly $1.1 trillion for the 50 states and more than 7,000 cities, counties and K-12 school districts that Moody’s

Alternative trading system platforms provide the value of visible liquidity and price discovery in the marketplace, especially for municipal securities that are not widely known and transacted when directly compared to broker’s broker platforms, according to a new MSRB report. The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board report compares trading activity on ATS platforms versus broker’s broker

Surging COVID-19 hospitalization rates driven by the highly contagious Delta variant threaten to set back the not-for-profit healthcare sector’s recovery and pose new uncertainties, new reports warn. Hospitalizations are trending upward in all states with the 14-day increase at double-digit percentages for all but a few. The most daunting strains that could negatively impact hospital

Municipals were little changed in light trading on the last Friday of August as U.S. Treasuries made gains as did equities following Federal reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell’s Jackson Hole speech. The total potential volume for next week is estimated at $4.938 billion, an expected drop as the unofficial final week of summer comes ahead

Federal Reserve Gov. Lael Brainard spoke with the Biden-Harris Federal Reserve transition team in January and with the president’s Council of Economic Advisers in May, her calendar shows. The meeting with the Fed transition team occurred Jan. 8 and included Gary Gensler, who is now Securities and Exchange Commission chairman. Brainard’s diaries were provided to

The Santee Cooper Board of Directors gave official approval Thursday to this week’s sale of about $430 million of tax-exempt revenue bonds as North Carolina finalized the sale of its $253 million grant anticipation revenue vehicle bond deal. The the South Carolina Public Service Authority transaction included about $146 million of Series 2021A refunding bonds

Weakness moved out the yield curve Thursday as secondary bid-wanteds were still elevated while U.S. Treasuries pared earlier losses and equities sold off in the afternoon as news out of Afghanistan grew worse. For the 25th straight week, Refinitiv Lipper reported inflows into municipal bond funds. Investors put $1.9 billion of cash into the mutual

Municipal issuers in the Far West sold $50.1 billion of bonds in the first half of 2021, up 24.9% from the same period in 2020. The first quarter saw the biggest spike to $26.8 billion, a 74.4% increase during the same period a year ago, according to Refinitiv data. Issuers in California, the region’s biggest

Municipals faced some pressure and benchmark yield curves were cut by one to two basis points Wednesday. Municipals largely have shrugged off a weaker U.S. Treasury market and outperformed while mutual funds saw another $2 billion-plus week of inflows. The 10- and 30-year UST have risen nine basis points since Monday, while munis have only

Municipal issuers in the Southeast sold $37.13 billion of bonds in the first half of 2021, up 30% from the $28.56 billion sold in the same period in 2020. New money bonds accounted for $25.84 billion, a 70.9% increase, with refunding amounting to $9.56 billion, nearly flat at a 1.1% increase. Deals classed as combined

Kroll Bond Rating Agency raised its outlook on Chicago’s general obligation bonds to stable from negative and affirmed the city’s GO rating at A. “The stable outlook assignment and the outlook revision on the outstanding GO bonds recognizes the tenor of actions taken by the city’s management in confronting COVID-19 induced challenges, an improved revenue

The South Carolina Public Service Authority is set to sell $427 million of tax-exempt revenue obligations on Wednesday. The Santee Cooper deal consists of $138 million of Series 2021A refunding bonds and $289 million of Series 2021B improvement bonds. The bonds are secured by electric revenues and rated A2 by Moody’s Investors Service, A by

Municipals were unmoved in light trading to start the last week of August while U.S. Treasuries maintained Friday’s levels and equities advanced on news the FDA gave the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine full approval. Municipal benchmark yield curves continued to hold steady for the seventh day as investors await a diverse primary that includes gilt-edged Montgomery

Puerto Rico employment numbers were mixed in July. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ household survey showed July employment was down 0.06% from the June total. The bureau also releases an employment survey of non-farm establishments and this showed an increase of 0.4% from June. The survey does not include self-employment. July’s household survey total