Activity in the primary market is winding down on Thursday as a last few big deals head to the market before traders turn their eyes to next week's slate.
Secondary Market
U.S. Treasuries were little changed on Thursday. The yield on the two-year dipped to 1.24% from 1.25% on Wednesday, while the 10-year Treasury yield was unchanged from 2.39%, and the yield on the 30-year Treasury bond decreased to 3.00% from 3.01%.
Top-rated municipal bonds finished stronger on Wednesday. The yield on the 10-year benchmark muni general obligation on Wednesday fell three basis points to 2.30% from 2.33% on Tuesday, while the 30-year GO yield dropped three basis points to 3.10% from 3.13%, according to the final read of Municipal Market Data's triple-A scale.
On Wednesday, the 10-year muni to Treasury ratio was calculated at 96.1% compared with 95.8% on Tuesday, while the 30-year muni to Treasury ratio stood at 103.0%, versus 102.6%, according to MMD.
MSRB: Previous Session's Activity
The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board reported 43,803 trades on Wednesday on volume of $16.06 billion.
Primary Market
Traders will be eyeing next week's supply as this week's new issue activity winds down.
On Thursday, the North Texas Municipal Water District is competitively selling $112.26 of bonds in two separate offerings.
The sales consist of $74.94 million of Series 2017 regional wastewater system revenue bonds, rated Aa2 by Moody's and AAA by S&P, and $37.32 million of Series 2017 contract revenue bonds for the Upper East Fork wastewater interceptor system, rated Aa1 by Moody's and AAA by S&P.
Since 2007, the district has sold about $2.5 billion of bonds, with the most issuance occurring in 2016 when it offered $514.7 million of debt. It did not come to market in 2011 and only issued $27.9 million of securities in 2013.
Piper Jaffray received the award on the Palomar Community College District, Calif.'s $139 million of Series 2017D general obligation bonds.
The issue was priced as 4s to yield 0.91% in 2018 and 1.09% in 2019 and as 5s to yield from 1.72% in 2022 to 2.99% in 2032; a 2045 maturity was priced as 5 1/4s to yield 3.25% and a 2046 maturity was priced as 4s to yield 3.82%. The deal is rated Aa1 by Moody's and AA by S&P.
Several deals of interest are already on the calendar for the upcoming week, including the Golden State Tobacco Securitization Corp.'s $619 million of asset backed bonds to be priced by Jefferies and the New Jersey Turnpike Authority's $525 million of revenue bonds to be priced by Goldman.
Bond Buyer Visible Supply
The Bond Buyer's 30-day visible supply calendar decreased $2.21 billion to $7.45 billion on Thursday. The total is comprised of $3.30 billion of competitive sales and $4.15 billion of negotiated deals.
Tax-Exempt Money Market Fund Inflows
Tax-exempt money market funds experienced inflows of $18.1 million, bringing total net assets to $131.10 billion in the week ended March 20, according to The Money Fund Report, a service of iMoneyNet.com. This followed an inflow of $90.9 billion to $131.08 billion in the previous week.
The average, seven-day simple yield for the 232 weekly reporting tax-exempt funds was jumped to 0.25% from 0.20% in the previous week.
The total net assets of the 861 weekly reporting taxable money funds decreased $25.78 billion to $2.495 trillion in the week ended March 21, after an outflow of $4.95 billion to $2.521 trillion the week before.
The average, seven-day simple yield for the taxable money funds spiked to 0.36% from0.29% in the prior week.
Overall, the combined total net assets of the 1,091 weekly reporting money funds fell $25.75 billion to $2.626 trillion in the week ended March 21, after outflows of $4.86 billion to $2.652 trillion in the prior week.
