junk bonds Archives - the patient investor

February 28, 2013

Analysis: Bond managers fret junk bond rally is losing steam | Reuters

Jennifer Ablan and Sam Forgione at Reuters explain why Dan Fuss, vice chairman and portfolio manager at Loomis Sayles, which oversees $182 billion in assets, is slashing exposure to high-yield bonds:

Fuss and others worry the Fed’s easy money policy – short-term interest rates held at effectively zero and a bond-buying program known as quantitative easing – will soon foster inflation, a bond manager’s biggest fear. That would drive up interest rates, so bond prices, which move in the opposite direction to rates, would fall.

February 12, 2013

A credit vigilante arrives at the Fed | Gavyn Davies

Gavyn Davies at FT writes:

[Fed Governor, Professor Jeremy Stein] argues that the credit markets have recently been “reaching for yield”, much as they did prior to the financial crash. Although not yet as dangerous as in the period from 2004-2007, this behaviour is shown by the rapid expansion of the junk bond market, flows into high-yield mutual funds and real estate investment trusts and the duration of bond portfolios held by banks……. he indicates that the right weapon to deal with this might well be to raise interest rates, rather than relying solely on regulatory and other prudential policy to control the process. This would obviously come as a big surprise to the markets, which have tended to view the Fed’s stated concerns about the “costs of QE” as so much hot air……