Markets

The Bond Buyer's weekly yield indexes declined this week, as tax-exempt yields fell in all but one of the week's sessions.

Topping last week's haul of nearly $10 billion, tax-free money market funds raked in $11.9 billion, setting a record high of $511.5 billion in total assets for the week ending May 12, according to the Money Fund Report, a service of iMoneynet.com of Westborough, Mass.

Implementation of a unified global rating scale for both municipal and corporate bonds is unlikely to have a significant market impact, municipal bond investors say.

Weekly reporting municipal bond mutual funds had a net inflow of $881 million during the period ending May 7, AMG Data Services reported.

Except for two large school financings in Nevada and Florida to hold investors' attention this week, there will be a lull in primary market activity as new-issue volume declines by just over $1 billion from last week's total, continuing May's slow start.

The Bond Buyer's weekly yield indexes were mixed this week as market participants focused on new issues.

Tax-free money market funds gained nearly $10 billion during the week ending May 5, recouping twice the $5 billion-plus they lost in the previous week, according to the Money Fund Report, a service of Westborough, Mass.-based imoneynet.com.

Weekly reporting municipal bond mutual funds had a net inflow of $478 million during the period ending April 30, AMG Data Services reported.

While April ended with record-high volume of $43.8 billion, May is starting out on a sluggish note with new issuance expected to decline significantly from last week.

In the supermarket of investment products, municipal exchange-traded funds are a relatively new brand label, but have been steadily gaining attention and experiencing noticeable growth of assets and trading volume since their debut in fall 2007 at the start of the credit crisis.