Healthcare industry

CHICAGO - New York City-based Cain Brothers & Co. is extending its Midwestern reach with the opening of a new St. Louis office that will house former Wachovia Securities LLC health care bankers Joseph Mulligan and Sara Kisner.

CHICAGO - The Wisconsin Health and Educational Facilities Authority yesterday approved three transactions tied to borrowers' efforts to exit the auction-rate market. They include a $152 million deal from Children's Hospital and Health System of Wisconsin Inc. that will mark the second use in the tax-exempt market of a floating-rate structure promoted by Goldman, Sachs & Co.

DALLAS - The Texas Public Finance Authority will give investors a chance to grab some of its general obligation debt this week as the agency issues $225 million of bonds for refunding and new money.

New York issuers will dominate the new-issue activity this week as both the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority and the New York City Municipal Water Finance Authority come to the primary market amid an anticipated slate of $7.5 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.

CHICAGO - Flint, Mich.-based McLaren Health Care Corp. will enter the market tomorrow with $204 million of fixed-rate revenue bonds in the first of two series that together will refinance all the system's so-called indexed put bonds as well as a portion of debt taken on with a pair of recent acquisitions.

ATLANTA - North Carolina lawmakers have approved a roughly $22 billion budget for the 2008-09 fiscal year, which includes almost $900 million of borrowing.

CHICAGO - A gaming expansion bill - one of three funding sources for a $34 billion capital budget - failed during a special session of the Illinois House yesterday, one day after Gov. Rod Blagojevich sought to pressure lawmakers to pass the plan by vetoing $1.4 billion in spending from the fiscal 2009 operating budget.

CHICAGO -Fitch Ratings this week revised to negative its outlook on the U.S. health insurance and managed care sector.

CHICAGO - The University of Toledo will enter the market today with roughly $35 million of fixed-rate general receipts bonds in the first of two series that will refund recent notes used to take out all the system's insured variable-rate demand bonds.

The South Carolina Jobs-Economic Development Authority is readying a $19 million deal for the Kershaw County Medical Center.

The Adventist Health System-Sunbelt Obligated Group on Monday won a trio of rating upgrades from Moody’s Investors Service in conjunction with the conversion or addition of letters of credit from SunTrust Bank on three series of bonds.

BRADENTON, Fla. - A Tampa-based real estate broker specializing in the sale of senior housing communities has a new niche: the sale of distressed senior housing financed with tax-exempt bonds.

Fitch Ratings and Standard & Poor’s last week downgraded their long-term ratings on BRCH Corp. Obligated Group, an acute-care hospital with 400 licensed beds in Boca Raton.

CHICAGO - The Illinois Finance Authority board yesterday advanced borrowing plans totaling $500 million for health care facilities in the state, including up to $350 million for Northwest Community Hospital to finance a new patient tower and other projects and to refund existing debt.

Standard & Poor’s last week revised the outlook to stable from negative on Morris Hospital and Healthcare Centers’ BBB-plus rating on $11 million of debt.

DALLAS - Integris Health will reduce its level of variable-rate demand debt with next week's negotiated sale of $222.7 million of fixed-rate hospital system revenue and refunding bonds by Oklahoma Development Finance Authority.

CHICAGO - Fitch Ratings last week placed West Bend, Wis.-based SynergyHealthInc.'s BBB-minus credit on rating watch for an upgrade in recognition of its newly minted affiliation with the stronger-rated Froedtert & Community HealthInc. system, based in Wauwatosa.

The New York Department of Health last week announced that it has amended the operating certificates of 18 health care facilities for failing to comply with the mandates of the Commission on Health Care Facilities in the 21st Century.

DALLAS - A revised business plan for a proposed new medical center in New Orleans supports construction of the $1.2 billion facility, but indicates that the Louisiana Legislature will have to provide financial support to the bond-financed project.

CHICAGO - Joliet, Ill.-based Silver Cross Hospital and Medical Centerwon state regulatory approval this week to build a nearly $400 million replacement hospital a few miles from its current location while consideration of Edward Hospital's proposed new facility was again postponed by the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board.