Bonds

Municipal volume in January fell year-over-year as issuers hit the pause button while contemplating COVID-19 effects on their budgets and the potential for direct aid from Washington. Total volume fell 26.7% in January to $24.023 billion from $32.792 billion in 2020. Tax-exempt financings fell 32.6% to $14.662 billion from $23.995 in 2020, refundings fell 14.8%

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President Robert Kaplan predicted an “enthusiastic” internal discussion over the U.S. central bank’s massive bond-buying program, while vowing to be patient in judging when the economy has made sufficient progress to warrant scaling it back. “I don’t want to associate or even think about associating a time frame with that,”

Municipal secondary activity was quiet Friday but weakness in U.S. Treasuries and an unsettled equities market led to small cuts to triple-A benchmarks around the five- to 10-year part of the curve. About $7.44 billion of issuance is expected for the first week of February, up from the $5.95 billion issued the last week of

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ $96.6 billion budget proposal for fiscal year 2021-2022, increases spending and counts on debt service savings of $40.8 million and bond savings of $64.2 million. Over half of the $4.3 billion rise in the budget proposal, $2.6 billion, is related to spending increases due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “The ‘Florida Leads’

Municipal yields were steady across the curve as rising U.S. Treasury yields took some of the shine off of a two-day muni rally, but inflows continued to hit records with another multi-billion week. Refinitiv Lipper reported $2.79 billion of inflows into municipal bond mutual funds for the week ending Jan. 27, a record. It was

Moody’s Investors Service has revamped the way it rates K-12 school districts, which is likely to bring rating changes to hundreds of school districts across the country. When it announced its new rating methodology Tuesday, Moody’s placed 637 of the roughly 3,400 school districts it rates on review for upgrade or downgrade, affecting $65 billion

Illinois avoided the grim, early COVID-19 tax loss warnings as a recovery began quicker than expected thanks to federal stimulus and changes in consumer spending, a University of Illinois pandemic task force found. The net effect of revenue losses from the pandemic through November totaled $801 million for the state’s “big three” sources: personal and

The scourge of COVID-19 has slammed the residents and the economy of Miami, but the resilience of its people has kept the Magic City vibrant, growing and moving ahead, Mayor Francis Suarez said in his State of the City address on Tuesday. “Over the past year we have been tested, we have adapted, and we

U.S. Virgin Islands Gov. Albert Bryan warned the territory’s underfunded pensions were becoming critical and said help is coming for the ailing power system. Bryan addressed these and other financial topics in his annual state of the territory speech Tuesday evening. Virgin Islands Gov. Albert Bryan said the island’s pension system was in an “accelerating

Municipals were firmer in spots but triple-A yield curves held at Friday’s levels even as U.S. Treasuries gained on the tail of equity losses. The start of the new week brought with it an increasing demand for paper amid ongoing scarcity and high-yield is the paper du jour. On a week-over-week basis, the performance of

Chicago’s school district is heading into the market for its first COVID-19 era deal with a balance sheet shored up by federal relief. The district is selling this week $560 million of tax-exempt, dedicated revenue-backed general obligation paper that carries two junk ratings and one at investment grade. Chicago Public Schools will sell $560 million

It’s one thing for Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New York’s legislature to approve online sports betting. Implementing it is another. Cuomo has been scant on details, although in Tuesday’s budget address, he suggested the state could run it akin to the state lottery. That would appear to shut out racetracks and casinos. Expanding sports betting

Shreveport, Louisiana, voters won’t get to decide the fate of a general obligation bond referendum after the mayor took the measure off the table because of a lack of support by the City Council. Last week, Mayor Adrian Perkins asked the City Council to approve a special April 24 election for $206.685 million of GO

For eight straight months, Florida has seen its workforce expand at a rate above the national average. The Sunshine State gained 21,100 new private sector jobs in December, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity reported on Friday, even as the U.S. lost 95,000 jobs last month. December’s rate of gains was up 0.3% from November.

Gov. Kate Brown said in her annual State of the State address that she wants to rebuild from a place of racial and economic equality as Oregon attempts to recover from a year overshadowed by wildfires, violent protests and the pandemic. Rating agencies have said social issues, including how states are addressing income inequality and

S&P Global Ratings lifted its outlook for Detroit to stable from negative ahead of a $175 million general obligation bond sale.Bloomberg News Detroit heads into the bond market in early February with a rating outlook boost as the speculative-grade city makes the case that it is capably managing the fiscal blows of the COVID-19 pandemic.

