Mayo Clinic's $290 Million Sale Leads Anemic Calendar

In one of the skimpiest new-issue weeks so far this year, the municipal market will see only an estimated $1.43 billion of new bonds, according to Ipreo LLC and The Bond Buyer.

That’s barely half of the $2.48 billion that was priced last week, according to Thomson Reuters.

The largest deal on the long-term negotiated calendar this week is a $290 million Rochester, Minn., hospital revenue deal on behalf of the Mayo Clinic.

The deal is rated Aa2 by Moody’s Investors Service and AA by Standard & Poor’s. It is slated to be priced by Bank of America Merrill Lynch on Wednesday.

The Indiana Finance Authority will sell $228.18 million of Series 2011 hospital revenue bonds on Monday in a five-pronged offering for the Indiana University Health Obligated Group.

The variable-rate deal is rated F1-plus by Fitch Ratings. Proceeds will finance improvements at facilities operated by the obligated group and currently refund outstanding 2008 bonds.

The Series 2011 A, B, C, and D bonds mature in 2033, while the Series 2011 E bonds mature in 2036. The bonds will bear interest at a weekly interest rate and may be converted to other interest-rate periods in accordance with the terms of the applicable indenture, according to the preliminary official statement.

Indiana University Health changed its name from Clarian Health Partners Inc. on Jan. 24.

After the light slate, the market could get a shot in the arm next week.

Chicago is slated to sell $1 billion of general airport revenue bonds on behalf of O’Hare International Airport.

The New York Liberty Development Corp. could move forward with remarketing $2.6 billion of bonds to help finance the construction of Tower 4 at the World Trade Center. Goldman, Sachs & Co. said the deal’s timing is still to be determined.

The corporation, a subsidiary of the Empire State Development Corp., is trying to sell the bonds on behalf of Silverstein Properties Inc., the developer of Tower 4 and other buildings at the site.

The deal consists of $1.27 billion of Series 2009 A1 bonds and $1.3 billion of Series 2009 A2 bonds, all of which have a 2049 maturity.

Due to poor market conditions last week, officials last Monday pulled $900 million of fixed-rated Liberty bonds originally set for the following Wednesday as the municipal market rebounded and prices rose on the heels of a Treasury rally.

It is the second time that the Liberty bond deal has been postponed due to the tenuous state of the municipal market. The transaction had been on hold since December, when officials delayed what was then an all fixed-rate deal as interest rates rose.

Back in Chicago, Citi is the book-running senior manager and Siebert Brandford Shank & Co. is co-senior on the O’Hare deal, which will finance projects under an ongoing $8 billion runway expansion program. It is slated for pricing the week of April 25, according to an underwriting source at Citi.

Fitch affirmed the A-minus third-lien GARB rating and upgraded the passenger facility charge credit rating to A from A-minus following the city’s decision last month to shift the structure on most of the upcoming transaction to GARBs from PFC bonds in order to ease the growing strain on coverage ratios for O’Hare’s PFC credit.

O’Hare has $5.58 billion of third-lien GARBs outstanding.

By comparison, a $1.22 billion deal from the North Texas Tollway Authority was last week’s largest offering.

The larger portion was $874 million of special project system revenue bonds priced by Citi for retail investors on Wednesday, with an official pricing for institutions on Thursday. The bonds are rated AA by Standard & Poor’s and AA-minus by Fitch.

The authority also sold $351 million of taxable bond anticipation notes on Wednesday for retail investors and on Thursday for institutions.

For reprint and licensing requests for this article, click here.
Buy side
MORE FROM BOND BUYER