U.S. issuers have engaged Standard & Poor’s to rate 35 collateralized loan obligations totaling $16.5 billion as of July 3, flat to the previous week.
The most recent S&P-rated deal to price, the $542 million Ares Enhanced Loan Investment Strategy IR, brought issuance for the year to date to $43 billion. That deal refinanced a 2008-vintage CLO. The issuer split the class A-1 into 2 pieces, one with a fixed coupon of Libor plus 125 basis points and one at Libor plus 100 basis points with a step-up feature.
S&P is still forecasting that full-year issuance will reach $65 billion.
The agency placed ratings on 72 tranches from 15 U.S. CLOs under review for a possible upgrade. The affected tranches had an original balance of $5.5 billion. “The transactions continue to benefit from deleveraging and have exited reinvestment periods,” it said in research published Sunday.
The total number of classes on watch positive is more than 120.
