Bonds

Munis were slightly firmer in light secondary trading to start the week, while U.S. Treasuries were weaker and equities ended the trading session up. The two-year muni-to-Treasury ratio Monday was at 69%, the three-year at 69%, the five-year at 70%, the 10-year at 71% and the 30-year at 90%, according to Refinitiv Municipal Market Data’s

The Biden administration Monday announced $16.4 billion for dozens of infrastructure projects aimed at improving train times and efficiency across Amtrak’s Northeast rail corridor. Biden is set to highlight the investment today during a speech in Delaware. The largest grant, totaling $4.7 billion, goes to Maryland to replace the 150-year-old Baltimore and Potomac Tunnel, considered

Municipals rallied Friday across the curve sending triple-A yields lower by as much as 13 basis points as they continued to play catch up to the moves in U.S. Treasuries, which also saw more gains after a weaker jobs report further signaled Fed rate hikes may be done. Equities closed the week in the black.

Two major offshore wind projects in New Jersey got the ax as their developer, Danish energy company Ørsted, reassesses its U.S. portfolio citing sustained inflation and rising construction costs. Mads Nipper, Group President and CEO of Ørsted, on Tuesday said the company was “extremely disappointed” to cancel Ocean Wind 1 and 2, a pair of offshore wind

The notion of channeling federal dollars devoted to infrastructure improvement into affordable housing including office conversions located near mass transit is picking up steam. Quantifying the possibilities and costs offered by the concept remains elusive but recent research is revealing new possibilities.  “We end up concluding something on the order of 10% of the existing

Washington is banking on its high credit ratings and strong demand on previous sales as it heads to market Tuesday with a $483 million competitive refunding.  The bonds will be auctioned in two series: $296.550 million various purpose general obligation refunding bonds, Series R-2024A and $186.225 million motor vehicle fuel tax and vehicle-related fees GO

States would suffer deep cuts in water infrastructure funding they receive through state revolving funds, which make up a significant corner of the municipal bond market, under a bill passed Friday by the U.S. House of Representatives. The fiscal 2024 Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations measure, House Bill 4821, totals $37.4

While municipal bond issuance has dropped precipitously the past two years amid volatile markets, environmental, social and governance debt has steadily grown despite issuer hesitation to designate it as such and an ever-more acrimonious political environment emerges over it. ESG issuance for the first three quarters of 2023 was at $27.970 billion, potentially on pace

A Pennsylvania company that operates three nursing homes is in default, and it’s a familiar story: staff shortages and a large slump in occupancy in the aftermath of the pandemic. Senior Choice Inc. failed to make interest and principal payments due Oct. 31 on its $15.9 million bond issued in 2006 by the Cambria County

Municipals were firmer Wednesday but underperformed a U.S. Treasury rally after the Fed held rates steady. Equities rallied as well. The municipal market was up “a touch” after the Fed announced it would keep rates unchanged at their November meeting, according to Michael Pietronico, chief executive officer at Miller Tabak Asset Management. Commenting on the

Quickly rising demand for energy in Georgia has left a major state power provider searching for additional sources of electricity to meet growing near-term needs, all while keeping in mind carbon-zero commitments. Just a little over a year after Georgia Power released its Integrated Resources Plan, a blueprint for meeting power demand through 2030 and

For train enthusiasts and municipal investors alike, the September opening of the Florida Brightline train expansion to Orlando marked a key goal for the long-term success of the nation’s only privately financed, intercity express passenger train and one of the largest speculative project finance deals in the municipal market. The extension was also celebrated by

Municipal bond delinquencies declined in the third quarter, despite some dramatic outliers including Mercy Hospital’s bankruptcy filing in Iowa, and some unrated affordable housing and senior living bonds, Moody’s Investors Service said. There were only three new municipal bond defaults in the third quarter, compared to nine in the second quarter, Moody’s analysts wrote. Two

Illinois and Wall Street banks accused of rigging interest rates on the state’s variable-rate debt have reached a final deal after the state and the whistleblower who brought the case agreed to smaller payments to resolve a dispute over attorney fees. The deal calls for the group of eight banks to pay $70 million to

Overdue and over budget, a project to redevelop Connecticut’s New London Pier into an offshore wind energy hub for projects along the Atlantic coast is nearly complete. Its first shipments, components for a project in the Long Island Sound, are set to leave port early Tuesday. Launched in 2020 with an original price tag of

Analysts are certain the Federal Open Market Committee will not increase rates at the meeting that ends Wednesday, but the December meeting is still in play for the last 25 basis point rate hike that was predicted by the panel’s Summary of Economic Projections. The final 2023 meeting remains in play, according to Tony Welch,

New York City has received a boost of state support as it seeks to head off a worsening affordable housing crisis, including an increase in the bonding capacity of the New York City Housing Development Corp. Gov. Kathy Hochul this week signed into law a trio of bills passed by New York’s Legislature leveraging state

Municipals were steady Friday ahead of an expected paltry new-issue calendar. U.S. Treasuries were firmer 10 years and in and equities were mixed after a volatile week of market-moving economic data and increasing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East while all markets await the Federal Open Market Committee’s November meeting. “Any chance of a dovish

A new stream of federal funding may find its way into office conversions and other efforts designed to boost the nation’s housing supply, and public finance officers are eyeing a renewed effort to finance homebuilding with new rules on Community Development Block Grants and the freeing up of federally-owned land.  The new efforts were officially

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board has approved its first fees under its new rate card model, which helps the board respond to market pressures and adjust yearly rates accordingly, and expects to file those changes with the Securities and Exchange Commission within a month’s time. Of the four fees the board collects from regulated entities,

Market data platform SOLVE has introduced a public finance workflow solution that shows historical scales for all muni deals, allowing for spread comparisons of where a deal priced in the past to where it might price in current market conditions. The firm’s clients wanted a tool to deliver deal-based spreads on their terms, said Gregg