Markets

A year ago, Fitch Ratings had a negative outlook on states, but now it has a stable outlook for the coming year.

After 16 years as a municipal research analyst on the buy side of the market, Tom Weyl, vice president and director of research at Eaton Vance Management in Boston, will start the new year off with a new career on the sell side.

Bond buyers place more weight on Moody's Investors Service ratings than on Standard & Poor's ratings, according to a recent Loop Capital Markets study.

With trading active on much of bankrupt American Airlines' $3.2 billion of special facilities revenue bonds, some market participants are sounding a cautionary tone in assessing their value, as bargain hunters eye the airline's discounted bonds secured by collateral.

A Puerto Rico infrastructure financing and a Detroit water revenue sale will lead the activity in the primary market this week as volume is expected to dip slightly from last week.

Reinvestment cash jolted the municipal bond market into life this past week.

In their largest one-week move so far this year, tax-exempt money market funds gained a stunning 1.9%, or $5.27 billion, from last week, bringing assets in the week ended Dec. 5 to $289.94 billion, according to the Money Fund Report, a service of iMoneyNet.com.

For online vendors, this year's record sales for Cyber Monday may have been like Santa arriving early, but for states and municipalities that collect sales taxes, it was more like getting a lump of coal in their Christmas stockings.

Following last week's post-Thanksgiving feast, the municipal market will continue to usher in December with an equally hearty slate of primary market deals. Yields remained mostly firm on Friday as investors clamored for high-quality paper in the scarce secondary.