Banco Popular de Puerto Rico

Dramatic Fed intervention may steady some markets, but unless something changes — and, judging by the last two weeks, it very well could — the central bank won’t be there to save fallen angels. Which brave investors will step up?

Hedge funds are making headlines daily with plans to capitalize on this rapid shift in the outlook, contending the market presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity

Speculative-grade borrowers are different because they made a conscious choice to take on more debt in the hopes of generating bigger returns for equity holders. They did this even though they knew it would make them more vulnerable in an economic downturn.

There’s no reason to punish companies for failing to see a history-changing, once-in-a-century pandemic, or anticipate the shutdowns that would result.

Unlike public equities and even high-yield bonds, funds focused on CLO equity show little evidence of rebounding anytime soon from steep losses in total value.

There are any number of reasons to fret about America’s recovery from the coronavirus crisis. A repeat financial collapse at the hands of a structured product with a similar sounding acronym isn’t one of them.

Franchise businesses looked like a safe bet for whole-business securitization bonds before the pandemic made gyms, dine-in restaurants and massages a riskier setting.

Investors shouldn’t assume anything about the behavior of speculative-grade debt in this environment.

An emergency expansion of federal rental assistance would cost between $12 billion and $16 billion a month, depending on whether enhanced unemployment benefits are extended alongside. That is a bargain in comparison with the $2.2 trillion price of the last coronavirus relief package.

The debut fund chose an unmistakable ticker (AAA) to market the relative safety of the CLO that is often unfairly attributed with the risks of the pre-crisis CDO.