Courtesy of Bruce Krasting.
The 1st Q was a boomer for junk. The best ever – by a long shot.
U.S. Leveraged lending reached a quarterly record in 1Q13
- Leveraged institutional lending hit all time $190 billion record in 1Q13
- CLO issuance topped $26 billion in 1Q
- U.S. leveraged loan issuance reached a quarterly record in 1Q13, at $286.6 billion, beating 4Q12′s prior $232.82 billion record, according to Thomson Reuters LPC.
The big numbers were the result of a combination of new issues, and refinancing of existing junk. Wall Street created a blizzard of junk paper – and sold it all. The window for all this biz was clearly the Fed. The promises of endless ZIRP and $85B a month of artificial demand forced yield starved investors to run to the junk pile. In the process, the cost of issuing the junk fell to record lows.
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