Midwest

CHICAGO — The Illinois State Toll Highway Authority will enter the market as soon as tomorrow with roughly $400 million of fixed-rate refunding bonds, the first of two sales planned this year to restructure a chunk of the agency’s synthetically fixed-rate debt to reduce bank and liquidity risks.

CHICAGO — Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded nearly $2 billion of outstanding tax-exempt gas prepayment bonds and warned that another $1.9 billion could be cut due to the recent rating downgrade for BP Corporation North America Inc.

CHICAGO — Gov. Pat Quinn yesterday signed legislation that allows Illinois’ nine public universities to issue short-term debt in anticipation of state aid to help the schools manage through the state’s chronic payment delays.

CHICAGO — Ohio-based public finance law firm Peck, Shaffer & Williams LLP has hired a new associate for its Cincinnati office.

CHICAGO — Cook County, Ill., on Wednesday and Thursday will price $1.05 billion of new-money and refunding bonds divided into five series in a transaction that likely marks the last issue under county board president Todd Stroger’s watch.

CHICAGO — Fitch Ratings’ Chicago-based lead Midwestern analyst of tax-supported government credits, Melanie Jopek Shaker, resigned last week to take a newly created position with the fiscally stressed Chicago Public Schools as its deputy chief financial officer.

CHICAGO — For Illinois, Build America Bonds are the gift that keeps on giving despite heightened federal scrutiny, the state’s debt manager said last week.

CHICAGO — Moody’s Investors Service Friday downgraded Illinois’s general obligation debt to A1 from Aa3, saying infighting among the state’s leaders has led to ongoing budget delays, erosion of finances, and a severe pension funding gap.

CHICAGO — Sanitary improvement districts have long been a key infrastructure development tool in Omaha. However, the districts are increasingly distressed amid the region’s lifeless housing market, and many are starting to have trouble paying back the debt they issued at the peak of the housing boom five years ago.

A state court on Wednesday allowed the Wisconsin insurance commissioner to proceed with his plan to allow bond insurer Ambac Assurance Corp. to imminently settle claims owed to major banks on structured finance product transactions.