With a single basis point bump in yields across the municipal curve on Friday, the market readied for the new-issue calendar with the expected arrival of a $1 billion Texas Municipal Gas deal, several taxable and transportation deals, and a $260 million competitive deal from gilt-edged Fairfax County, Virginia. A “perpetual calm” continued to fall

Lumesis has incorporated artificial intelligence to its municipal pricing and scales software in an effort to address limitations of the interpolation and extrapolation methodologies in predicting curve structures that are currently widely used in the market, the firm said. The improvements have been added to the company’s DIVER Pricing and Scales software and is currently

Tax-exempt yields fell one to two basis points Thursday, the first time in a week there was movement in triple-A generic benchmark scales, as the imbalance of supply versus the pent-up demand persisted and Refinitiv Lipper reported another multi-billion week of inflows, the 11th consecutive week of inflows. The Port Authority of New York and

Government officials are responding to a growing call for more ESG disclosure by drafting a best practice document to help issuers provide more information to the market. The Government Finance Officers Association is preparing to release an ESG (Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance) best practice this summer. This would be the first best practice released

Municipal yields were steady throughout the day as the tax-exempt market saw the launch of the retail order period on $868 million of Port Authority of New York and New Jersey revenue bonds, N.J. turnpikes priced and Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th president of the United States. Municipal bond yields on triple-A benchmarks

California’s widening gap between its rich and poor, plus population losses this year, are credit factors and not just from an ESG standpoint, according to S&P Global Rating analysts. California Forward, a think tank, released its California Dream index last week, which it said, confirmed that prosperity was not experienced evenly by all Californians. The

Quiet and unchanged is how municipal traders described the municipal market on Tuesday, as Treasury yields rose slightly and the week got underway ahead of Wednesday’s inauguration. “Tax-exempts remain ultra-rich on a muni/Treasury ratio and spread basis — despite last week’s modest underperformance,” Peter Block, managing director of credit strategy at Ramirez & Co. wrote

The Fitch Group announced its intention Thursday to acquire CreditSights, Inc., a provider of independent credit research. CreditSights and The Fitch Group, which includes Fitch Ratings, announced the deal in a statement and the deal’s terms are not being announced. Consummation is contingent on regulatory approvals and “customary closing conditions,” according to CreditSights. The Fitch

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio’s $92.3 billion fiscal 2022 preliminary budget rollout came with caveats about the levels of federal aid and prospective cuts from the state. The lingering COVID-19 crisis makes them more poignant than past advisories. De Blasio on Thursday said the spending plan, the final one for the term-limited mayor, “demonstrates

Los Angeles lawmakers reached a tentative agreement with a union that represents 3,600 city firefighters Thursday to postpone raises for 18 months amid a pandemic-induced budget gap. The COVID-19 crisis has caused the worst economic downturn Los Angeles has ever faced, decimating city revenues and depleting budget reserves, according to a joint release issued by

The University of Utah is reopening classrooms for the spring 2021 semester.U. of Utah Amid a challenging environment for higher education, the University of Utah is diving into 2021 with $172 million of taxable and tax-exempt bonds. The university is planning to price the new money and refunding debt Jan. 21 through negotiation with book-runner

President-elect Joe Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill would relieve the financial stress on local governments.Bloomberg News Direct federal aid of $350 billion to state and local governments is just one of several ways President-elect Joe Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill would relieve the financial stress on local governments. Biden’s plan to

Federal Reserve Bank of Boston President Eric Rosengren said President-elect Joe Biden’s request for $1.9 trillion in economic relief is needed as growth shows signs of slowing. “It’s a big package, but I think it’s appropriate,” Rosengren said Friday in a CNBC interview. “The economy is in a lull right now, we’ve had a series

Municipals were quiet and remained steady on Friday as U.S. Treasuries dipped slightly following President-elect Joe Biden’s address Thursday night that outlined plans for a $1.9 trillion relief package and the market prepared for a three-day weekend. In his speech, Biden called for a new round of stimulus checks and pandemic control measures. “Everyone was