Bonds

The Municipal Bonds for America coalition is pressing the importance of key legislative issues affecting the world of public finance onto the docket of the powerful House Committee on Ways and Means.    “We did some meetings up on the Hill earlier this summer, almost simultaneously as when Ways and Means majority leadership announced their tax

Moody’s Ratings revised the outlook on New Mexico’s Aa2 rating to positive from stable, while downgrading ratings on certain state transportation and severance tax bonds in the wake of a methodology update review.  The positive outlook, which affects $521 million of outstanding general obligation bonds, reflects Moody’s view “the state’s strong financial position, reflected in

Siebert Williams Shank has hired five senior and junior public finance professionals across the country, with the intention of expanding the firm’s footprint. Their responsibilities will include transaction execution, client relationship management, and quantitative analysis. Two will be based in Siebert’s New York City office, two in its Oakland, California, office, and one in its

The municipal bond market will be showered this week with nearly $2 billion of triple-A-rated debt from water agencies in Southwest states facing drought and other climate issues. The Texas Water Development Board tops the week’s issuance calendar with $1.6 billion of State Water Implementation Revenue Fund for Texas master trust bonds to finance local

The New York Power Authority offered green revenue bonds to retail investors Monday, fresh on the heels of ratings upgrades from Moody’s Ratings and KBRA. The Power Authority is bringing $404.375 million of green revenue bonds to market this week, starting with $104 million offered to retail investors Monday. While pricing details were not yet

Enjoy complimentary access to top ideas and insights — selected by our editors. Between the anticipated departure of the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia and shifting spending priorities from the Senate Banking Committee, the past few months in the bond markets have been full of regulatory shifts — and the upcoming presidential

Municipals were steady to start the week while the focus moved to the hefty primary slate as several deals priced bonds for retail to good demand. U.S. Treasuries were slightly weaker and equities closed the session in the black. The two-year muni-to-Treasury ratio Monday was at 64%, the three-year at 66%, the five-year at 66%,

The Los Angeles Unified School District plans to come to market Wednesday with $1.1 billion of general obligation bonds designated as sustainable. Lead manager RBC Capital Markets is scheduled to price the bonds Wednesday after a retail order period Tuesday. The debt will enter a market influenced by the Federal Open Market Committee’s decision last

Climate change will sap 18.3% of Puerto Rico’s economic activity unless it takes substantial steps to adapt to expected changing weather and environment, a study says. Without these steps Puerto Rico will lose $379.3 billion in gross domestic product it otherwise would have had from 2021 through 2050, according to a study released last week

The House last week passed a package of bills aimed at curbing the use of environmental, social and governance factors in retirement investment decisions and limiting Securities and Exchange Commission climate-related disclosure rules. The bills were part of what the GOP dubbed an “anti-woke week” on the Hill. The legislation has little chance of advancing

Ann Kaplan, a social worker, was deep into her studies for a Ph.D. in sociomedical sciences when fate intervened. She accidentally left the voluminous notes for her dissertation in the back of a New York City taxi. Shock and disappointment eventually gave way to the realization that she hadn’t been that happy on her career

Moody’s Ratings upgraded Virginia’s Hampton Roads Transportation Accountability Commission bonds and loans this week as part of the agency’s new states and territories methodology. It upgraded the senior lien revenue bonds to Aa1 from Aa2 and intermediate lien notes and subordinate lien loans to Aa2 from Aa3. It assigned the rating of Aa1 to the

Enjoy complimentary access to top ideas and insights — selected by our editors. Career moves are still heating up even as the fourth quarter approaches, and the industry gets more settled following Citi’s exit from the municipal bond market and UBS’s exit from the negotiated underwriting business at the end of 2023.  Chicago Transit Authority

The Utah Inland Port Authority (UIPA) is the target of a lawsuit filed by environmental groups seeking to reverse decisions by its board since state lawmakers restructured its leadership in 2022 after the agency’s only bond issuance. The litigation, filed in Salt Lake County District Court Thursday against the authority, as well as Utah Gov.

First Eagle’s high-yield municipal team, led since January by former Nuveen portfolio manager John Miller, continues its trend of hiring from Miller’s former shop with two Nuveen veterans and one from Lord Abbett. Douglas Johnston, who has been at Nuveen for 25 years, and Ryan Rosberg, at Nuveen for 18 years, will join First Eagle

The Securities and Exchange Commission has approved amendments to Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board Rule G-14 on customer transaction reporting, shortening the time of trade window to one minute from 15 minutes and kicking off the initial opt-in period, though a formal compliance date has yet to be set. The board first requested comment on the

BlackRock will convert its $1.7 billion BlackRock High Yield Municipal Bond Fund to an active exchange-traded fund, the latest example of shifting investor demand from mutual funds to ETFs. “Active ETFs are becoming an integral part of investor portfolios around the world, with financial advisors increasingly incorporating them into their models-based practice,” said a BlackRock spokesperson.

The enthusiasm of Buffalo Bills fans is well-known. Erie County wants to see how much that enthusiasm is worth. The county will price $110 million of general obligation bonds for a new Bills stadium this week, with a heavily publicized retail order period. The results will test whether the fans known for pre-game table-smashing contests

Enjoy complimentary access to top ideas and insights — selected by our editors. The top five bond financings in the ranking came in at more than $8 billion. The top 20 bond financings have a cumulative amount of more than $20 billion. Total issuance in August hit a record at nearly $50 billion. Scroll through

Tampa, Florida’s sales and utility tax bonds were upgraded to Aa1 from Aa3 by Moody’s Ratings and the outlook is stable. The upgrade affects Series 2016 and 2020 sales tax refunding and improvement bonds and Series 2012A and C utilities tax and Series 2010A & B utility tax revenue bonds. “That’s great news, and it

Despite the pressure on U.S. Treasuries this week following the Federal Reserve’s 50 basis point rate cut, municipals closed out the week on track to post positive returns for the fourth consecutive month, the first time since 2021. Triple-A municipal yield curves were lightly traded and little changed while Treasuries saw small improvements for the