Got some articles recommended regarding to the municipal bond/debts (munis) in the USA
Munis Underperform Treasuries as Default Speculation Mounts
[size=1.4em]June 30 (Bloomberg) -- Municipal bonds underperformed U.S. Treasuries in the first half as default speculation drove state and local government yields to the highest level relative to government bonds in 13 months.
[size=1.4em]Ten-year municipal bond yields rose to 100 percent of Treasuries for the first time since May 2009, from 80 percent six months ago, according to Municipal Market Advisors data. Investors bought Treasuries, pushing two-year yields to a record low this week, on signs of slowing global economic growth and amid protests in Europe over austerity measures.
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The cost of contracts insuring against losses in municipal bonds almost doubled in the past two months, led by Illinois. Greece and Spain led a surge in the cost of protecting sovereign debt.
[size=1.4em]“The Treasury market rallied its brains out,” said Brian Battle, vice president of trading for Performance Trust Capital, a Chicago-based institutional portfolio adviser. “Munis haven’t followed as much.”
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Financial pressure on states and municipalities has built as revenue fell in the wake of the recession. More than two- thirds of states had a drop in revenue last quarter over the same period in 2009, the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government said this month. States will have confronted $296.6 billion of budget deficits from 2009 to 2012, the National Governors Association and National Association of State Budget Officers said.
[size=1.4em]Pennsylvania Capital
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Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, capital of the sixth most- populous U.S. state, has considered filing for bankruptcy protection in the face of $68 million in debt payments tied to an incinerator project.
[size=1.4em]Illinois, whose $13 billion deficit is about half its budget, had the cost of insuring its debt against default more than double since early April, to a record of 370 basis points, or $370,000 to protect $10 million of debt, according to CMA DataVision. A basis point is 0.01 percentage point.
[size=1.4em]“You’ve gotten a lot of negative press about municipal bonds,” said J.R. Rieger, vice president of fixed-income indexes at S&P in New York. “Yields have been driven down on U.S. Treasury bonds due to a flight to quality.”
[size=1.4em]Investors in the $2.8 trillion municipal-bond market on average earned 3.13 percent this year through June 28, compared with about 7.3 percent in the same period of 2009, according to S&P’s Investortools Municipal Bond Main Index. Treasuries brought in about 5 percent, according to S&P. Corporate bonds returned 5.8 percent, Credit Suisse’s Liquid U.S. Corporate Bond Index shows.
[size=1.4em]Default Ratio
[size=1.4em]Municipal investors may be worrying unduly given the debt’s low default ratio relative to other asset classes, said Battle at Performance Trust and Jim Colby, a senior municipal strategist for New York-based Van Eck Associates, which has about $515 million of municipal bonds.
Companies are 98 times more likely to default than muni issuers over a 10-year period, data from Moody’s Investors Service show.
[size=1.4em]The volume of municipal defaults has also declined. Nineteen issuers have defaulted on about $1 billion of municipal debt this year, the Distressed Debt Securities Newsletter reported in its June issue. In the two previous years a combined $14.5 billion defaulted, a rate of $3.6 billion every six months.
[size=1.4em]There is a limit to how much municipal yields will fall as Treasury yields decline, said Matt Fabian, a managing director at Concord, Massachusetts-based MMA.
[size=1.4em]Ten-year top-rated municipal bonds yield 3.08 percent, or about 60 basis points below their five-year average, according to MMA data.
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“Must municipal buyers are income buyers, and if there is no income, there are no buyers,” said Fabian. “Yields can’t go much lower.”
[size=1.4em]Following are descriptions of pending sales of municipal debt in the U.S.:
[size=1.4em]DELAWARE RIVER PORT AUTHORITY, the regional transportation agency that owns and operates four toll bridges linking Pennsylvania and New Jersey, plans to offer $320 million in Build America Bonds tomorrow to finance capital improvements. The bonds, rated fourth-lowest at A3 and A- by Moody’s and S&P, respectively, will be used for capital-improvement projects and to refinance debt. Citigroup Inc. will lead a group of underwriters in marketing the securities. (Updated June 30)
[size=1.4em]LOS ANGELES COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTRICT, the nation’s largest two-year system, with about 141,000 students, is scheduled to offer $125 million in taxable bonds today. The district is rated second highest at Aa1 by Moody’s and one step lower, at AA, by S&P. Citigroup will lead marketing of the securities, which will be used for improvements on the district’s nine campuses, including a green-technology student union at Los Angeles City College and a performing-arts center at Los Angeles Valley College. (Updated June 30)
[size=1.4em]NEW YORK LIBERTY DEVELOPMENT CORP., a state arm created to finance loans for lower Manhattan construction, will sell $650 million in tax-exempt municipal bonds today to refinance debt from the Bank of America Tower project at One Bryant Park. Bank of America Merrill Lynch and JPMorgan Chase & Co. will underwrite the securities, which are top-rated by Fitch and Moody’s. (Updated June 30)
[size=1.4em]U.S. VIRGIN ISLANDS, whose rum shipments to the mainland in 2009 reached 8 million “proof gallons,” a measure for calculating federal excise tax, plans to offer about $396 million of tax-exempt debt through its public finance authority as soon as next week. About $308 million of the issue is senior obligations rated BBB+ by Fitch, third-lowest. The remaining subordinate bonds are rated BBB, second-lowest. Underwriters led by Jefferies & Co. will market the securities to investors. (Added June 30)
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