A review of the first quarter issuance reveals that just under $14 billion (domestic, international, and agency multifamily) was priced over that period. According to Credit Suisse First Boston this is down 23% from the same quarter one year ago. Domestic issuance was down 30% to just $10.4 billion versus $14.9 billion.
Conduit issuance was $5.6 billion, which according to CSFB, is 9% lower than Q1 2001 and 54% than the final quarter of last year. Despite this, conduits made up 54% of the market share of Q1 2002 as single-borrower and trophy asset issuance declined substantially, mainly due to the lack of resolution on terrorism insurance.
Single-borrower transactions totaled $1.7 billion, or 16% of Q1 transaction activity, was only slightly lower than the 14% seen last year. The "other" category of offerings, which includes large loans, brought $1.5 billion in supply, mainly in two agencies deals. This made up 14% of deals in the quarter, far less than the 36% share posted last year.
These figures have CSFB comfortable with their estimate of $55 billion in domestic issuance for the entire year. Looking at the near term, conduits from Bank of America, JPMorgan and CSFB are expected to bring $3.1 billion April, with an additional $2.4 billion across a pair of floating-rate issues and two "other" transactions.
A $685 million floater from Salomon Smith Barney and CDC Capital is currently in the early stages of premarketing. The issue, backed by 13 loans on 60 properties, consists mainly of retail and office assets and is being comanaged by Lehman and Morgan Stanley. See the scorecard for this transaction near the back of this issue.
